Just 9 verses into Genesis Chapter 11 and we have a new problem. The flood had washed away the sinful culture and resulted in a renewed creation. But this hopeful renewed creation is followed by a renewed fall when Noah becomes drunk and a renewed rebellion when Nimrod founds a city instead of dispersing to fill the earth with life. The reader asks the question, “What now?”
God had used godly Noah to help deliver humanity—and all animal life—through the destruction of the flood. But now that deliverer and many of his offspring have fallen and, except for the intervention of capital punishment, are headed on to another sinful broken culture. Noah served his purpose, but it was rescue and not restoration.
The earth begins falling back into its old ways of rebellion. And we are immediately confronted not with an obvious solution, but with another genealogy, and one that begins in a very odd way.
“These are the records of the generations of Shem. Shem was a hundred years old when he fathered Arpachshad, two years after the flood.” The pattern for this genealogy looks very much like the pattern for the genealogy in chapter 5, that is to say, a man lives a certain number of years and has a son, and then he lives more years and dies. But in Genesis 5 we don’t know where the 130 years of Adam’s life begin. Genesis 11:10 leaves no doubt when Shem’s life began.
Two years after the flood Shem fathers Arpachshad. And he was 100 years old at that point. That would have made Shem 98 years old when the flood began. Since Noah is said to have fathered all three when he was 500, Shem cannot have been the oldest, yet he was listed first. This new genealogy explains why: Shem is not the firstborn, but since this genealogy begins with him, he matters most — through him the godly line continues.
We also see more mirroring taking place here. The last name in the first genealogy in Genesis 5, Noah, breaks the chain pattern by linking not to the next generation but to the flood. Shem does the same thing here. He is not linked to his father, Noah, but to the flood.
This genealogy moves undisturbed from the first generation mentioned, Shem, to the 9th generation, Terah, and there the pattern in this genealogy breaks — but it mirrors the first one in an odd way. Terah lives 70 years and has three sons all at once apparently, mirroring what happened in Noah’s case, the 10th generation of the first genealogy. And once again, from other sources we know that the first one listed, Abram, is not the first one born—but it is through him the godly line continues.
This genealogy has much more to tell us, but we already have arrived at the answer to our question that began this post. What is God going to do?
The answer this gives us is simple: Abram.
How do we know that this is true? That’s the topic for next time.
