And all the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years: and he died.
Seth lived nine hundred and twelve years and then died, after the pattern of the generations from Adam to Noah who, with few exceptions, lived nearly a thousand years. His long life was lived in remarkably full health, with no sickness, suffering, or early death, sustained on vegetables, fruits and grains, and ending without long-drawn agony when the springs of life simply stood still. Those centuries gave great physical and mental strength, with strong memory and increasing wisdom without books, and allowed what God taught Adam to pass directly through very few overlapping lives to distant posterity. That length of days came from the life-giving power of the tree of life transmitted from Adam and Eve to their descendants, and proves the nobility, stature and perfection of man as first made in the image of God. After the Flood the race rapidly declined in length of days and vital force through violation of the laws of life, until life dwindled to threescore years and ten and to still briefer, disease-filled spans in the present.
Long Life in Genesis
Seth lived 912 years and then died, exemplifying the generations before the Flood whose average across nine generations was 912 years. That longevity is set against the shorter lifespans after the Flood, in Moses' time, and in the present. His lifespan belongs to the time from Adam to Noah when, with few exceptions, men lived nearly a thousand years. Since that time the average length of life has decreased, and human lifespans later declined as disease and mortality increased through continued violations of the laws of life.
The patriarchs from Adam to Noah lived literally between nine hundred and a thousand years, with one or two exceptions, afterwards tapering gradually to between one and two hundred years by the time of the Egyptian bondage. The record gives the age at death for men, with but an exception or two never for women. Those great ages mean the race was created with ten times more vital force than it now possesses, which alone kept its violations of the laws of health and life from extinguishing it altogether. The running down of life to an average of threescore years and ten by the time of David, about halfway from Adam to the present day, and to thirty years in Europe and the United States and twenty years in great cities now, was done by awful violations of God's laws of health and life, which cut down the years of man to contemptible brevity and fill them with pain and disease from the cradle.
The verse follows the Genesis pattern of brief obituaries recording death only after a very long life in old age. There is no recorded natural death in infancy, childhood, or early manhood and no recorded infant born blind, deaf, crippled, or imbecile, so that death before a father or death in early life was rare enough to be specially noted. There is no record of sickness, suffering, or local disease in his life. His life belongs to the more than sixteen hundred years from Adam to Noah when vegetables, fruits, and grains grown out of the ground were man's diet, a time of remarkably good health with no sickness and death of children, no feebleness in youth or middle age, and no fevers, dyspepsia, gout, or consumption.
Like the other patriarchs he lived in full enjoyment of health nearly one thousand years until the weary springs of life stood still, without long-drawn sufferings or excruciating agonies in death, the record giving only the measure of his life and its cessation. He lived so long because the life-giving power of the tree of life was transmitted to him from Adam and Eve. The tree possessed power to perpetuate life so that as long as they ate of it they could not die, and that vitality passed to their descendants.
Strength Knowledge and Witness
Seth's 912 years were one of the long lives before the Flood marked by great physical and mental strength that gave unrivaled advantages for religious and scientific knowledge. Mental powers developed early could keep increasing in knowledge and wisdom through centuries of life, with strong memory able to grasp and retain teaching without books and transmit it unimpaired to posterity. His lifetime overlapped with Adam, who was formed in God's image and instructed by the Creator in the history of creation and the wisdom of the material world, who witnessed the events of nine centuries and imparted his knowledge to his descendants. It belonged to a time when seven generations lived on the earth at once, with opportunity to consult together and profit each by the knowledge and experience of all.
Because early lives overlapped one another for hundreds of years, all that God taught Adam could be communicated directly to descendants through very few links. Adam imparted it to Methuselah, Methuselah to Shem, Shem to Abraham and Isaac, and these patriarchs to Jacob the father of the tribes of Israel. That each patriarch lived nearly a thousand years, Seth 912 years, proves the nobility, grandeur, beauty, symmetry, and intellectual and physical perfection of man as first made in the image of God and set as lord over creation. Length of life measured size and physical strength, so that the race has fallen off in size and strength in proportion as life has shortened.
His living over nine centuries was part of mankind still retaining much early vigor only a few generations after Adam had access to the tree that prolongs life, when human existence was still measured in centuries and people possessed rare powers to plan and execute. That long life was given to serve God and make the Creator's name a praise in the earth and answer the purpose for which life was given, but they failed to do this. Among them were many giants 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.
Seth was among that long-lived race before the Flood as a righteous man who presented the truth and, together with Enoch, Noah, Methuselah and others, kept the knowledge of God continually before the world. That witness was despised as truth is despised today, while the imaginations of the hearts of the people was evil and only evil continually, and secret societies were formed to work in darkness to do violence, until the Lord destroyed that long-lived race by a flood. Seth lived 912 years and died as one of the early faithful men with Abel, Enoch, and Noah whose history was taught to Daniel and his three companions in Babylon. His life was part of the truth handed down by human lips from one generation to another, alongside written parchments about Nadab and Abihu, which engraved the image of God on the heart and prepared Daniel to refuse wine and food dedicated to idols at the king's table.
Decline and Present Warning
Seth's 912 years exemplifies the nine generations before the Flood whose average age was 912 years, belonging to the time from Adam to Noah when with few exceptions men lived nearly a thousand years. After Noah's time human lifespans steadily shortened and the average length of life decreased, in contrast with the shorter lifespans after the Flood, in Moses' time, and in the present. Mortality and disease increased because people continually violated the laws of life, while his long life reflects great vitality before the effects of appetite, passion, and violations of physical law had become strongly felt, with those effects accumulating across generations. So the present generation dies at a younger age with suffering and mortality than the generations of the first millennia after creation.
Noah still lived 950 years, but the necessity of eating flesh after the Flood marked the point from which the race rapidly declined in length of days. His 912 years, with each patriarch from Adam to the Flood living nearly a thousand years, proves the nobility, grandeur, beauty, symmetry, and intellectual and physical perfection of man as first made in the image of God and set as lord over creation, with length of life measuring size and physical strength, so that the race has fallen off in size and strength in proportion as life has shortened. The original curse with its accumulated weight of transgression and violation of natural law has bowed the race down and dwindled man to a brief existence marked with disease, decrepitude, and imbecility.
The patriarchs from Adam to Noah lived literally between nine hundred and a thousand years, with one or two exceptions, afterwards gradually tapering down to between one and two hundred years by the time of the Egyptian bondage, and the record gives the age at death for men with but an exception or two never for women. The great ages mean the race was created with ten times more vital force than it now possesses, which alone kept its violations of the laws of health and life from extinguishing it altogether. The running down of life to an average of threescore years and ten by the time of David, about halfway from Adam to the present day, and to thirty years in Europe and the United States and twenty years in great cities now, was done by awful violations of God's laws of health and life. Those violations cut down the years of man to contemptible brevity and fill them with pain and disease from the cradle.
Seth lived nine hundred and twelve years and then died, after the pattern of the generations from Adam to Noah who, with few exceptions, lived nearly a thousand years. His long life was lived in remarkably full health, with no sickness, suffering, or early death, sustained on vegetables, fruits and grains, and ending without long-drawn agony when the springs of life simply stood still. Those centuries gave great physical and mental strength, with strong memory and increasing wisdom without books, and allowed what God taught Adam to pass directly through very few overlapping lives to distant posterity. That length of days came from the life-giving power of the tree of life transmitted from Adam and Eve to their descendants, and proves the nobility, stature and perfection of man as first made in the image of God. After the Flood the race rapidly declined in length of days and vital force through violation of the laws of life, until life dwindled to threescore years and ten and to still briefer, disease-filled spans in the present.
Long Life in Genesis
Seth lived 912 years and then died, exemplifying the generations before the Flood whose average across nine generations was 912 years. That longevity is set against the shorter lifespans after the Flood, in Moses' time, and in the present. His lifespan belongs to the time from Adam to Noah when, with few exceptions, men lived nearly a thousand years. Since that time the average length of life has decreased, and human lifespans later declined as disease and mortality increased through continued violations of the laws of life.
The patriarchs from Adam to Noah lived literally between nine hundred and a thousand years, with one or two exceptions, afterwards tapering gradually to between one and two hundred years by the time of the Egyptian bondage. The record gives the age at death for men, with but an exception or two never for women. Those great ages mean the race was created with ten times more vital force than it now possesses, which alone kept its violations of the laws of health and life from extinguishing it altogether. The running down of life to an average of threescore years and ten by the time of David, about halfway from Adam to the present day, and to thirty years in Europe and the United States and twenty years in great cities now, was done by awful violations of God's laws of health and life, which cut down the years of man to contemptible brevity and fill them with pain and disease from the cradle.
The verse follows the Genesis pattern of brief obituaries recording death only after a very long life in old age. There is no recorded natural death in infancy, childhood, or early manhood and no recorded infant born blind, deaf, crippled, or imbecile, so that death before a father or death in early life was rare enough to be specially noted. There is no record of sickness, suffering, or local disease in his life. His life belongs to the more than sixteen hundred years from Adam to Noah when vegetables, fruits, and grains grown out of the ground were man's diet, a time of remarkably good health with no sickness and death of children, no feebleness in youth or middle age, and no fevers, dyspepsia, gout, or consumption.
Like the other patriarchs he lived in full enjoyment of health nearly one thousand years until the weary springs of life stood still, without long-drawn sufferings or excruciating agonies in death, the record giving only the measure of his life and its cessation. He lived so long because the life-giving power of the tree of life was transmitted to him from Adam and Eve. The tree possessed power to perpetuate life so that as long as they ate of it they could not die, and that vitality passed to their descendants.
Strength Knowledge and Witness
Seth's 912 years were one of the long lives before the Flood marked by great physical and mental strength that gave unrivaled advantages for religious and scientific knowledge. Mental powers developed early could keep increasing in knowledge and wisdom through centuries of life, with strong memory able to grasp and retain teaching without books and transmit it unimpaired to posterity. His lifetime overlapped with Adam, who was formed in God's image and instructed by the Creator in the history of creation and the wisdom of the material world, who witnessed the events of nine centuries and imparted his knowledge to his descendants. It belonged to a time when seven generations lived on the earth at once, with opportunity to consult together and profit each by the knowledge and experience of all.
Because early lives overlapped one another for hundreds of years, all that God taught Adam could be communicated directly to descendants through very few links. Adam imparted it to Methuselah, Methuselah to Shem, Shem to Abraham and Isaac, and these patriarchs to Jacob the father of the tribes of Israel. That each patriarch lived nearly a thousand years, Seth 912 years, proves the nobility, grandeur, beauty, symmetry, and intellectual and physical perfection of man as first made in the image of God and set as lord over creation. Length of life measured size and physical strength, so that the race has fallen off in size and strength in proportion as life has shortened.
His living over nine centuries was part of mankind still retaining much early vigor only a few generations after Adam had access to the tree that prolongs life, when human existence was still measured in centuries and people possessed rare powers to plan and execute. That long life was given to serve God and make the Creator's name a praise in the earth and answer the purpose for which life was given, but they failed to do this. Among them were many giants 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.
Seth was among that long-lived race before the Flood as a righteous man who presented the truth and, together with Enoch, Noah, Methuselah and others, kept the knowledge of God continually before the world. That witness was despised as truth is despised today, while the imaginations of the hearts of the people was evil and only evil continually, and secret societies were formed to work in darkness to do violence, until the Lord destroyed that long-lived race by a flood. Seth lived 912 years and died as one of the early faithful men with Abel, Enoch, and Noah whose history was taught to Daniel and his three companions in Babylon. His life was part of the truth handed down by human lips from one generation to another, alongside written parchments about Nadab and Abihu, which engraved the image of God on the heart and prepared Daniel to refuse wine and food dedicated to idols at the king's table.
Decline and Present Warning
Seth's 912 years exemplifies the nine generations before the Flood whose average age was 912 years, belonging to the time from Adam to Noah when with few exceptions men lived nearly a thousand years. After Noah's time human lifespans steadily shortened and the average length of life decreased, in contrast with the shorter lifespans after the Flood, in Moses' time, and in the present. Mortality and disease increased because people continually violated the laws of life, while his long life reflects great vitality before the effects of appetite, passion, and violations of physical law had become strongly felt, with those effects accumulating across generations. So the present generation dies at a younger age with suffering and mortality than the generations of the first millennia after creation.
Noah still lived 950 years, but the necessity of eating flesh after the Flood marked the point from which the race rapidly declined in length of days. His 912 years, with each patriarch from Adam to the Flood living nearly a thousand years, proves the nobility, grandeur, beauty, symmetry, and intellectual and physical perfection of man as first made in the image of God and set as lord over creation, with length of life measuring size and physical strength, so that the race has fallen off in size and strength in proportion as life has shortened. The original curse with its accumulated weight of transgression and violation of natural law has bowed the race down and dwindled man to a brief existence marked with disease, decrepitude, and imbecility.
The patriarchs from Adam to Noah lived literally between nine hundred and a thousand years, with one or two exceptions, afterwards gradually tapering down to between one and two hundred years by the time of the Egyptian bondage, and the record gives the age at death for men with but an exception or two never for women. The great ages mean the race was created with ten times more vital force than it now possesses, which alone kept its violations of the laws of health and life from extinguishing it altogether. The running down of life to an average of threescore years and ten by the time of David, about halfway from Adam to the present day, and to thirty years in Europe and the United States and twenty years in great cities now, was done by awful violations of God's laws of health and life. Those violations cut down the years of man to contemptible brevity and fill them with pain and disease from the cradle.