The Year Methuselah Died – Be’resheit – Oct. 10

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”

This first sentence of the Bible gives meaning to all of life and to all of the questions regarding humankind and the universe in which we live.  These first seven words in the Hebrew language explain to us that God exists and that He has created everything.

The very first word in the Hebrew text is “בראשית” – “Be’resheit,” “In the beginning…”  The Hebrew word “בראשית” – “be’resheit” is actually the word “ראשית” – “resheit,” meaning the first or beginning, with the added preposition “ב” – “be,” meaning in or on.  The word “ראשית” – “resheit” comes from the Hebrew root word ״ראש״ – “rosh” meaning head or first.  The recent celebration of Rosh Hashanah, The Jewish New Year, uses this same word “rosh” meaning the “head” or “beginning of the year.”  We see this word “resheit” used elsewhere in the Bible with the same meaning (Gen. 10:10. 49:3. Ex. 23:19).  In the book of Genesis God has provided us with an account of the beginning of all things through His Word.

Made in the Image of God

It is here in these first few chapters of Genesis that we read of the creation account and of the order which God established on the earth and through the sun, moon, and stars.  God created all of the plant and animal life on the earth.  Then God created the first human: “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness” (Gen. 1:26).  The Hebrew in this verse is unmistakably plural in reference to God.  The following verse, however, speaks of God in the singular form: “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” (Gen. 1:27).  Through these two verses we observe that God is in some way both a plurality and an individual unity.

Traditionally, Orthodox Jews reject any plural understanding of God and biblically it is safe to say, “God is One,” as the Scriptures teach us (Deut. 6:4), however, we would be amiss to deny a unique plurality regarding the person of God as revealed in these opening verses of the Bible.  One religious Jewish resource that I read referred to the phraseology in this verse as speaking of God as a “majestic plural” (Jonas, Irwin. Onkelos on the Torah. Genesis. p.7).  There is majesty and mystery in the person and essence of God that cannot be denied.  We begin to know God through His Word and by His creation. To read more about the essence of the person of God, I recommend reading the following article: Who Is God?

Life in Eden

After God created man and woman, He gave them authority over the earth and told them to be fruitful and multiply on the earth.  God then placed Adam in the garden along with his wife Eve and gave them one specific command to keep:

Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. The LORD God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” – Gen. 2:15-17

Outside of tending the garden and being prolific, God gave Adam (and later Eve) just one command, “Do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil!”  God warned them that the punishment for disobeying this command would be death.

Eve, being deceived by the serpent, chose to disobey God’s Word and took of the fruit.  She then ate of the fruit of this tree and gave it to Adam to eat as well.  They both ate of the forbidden fruit and according to the Word of the LORD they would die.  However, did they really die?

Did Adam & Eve Die the Day that they Sinned?

Immediately after Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit the Bible tells us that their eyes were opened and that they now felt shame: “Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings” (Gen. 3:7).  Before they disobeyed God’s command they only knew good.  Now they knew both good and evil and felt shame at their nakedness and sought to cover themselves but they were still alive.  Where was death after the sin of disobedience?

Death did come to Adam and Eve but not as we might expect it.  The perfect world that Adam and Eve once lived in was now shattered and broken.  Sin had entered into the world and this sin brought death, death of innocence and death of relationship between them and God:

They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. Then the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.” And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” – Gen. 3:8-11

When the LORD came to them in the garden Adam and Eve reacted in fear and they hid themselves.  Their relationship with God was now altered in a permanent manner.  Adam and Eve had brought spiritual death into the world by their sin which not only affected them but also all of mankind.  Man’s relationship with God would be forever broken and only God could redeem them and properly cover over the sin that brought separation.

After God punished Adam, Eve, and the serpent for their disobedience (Gen. 3:14-19), God provided coverings for Adam and Eve to cover their nakedness and to figuratively cover their sin: “The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them” (Gen. 3:21).  It appears that, by this act of making garments of skin for Adam and Eve, God made temporary atonement for them.  There must have been the death of an animal or animals that the skins were made from.  It seems probable that it was at this time that the first sacrifice was made as we see that animal sacrifices were part of life for the first family as we read in the Bible that Cain and Able brought their offerings to the LORD (Gen. 4:3-7).

Death & Resurrection

Through Adam sinned entered the world and with sin came death.  The Bible clearly teaches that sin only brings death, however, just as God did not leave Adam and Eve in their fear and separation from Him but provided reconciliation, so God offers His gift of life and reconciliation to all of mankind: “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

Death came through Adam but resurrection life came through the Messiah: “For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:21-22).  This is the most fundamental spiritual truth that all men and women must know.  Sin brings death and because the first man sinned we are all under the penalty of death.  Yeshua the Messiah has died for us and was resurrection.  Through His death and resurrection we have reconciliation with God and freedom from the power of death.  Although our physical life will one day end, we can have eternal life with God.

Sent Out from Eden

The last consequence of the original fall was that God sent Adam out of the Garden of Eden:

Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— therefore the LORD God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life. – Gen. 3:22-24

God sent Adam out of the Garden of Eden so that he would no longer have access to the tree of life and live forever.  Here we see that physical death would also be a result of the fall.

The Hebrew word used in the above verse, when it says that God “sent him” out of the garden, is the word “וישלחהו” – “va’yeshalchehu,” which is translated as “and he sent him.”  The root of the Hebrew verb is “שלח” – “shalach” which means “to send.”  As noted above, God sent Adam out of the garden which would eventually result in his physical death.  I mention this because there is an interesting connection related to this word “shalach” at the end of this week’s Torah Portion.

The End of the First Civilization

From the first couple, Adam and Eve, man multiplied on the earth but instead of seeking God they only sought their own selfish desires and this grieved the heart of God: “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”  (Gen. 6:5).  God decided to destroy all men from the face of the earth including the animals of the field and the birds of the sky (Gen. 6:6-7).

It was the sin of Adam that brought death into the world and it was the universal sin of humankind that would bring death to the whole earth.  Sin always brings death.  It would be through a global flood that God would blot out man and all of life from the face of the earth.  The flood took place in the 600th year of the life of Noah (Gen. 7:6).  God always gives us details in His Word for a reason.

The Year Methuselah Died

The sixth hundredth year of Noah’s life was the same year that Noah’s grandfather, Methuselah died.  Methuselah died at the age of 969 (Gen. 5:27).  We know that Lamech, Noah’s father, was born to Methuselah when Methuselah  was 187 years old (Gen. 5:25).  And when Lamech was 182 years old Noah was born (Gen. 5:28).  This would make Methuselah 369 years old at Noah’s birth.  When the flood came on the earth Noah was 600 years old and this was the year that Methuselah died at the age of 969.  Lamech had died 5 years earlier (Gen. 5:30-31).  So what is the significance about Methuselah’s death being the same year as the flood and the destruction of all mankind?

The name “Methuselah” in Hebrew is “מתושלח” – “metushelach,” which is the combination of two Hebrew words “למות” – “lamut,” which mean “to die” and “לשלוח” – “lishloach,” means “to send.”  The name “Metu-Shelach” literally means “sent to their death” or “he sent them to their death.”  Therefore we can see that in the year that “Metu-shelach” died the people of the world were “sent to their death.”  God had prophesied of the death that would come upon the world through the man Methuselah.  And just as Adam was “sent” out of Eden to die because of his sin, so were the people of the world at the time of Noah “sent to their death” for their sin.  Sin always brings death!

Escaping Death

Sin brings death but faith brings life eternal.  Although we see the sign of death in the name of Methuselah we read of the sign of life in Methuselah’s father (Noah’s great grandfather), Enoch: So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years. Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him” (Gen. 5:23-24).  Enoch was a man who knew God and God knew him.  Enoch was pleasing to God and he obtained life eternal and literally escaped physical death as God took him from this earth.

Enoch is an example of a man who walked in faith with God and was granted eternal life with God because of his testimony: “By faith Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death; and he was not found because God took him up; for he obtained the witness that before his being taken up he was pleasing to God” (Hebrews 11:5).

Let us learn from this week’s Torah Portion that although sin brings death God has not left us to die in our sin but to provide a way of escape through faith in Him: And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him (Hebrews 11:6).  Believe in God, walk in faith, and obtain life everlasting!

Shabbat Shalom!

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Torah Portion: Gen. 1:1 – Gen. 6:8

Hafatara: Isaiah 42:5 – Isaiah 43:10

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