This is embarassing.
My Mormon friend and I do a lot of "lunchtime bible discussions" and today he asked..."what's the timeline between Adam and Noah? How many generations...how many years....?
Well, with confidence I pulled out bibical people...pulled up Adam...and all it showed was about 3 generations....
Then he asked...what about the other kids...? So after some fumbling I clicked on each of Adams sons to try and trace the lineage to Noah...
Anyway...what I REALLY was looking for was a "bible-lifespan" timeline.....that would have been really easy...and quick.
I didn't even have an easy "go to" resource to give the answer....how embarassing....
Robert Pavich
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I did a search of my library for "adam AND noah AND generations" and the Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary came up with a good chart
Volume 1, Page 1003 (my Mac wont give a direct hyperlink yet, so here is the volume / page number)
The problem is that this is not easy to do. (warning I am about to insert some personal opinion).
We know from several of the genealogies that there are gaps - in other words you have listed the most significant ancestors, not always all of them. You notice that they are rounded to nice even numbers (life normally isn't that neat:-).
It has been a few years since I studied this one out, however I do remember discovering that there are some genealogies that leave out a lot of time. The opinions of experts I read felt that the genealogies were compressed anywhere from 10 - 90 percent.
From this info I formed the opinion that the genealogies are to show lineage and not to measure exact lengths of time.
I know you are not looking for an answer, but a resource. I agree a bible lifespan timeline would be very nice to have.
I found the answers below online. But I would of guessed 14, just based on Matthew 1:17. 17 So all the generations from Abraham to David were fourteen generations, and from David to the deportation to Babylon fourteen generations, and from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ fourteen generations.
But I think Noah to Abraham is 10 also. Interesting that it went 10, 10, 14, 14, 14, and was not consistent at 10 or 14. Is there a dispensationalist in the house that can explain this?
Michael Birney:Is there a dispensationalist in the house that can explain this?
Come now, we aren't supposed to provoke theological debates . This is issue is further complicated by the fact that is relatively common for ancient genealogies to skip generations and only include the "important people" so there could be more distance between Adam and Noah than simply adding up the years.
Prov. 15:23
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Kevin Becker:Come now, we aren't supposed to provoke theological debates . This is issue is further complicated by the fact that is relatively common for ancient genealogies to skip generations and only include the "important people" so there could be more distance between Adam and Noah than simply adding up the years.
Thanks Kevin, you beat me too it, but only because I used L4 to look up Bishop Ussher so that I could stay within the forum guidelines. BTW, I always heard them called "Gap Genealogies".
I was not "promoting," just playing - there was a big ol happy face there - kind of like yours I see. But I did find the 10,10,14,14,14 thing pretty interesting, maybe enough to do a little more study on my own. Now if I can just find a biblical people timeline to get started .....
Kevin Becker: Michael Birney:Is there a dispensationalist in the house that can explain this? Come now, we aren't supposed to provoke theological debates . This is issue is further complicated by the fact that is relatively common for ancient genealogies to skip generations and only include the "important people" so there could be more distance between Adam and Noah than simply adding up the years.
Michael Birney:But I did find the 10,10,14,14,14 thing pretty interesting
Are there any books on biblical numerology in the base packages?
thanks everyone, I knew that there would be some issues with this but my point was not an exact count but a lack of "timeline like" resources.
Even if there were gaps that said "we really don't know this section" or whatever...a general idea, along with the "family tree" would have been nice...
As it was....the biblical people was more confusing than enlightening....a longer "tree" would have helped....
If you want a literal timeline from Genesis see
http://www.clark-tx.net/wikis/scV3/tiki-index.php?page=Genesis+Timeline
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Robert Pavich:Well, with confidence I pulled out bibical people...pulled up Adam...and all it showed was about 3 generations....
Bob,
The information is in Biblical people (though not including a discussion/mention of genealogical gaps), but it's not immediately evident. If you type in Adam, you get the three generations you mentioned. However, at the bottom of the screen, you can select the second picture, which is Family Tree: Adam (Ge 5:1-32), which then brings up the more detailed family tree that you were expecting. I suppose this is somewhat necessary, as the question becomes: how much of a family tree do you show for Adam? Should it include everyone we know listed down through Jesus. You could have a crazy big family tree! It looks like they have therefore created multiple family trees for different individuals to show immediate larger families, and longer selected genealogies.
The lack of a Biblical Timelines feature (on par with Biblical People, Places, and Things) has also been one of my (few and minor) disappointments. It would definitely be nice to have something like that. Setting aside the debate about whether or not there are "gaps" in the early genealogies, we could certainly have something that gave timelines/lifespan charts based on the face value of the text. Later in the OT history where we have known dates from secular history, those could also be included alongside.
On your other note, I thought that some of the Jesus family tree resources went all the way back to Adam, but I don't remember for sure at the moment.
I walked away from my computer, came back and finished my reply and see that in the meantime David beat me to it I knew I'd seen it somewhere.
If I recall, during the Beta development Logos mentioned that the images and graphs in existing books would get tagged and add to the content of BPPT.
It was also mentioned that user tagging of images would be available so we could tag images in books and then others would get access to the benefit of the user community tagging items.
Does anyone know if this is still in the works? I ask here because this might help resolve some of the original question posed in this thread.
Robert Pavich:As it was....the biblical people was more confusing than enlightening....a longer "tree" would have helped....
The problem is Robert, that because of the controversy this subject doesn't really lend itself to a timeline. At least IMHO. It would be like requesting a timeline for the end times. Which interpretations timing would you use?
Ronald S Keyston Jr: The lack of a Biblical Timelines feature (on par with Biblical People, Places, and Things) has also been one of my (few and minor) disappointments. It would definitely be nice to have something like that.
The lack of a Biblical Timelines feature (on par with Biblical People, Places, and Things) has also been one of my (few and minor) disappointments. It would definitely be nice to have something like that.
There is a Biblical Timelines feature, but it's hidden in your resources, not visible in the UI. Type into the Find box in your Library, type:timeline, and you'll see a bunch of them. These come with every base package except Home and Original Languages, so you probably have them. There are timelines for Israel's kings, biblical books, prophets, church history, etc. But there isn't one for genealogies or early biblical persons or or patriarchs, which might be an interesting addition (though given the "gaps" and different theories about literalness vs. literary structuring, it might be difficult to do to the satisfaction of every user).
Terry Poperszky:The problem is Robert, that because of the controversy this subject doesn't really lend itself to a timeline. At least IMHO. It would be like requesting a timeline for the end times. Which interpretations timing would you use?
Terry,
Like I said....I wasn't looking for "THE" answer..just something.
Even a timeline that shows all of the possibilities...or whatever....
I had to go to the web to get one..... :(
Robert Pavich:I had to go to the web to get one..... :(
But that is why God created Google.
I understand, the only reason I knew what to search on was that I had run into this issue several years ago. That is the problem with computers, it only tells me what I ask it, not what I want to know!
Biblical timelines are helpful, but quite challenging to get accurate. I think this is the answer to the question as to why we do not have Logos timelines for the oldest chronogenealogies, though we do have some Logos timelines for latter chronogenealogies in the history of Israel, as has been pointed out here in this discussion. For example, take a look at another interesting Logos resource, Table 1 of the ISBE, (p. 676) which can also be used for comparing the generations between Adam and Noah, along with the years for each patriarch. Like some of the other tables in other Logos resources that people have already cited here, it is important to carefully study the bibilical data presented for accuracy, since most of these tables seem hard to follow and usually appear to disagree with each other, even if only slightly. The two tables in the Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (noted earlier in this discussion), and the table in the ISBE match in many respects, but differ on a few key items, such as whether or not to include the second reference to "Cainan" (the Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary tables do not include the second "Cainan", but the ISBE table does). From what I have learned, the second reference to "Cainan" is believed by some Bible scholars to be a copyist problem found only in the more recent versions of the LXX (Genesis 11:13), and related to the copyist error in Luke 3:36 that also has the second reference to "Cainan". Some of the reasons for thinking that the reference to a second "Cainan" is spurious are: it's not found in the Masoretic text of the same passage (upon which most of our OT Bible translations are based), nor found in versions of the LXX prior to 220 AD, nor do the oldest manuscripts of Luke contain a second reference to Cainan), it's not found in Genesis 10:24, and neither is the second "Cainan" listed in 1 Chron. 1:24.Another item of note with this table is that it seems to indicate a total of 1,948 years to the birth of Abraham on the basis that Terah was 70 years old when he began having children (in Genesis 11:26 the Bible gives the names of three children, Terah's sons). But was Abraham actually the first born or just listed first in the Bible because of his prominence? If Abraham's departed from Haran around the time of his father Terah's death, (Terah died at age 205, according to Genesis 11:32, when Abraham was 75, according to Genesis 12:4), then Terah's age at the birth of Abraham was not 70 years. Doing the math, Terah would have been 130 years old at the birth of Abraham (205 - 75 = 130 years) -- an additional 60 years more than what Table 1 shows in the ISBE. In other words, the figure of 1,948 years in the ISBE table may be short by 60 years, and should total 2,008 years from Adam to the birth of Abraham.Lastly, as to the concern made here in this discussion regarding whether there are "gaps" in the generations between Adam and Noah (10 total patriarchal names are listed when including Noah), I would reference Jude 14 as a kind of biblical "QC check" because that passage confirms Enoch's position as #7 in the generations listed, because Jude 14 cites Enoch as "the seventh generation from Adam" (NASB).Here is Table 1 for those who might not have the ISBE (hint: you might want to purchase this Logos resource if you do not have it):