And all the days of Jared were nine hundred sixty and two years: and he died.
Jared lived 962 literal years and then died as one of the patriarchs from Adam to Noah who lived nearly a thousand years. He spent those centuries in full enjoyment of health without sickness or agonizing death, sustained by a vegetable diet and by life-giving power from the tree of life transmitted from Adam, showing the original vigor, stature and intellect of man made in the image of God. After the Flood the lifespan tapered steadily to seventy years and then to about thirty-five through continued violation of the laws of health, corrupt appetites, and flesh eating, with disease and feebleness increasing in each generation. Those centuries of life gave unrivaled advantage for knowledge, with many generations living together with strong memories and with Adam himself teaching what God had shown him, so truth could pass unimpaired from Adam through Methuselah and Shem to Abraham and Israel. That length of life was given to serve God and make His name a praise, but the long-lived race gave loose rein to iniquity in proportion to its skill and wisdom, despised the truth kept before it by righteous men, and was destroyed by the Flood.
Long Healthy Life Before Flood
Jared lived nine hundred sixty-two years and then died, standing among the patriarchs from Adam to Noah who, with one or two exceptions, lived literally nearly a thousand years, between nine hundred and a thousand years. Those years are literal years, not the result of a different way of counting time. Genesis 5 belongs to the more than sixteen hundred years from Adam to Noah when man's diet was vegetables, fruits, and grains. It was a time of remarkably good health when all lived nearly one thousand years.
He lived those nine hundred sixty-two years in full enjoyment of health and then died, with no sickness, feebleness, fever, dyspepsia, gout, consumption, local disease, long-drawn suffering, or agonizing death. At last the springs of life grown weary stood still, so the record gives only the measure of each life and its cessation. That length of life is explained by the life-giving power of the tree of life, which could perpetuate life so that while Adam and Eve ate of it they could not die. That power was transmitted from Adam and Eve to their descendants and prolonged Jared's life with the other antediluvian lives.
Only a few generations stood between Jared and Adam's access to the tree which was to prolong life, when human life was still measured by centuries and the race yet retained much of its early vigor. The race was created with ten times more vital force than it now possesses, since its known violations of all the laws of health and life would otherwise have extinguished it altogether long ago. This great length of days measures the original grandeur, beauty, symmetry, size, physical strength, and intellect of man made in the image of his Creator and made lord over creation.
The nine generations before the Flood averaged nine hundred twelve years, in contrast with nine post-Flood generations averaging three hundred thirty-two years, then seventy years in the time of Moses, and about thirty-five years at present. After Noah lifespans gradually tapered down to between one and two hundred years by the time of the Egyptian vassalage. From an average of threescore years and ten in the time of David, about halfway from Adam to the present day, life fell to thirty years in Europe and the United States and twenty years in great cities now, with disease seizing infants at birth. The patriarchs from Adam to Noah, with few exceptions, lived nearly a thousand years, and after that period average human lifespan decreased, tapering steadily since Noah.
The difference was caused by continued violation of the laws of life and health, bringing disease steadily increasing through successive generations since that period and fearfully increased mortality. Corrupt appetites and passions brought more rapid weakening and disease, more rapid weakening and disease, and sickness seizing infants at birth, in contrast to the sickness and mortality of the present. From the time when Noah and his sons of necessity ate flesh as food the race rapidly declined in length of days. With the original curse plus its accumulated weight of transgression and violation of natural law, the race has fallen off in size and physical strength in proportion to the shortening of life, progressing downward, not upward, to the present brief period of existence marked with disease, decrepitude, and imbecility. This rapid running down of life proves that violation of God's laws of health and life cut the years of man to a contemptible brevity and filled them with pain.
Knowledge, Purpose, and Judgment
The 962 years of Jared belong to a lifespan record that made direct handing down of what God taught Adam possible. Adam was still living when Methuselah was 243 years old, Methuselah was still living when Shem the son of Noah was 98, Shem lived 150 years after the birth of Abraham and 50 years after the birth of Isaac, Abraham lived till Jacob and Esau were 15 years old and Isaac lived till they were 120, so the teaching went from Adam to Methuselah to Shem to Abraham and Isaac to Jacob the father of the tribes of Israel.
Those lives of hundreds of years gave unrivaled advantages for knowledge. For hundreds of years seven generations lived on the earth at the same time, with opportunity to consult together and each to profit by the knowledge and experience of all. They had no books and no written records, but with great physical and mental vigor they had strong memories able to grasp and retain what was communicated and to transmit it unimpaired to posterity. Adam lived among them for hundreds of years, the man formed in God's image whom the Creator pronounced good, instructed by God in all wisdom pertaining to the material world, taught the history of creation by the Creator Himself, himself a witness of the events of nine centuries, and imparting his knowledge to his descendants.
The patriarchal record from Seth to Noah was passed down by word of mouth from one generation to another through human lips. Daniel and his companions were educated in that history, including Abel, Seth, Enoch, and Noah, and they cherished the truth given them, and the image of God was engraved upon the heart.
That long life gave rare powers to plan and execute. Those powers were given in order to serve God and to make the Creator's name a praise in the earth and to answer the purpose for which life was given. The long-lived people failed to do this and included many giants, men of great stature and strength, renowned for wisdom and skillful in devising cunning and wonderful works, whose guilt in giving loose rein to iniquity was in proportion to their skill and mental ability. While righteous men including Seth, Enoch, Noah, Methuselah and others kept the knowledge of God continually before the world, the people despised that truth then as people despise the truth now. The imaginations of their hearts were evil and only evil continually, and secret societies were formed to work in darkness to do violence, so the Lord destroyed that long-lived race by a flood.
Jared lived 962 literal years and then died as one of the patriarchs from Adam to Noah who lived nearly a thousand years. He spent those centuries in full enjoyment of health without sickness or agonizing death, sustained by a vegetable diet and by life-giving power from the tree of life transmitted from Adam, showing the original vigor, stature and intellect of man made in the image of God. After the Flood the lifespan tapered steadily to seventy years and then to about thirty-five through continued violation of the laws of health, corrupt appetites, and flesh eating, with disease and feebleness increasing in each generation. Those centuries of life gave unrivaled advantage for knowledge, with many generations living together with strong memories and with Adam himself teaching what God had shown him, so truth could pass unimpaired from Adam through Methuselah and Shem to Abraham and Israel. That length of life was given to serve God and make His name a praise, but the long-lived race gave loose rein to iniquity in proportion to its skill and wisdom, despised the truth kept before it by righteous men, and was destroyed by the Flood.
Long Healthy Life Before Flood
Jared lived nine hundred sixty-two years and then died, standing among the patriarchs from Adam to Noah who, with one or two exceptions, lived literally nearly a thousand years, between nine hundred and a thousand years. Those years are literal years, not the result of a different way of counting time. Genesis 5 belongs to the more than sixteen hundred years from Adam to Noah when man's diet was vegetables, fruits, and grains. It was a time of remarkably good health when all lived nearly one thousand years.
He lived those nine hundred sixty-two years in full enjoyment of health and then died, with no sickness, feebleness, fever, dyspepsia, gout, consumption, local disease, long-drawn suffering, or agonizing death. At last the springs of life grown weary stood still, so the record gives only the measure of each life and its cessation. That length of life is explained by the life-giving power of the tree of life, which could perpetuate life so that while Adam and Eve ate of it they could not die. That power was transmitted from Adam and Eve to their descendants and prolonged Jared's life with the other antediluvian lives.
Only a few generations stood between Jared and Adam's access to the tree which was to prolong life, when human life was still measured by centuries and the race yet retained much of its early vigor. The race was created with ten times more vital force than it now possesses, since its known violations of all the laws of health and life would otherwise have extinguished it altogether long ago. This great length of days measures the original grandeur, beauty, symmetry, size, physical strength, and intellect of man made in the image of his Creator and made lord over creation.
The nine generations before the Flood averaged nine hundred twelve years, in contrast with nine post-Flood generations averaging three hundred thirty-two years, then seventy years in the time of Moses, and about thirty-five years at present. After Noah lifespans gradually tapered down to between one and two hundred years by the time of the Egyptian vassalage. From an average of threescore years and ten in the time of David, about halfway from Adam to the present day, life fell to thirty years in Europe and the United States and twenty years in great cities now, with disease seizing infants at birth. The patriarchs from Adam to Noah, with few exceptions, lived nearly a thousand years, and after that period average human lifespan decreased, tapering steadily since Noah.
The difference was caused by continued violation of the laws of life and health, bringing disease steadily increasing through successive generations since that period and fearfully increased mortality. Corrupt appetites and passions brought more rapid weakening and disease, more rapid weakening and disease, and sickness seizing infants at birth, in contrast to the sickness and mortality of the present. From the time when Noah and his sons of necessity ate flesh as food the race rapidly declined in length of days. With the original curse plus its accumulated weight of transgression and violation of natural law, the race has fallen off in size and physical strength in proportion to the shortening of life, progressing downward, not upward, to the present brief period of existence marked with disease, decrepitude, and imbecility. This rapid running down of life proves that violation of God's laws of health and life cut the years of man to a contemptible brevity and filled them with pain.
Knowledge, Purpose, and Judgment
The 962 years of Jared belong to a lifespan record that made direct handing down of what God taught Adam possible. Adam was still living when Methuselah was 243 years old, Methuselah was still living when Shem the son of Noah was 98, Shem lived 150 years after the birth of Abraham and 50 years after the birth of Isaac, Abraham lived till Jacob and Esau were 15 years old and Isaac lived till they were 120, so the teaching went from Adam to Methuselah to Shem to Abraham and Isaac to Jacob the father of the tribes of Israel.
Those lives of hundreds of years gave unrivaled advantages for knowledge. For hundreds of years seven generations lived on the earth at the same time, with opportunity to consult together and each to profit by the knowledge and experience of all. They had no books and no written records, but with great physical and mental vigor they had strong memories able to grasp and retain what was communicated and to transmit it unimpaired to posterity. Adam lived among them for hundreds of years, the man formed in God's image whom the Creator pronounced good, instructed by God in all wisdom pertaining to the material world, taught the history of creation by the Creator Himself, himself a witness of the events of nine centuries, and imparting his knowledge to his descendants.
The patriarchal record from Seth to Noah was passed down by word of mouth from one generation to another through human lips. Daniel and his companions were educated in that history, including Abel, Seth, Enoch, and Noah, and they cherished the truth given them, and the image of God was engraved upon the heart.
That long life gave rare powers to plan and execute. Those powers were given in order to serve God and to make the Creator's name a praise in the earth and to answer the purpose for which life was given. The long-lived people failed to do this and included many giants, men of great stature and strength, renowned for wisdom and skillful in devising cunning and wonderful works, whose guilt in giving loose rein to iniquity was in proportion to their skill and mental ability. While righteous men including Seth, Enoch, Noah, Methuselah and others kept the knowledge of God continually before the world, the people despised that truth then as people despise the truth now. The imaginations of their hearts were evil and only evil continually, and secret societies were formed to work in darkness to do violence, so the Lord destroyed that long-lived race by a flood.