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My question is this. In Gen 6:3, God said, my spirit shall not remain in man for ever and his days shall be 120 years. However, The age of man extended far beyond 120 years after the flood, as Arphaxad lived 403 years.

If God shortened the life of man to 120 years, how therefore could anyone after the flood have lived beyond this? This seems contradictory?

Can you help me with this please as it has me confused.

—C.C., Ireland

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Thank you for contacting AiG. There are many passages in the Bible that do seem difficult. However, a closer examination reveals that the problem is not insurmountable (we deal with many of these in our new web-only series called Contradictions, published each Monday). First, let’s see what the passage says.

And the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” (Genesis 6:3)

At first glance, this verse may seem to indicate that God is limiting a human’s lifespan to 120 years. Yet after the Flood, men continued to live well past 120 years. So, is there a contradiction between what God decreed and what actually came to pass?

If we look closely at the context and the fulfillment, we’ll actually find that God is not discussing how long humans will live. Instead, God is referring to His own actions. In this passage, God is ordaining that the number of years between His decree to punish the wickedness of mankind and the carrying out of that decree will be 120 years. He gave mankind 120 years to repent of their sin and return to their Creator before sending His divine judgment in the form of the worldwide, earth-covering Flood.

Note that this 120 years does not necessarily refer to the amount of time that God gave Noah to build the Ark. It’s more likely that Noah has less than 100 years to build it, as God commanded Noah build the Ark and to take his sons and daughters-in-law into the Ark with him (Genesis 6:18). Yet Noah’s eldest son was born 20 years after God pronounced His 120-year decree.

God’s ordination of 120 years refers not the limit of man’s life, but to the number of years of grace until He would unleash His divine wrath on the wickedness of mankind. Although He hasn’t given us an exact timetable for when He’ll judge the earth with fire, we can be sure that now is the time to repent or to call others to repentance and faith in the only Ark of salvation—Jesus Christ.

After reading Genesis 11:10–26 and the genealogy of Shem and his descendants, there appears to be a contradiction in Genesis 25:8, which states that Abraham lived to a “good old age.” Considering that Shem, his great-grandfather of nine generations earlier, lived to within a few decades of Abraham’s death and Eber, Abraham’s great-grandfather of six generations earlier, actually outlived him, how can we reconcile this seeming contradiction? How can Abraham be said to have lived to a good old age when there were people much older than him still alive at the time of his death?

Now we know that there are no real contradictions in Scripture, which is inspired by God and therefore inerrant in the original manuscripts. And indeed when we closely examine the passage; the lifespan of Abraham with his contemporaries; and also the lifespan of Moses, the author of Genesis, we see that there is no contradiction in this statement.

There are a few ways to approach this, but first let’s consider what the text of Genesis 25:8 actually says. Here are several different English versions of this verse:

Then Abraham gave up the ghost, and died in a good old age, an old man, and full of years; and was gathered to his people. (KJV)
Then Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years, and was gathered to his people. (NKJV)
Then Abraham breathed his last and died at a good old age, an old man and full of years; and he was gathered to his people. (NIV)
And Abraham breathed his last and died in a ripe old age, an old man and satisfied with life; and he was gathered to his people. (NASB)

Was Abraham “Full of Years” or “Satisfied”?

Notice that some words appear in italics in the above versions. This signifies that the English words don’t exist in the original Hebrew text but have been supplied by the translators for clarity.1 Young’s Literal Translation (YLT) is a version which almost never includes these translator-supplied words and instead translates word-for-word literally. That version (with verbs modernized by the author) reads as follows:

And Abraham expired, and died in a good old age, aged and satisfied, and is gathered unto his people. (YLT)

So to begin with, it appears that this translation is more straightforward and in accord with what Moses was actually saying, and that the other versions have added words for clarity but instead may have lost some of the intended thought of the Hebrew text.

The authoritative Hebrew lexicon of Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner indicates that the basic meaning of the Hebrew word sabeaʿ שָׂבַע (“satisfied” in YLT) is satiated or satisfied.2

Translators have two basic interpretations of what this שָׂבַע Hebrew word sabeaʿ is conveying here. One is that Abraham was full of days or satisfied with his length of life. The other interpretation is that Abraham was satisfied with the quality of his life.

According to The JPS Torah Commentary on Genesis, the meaning of this phrase in Genesis 25:8 is “old and contented.” The commentary continues, “Such a summation of a life is found with no other personality in biblical literature. The phrase describes not his longevity, which is otherwise mentioned, but the quality of his earthly existence.”3

Abraham died and was “full,” “contented,” or “satisfied.” Why was he satisfied?

Abraham died and was “full,” “contented,” or “satisfied.” Why was he satisfied? At the time of his death, Abraham had indeed been materially blessed by God (Genesis 13:2); and more importantly he had been given three great promises by God. Although the full extent of the promises was never realized during his lifetime, Abraham nevertheless saw the beginning of the fulfilment of each promise. In Genesis 12:2–3 God promised: “I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Later in Genesis 14:14–17, 15:4–5, and 17:4–7, God promised Abraham many descendants and a homeland for them, as well as a future kingly line. So Abraham (then called Abram) was promised physical descendants, which would come from him and his wife, Sarah (Genesis 17:15–21); land in Canaan; and blessing for those who blessed Abraham. Abraham lived to see Isaac born, purchased a small plot of land in Machpelah as a burial site for Sarah and himself, and lived through countless examples of being blessed or protected and seeing those about to do him harm being threatened with curses from God (Genesis 12 and 20). Abraham also remembered that God had said He would cause kings to come forth from him and that he would be a blessing to all peoples (Genesis 17:6 and 12:2–3, respectively).

While we don’t know the full extent of what Abraham foresaw regarding how these promises would ultimately be fulfilled, it is clear that he had faith in God’s promises. Scripture tells us that somehow Abraham spiritually looked forward to the day the Messiah would come from his seed and also to the heavenly city that God would give him a portion in.

Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad. (John 8:56)
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise; for he waited for the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. (Hebrews 11:8–10)

Abraham definitely rested in God’s promises to him, was satisfied with his life, and looked forward to the future fulfillment of God’s promises to his descendants. Abraham was most certainly “full,” “contented,” and “satisfied” when he died. Whether he considered this “fullness” to be his length of time on earth or the satisfaction he had in the many and great promises of God is a matter of scholarly debate; but quite possibly both are in view here. Unlike his grandson Jacob who opined that his days were few and difficult compared with his grandfather and father, Abraham and Isaac (Genesis 47:9), Abraham knew that he had lived a long and good life and that God had providentially provided for all of his needs and blessed him immensely.

Gathered to His People

One other fascinating thing about Genesis 25:8 is the phrase “and was gathered to his people.” Again quoting from the JPS Commentary, we read:

This phrase, peculiar to the Torah, is also used of Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob, Aaron, and Moses. An analysis of the contexts in which it is found reveals that it is to be distinguished from death itself because the action follows the demise. It is not the same as burial in an ancestral grave, because it is employed of Abraham, Aaron, and Moses, none of whom was buried with his forefathers. It is also not identical with interment in general because the report of burial follows this phrase, and the difference between the two is especially blatant in the case of Jacob, who was interred quite a while after being “gathered to his kin.” It would seem, therefore, that the existence of this idiom, as of the corresponding figure ”to lie down with one’s fathers,” testifies to a belief that, despite his mortality and perishability, man possesses an immortal element that survives the loss of life. Death is looked upon as a transition to an afterlife where one is united with one’s ancestors. This interpretation contradicts the widespread, but apparently erroneous, view that such a notion is unknown in Israel until later times.4

We can’t help but be reminded of what Jesus said of the Father when disputing with the Sadducees: “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Matthew 22:32). Indeed faithful Abraham was gathered unto his people, and we also have this promise from Jesus that He (as God in the flesh and a member of the Trinity) is the God of the Living, that He has conquered death, that He will one day destroy it (1 Corinthians 15:22–26 and 53–57), and that we will one day be gathered with all the people of God.

But What About the “Good Old Age” Question?

So although the text does not say “full of years”5 in the original Hebrew, it does say “good old age;” so the question still remains: Is 175 years a good old age, when others from earlier generations lived much longer?

Is 175 years a good old age, when others from earlier generations lived much longer?

The first thing we need to consider is that the generation which lived to 600 years consisted of, at most, 6 people (Noah’s three sons and possibly their wives). Subsequent generations lived to approximately 400 years (for the next three generations), then down to about 230 years, then down to 205 years for Abraham’s father Terah (Genesis 11:32), but Abraham’s grandfather Nahor only lived to 148 (Genesis 11:24–25), so perhaps Terah was an exception and the generational age had declined to the 150 mark by this time. If so, then by the time Abraham died, he would have been considered old, based on the life expectancy of those around him. Even if Nahor was atypical and Terah’s generation lived to approximately 200 years, it seems likely that it was time for another generational drop. The 600 generation was singular, the 400s lasted for three generations, and the 230s lasted for three generations. Then came Nahor and Terah who lived 148 and 205 years respectively. Quite probably Abraham came from a further reduced generation, and his contemporaries would have had similar lifespans.

It must be remembered again that of the original Flood/post-Flood, long-lived generations, all but Shem (and possibly his wife, two brothers, and two sisters-in-law) had died by this time. People were aware that lifespans were declining. How could they not be when their great-grandfathers outlived them? But that time was rapidly closing, and in fact, Shem and the others (if still alive) were close to death themselves by the time Abraham was 150. So indeed, Abraham lived to a good old age of 175, in comparison with people around him of his generation, and with only the exception of, at most, a few people of Eber’s generation, who probably lived far away from Canaan where Abraham now lived. Eber died at 464 years old and only outlived Abraham by 4 years. It appears he was exceptionally long-lived for his time (living longer than both his father and grandfather who both died in their 430s). Eber may well have been the only one from his generation that outlived Abraham.

Secondly, we need to consider that Moses was the author of Genesis, and that even if he utilized preexisting documents, they were still not compiled and edited until after the Exodus. At this time almost 700 more years had passed, and Moses was considered to be old (although with no loss of strength or vigor) at 120 years (Deuteronomy 34:7). So again to those post-Exodus Israelites who first heard and read what Moses had recorded, 175 years old would have been considered a “good old age.” We can see now that there is no contradiction; Abraham lived to a good old age, just as Scripture states, both in regards to his contemporaries and also to the people of Moses’ time.

Footnotes

1. A similar usage of these words ("old and full of days") appears with reference to Isaac (Genesis 35:29), Job (Job 42:17), and Jehoiada (2 Chronicles 24:15). However each of these passages has the Hebrew word yamim (days) in the text, whereas Genesis 25:8 does not. Also note the difference in word order in Genesis 25:8 where “gathered to his people” occurs in relation to where it occurs in Genesis 35:29.
2. The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, vol. 2, rev. Walter Baumgartner and Johann Jakob Stamm, trans. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson (Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2001), 1304.
3. Nahum M. Sarna, The JPS Torah Commentary: Genesis (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 174.
4. Ibid.
5. Some manuscripts (e.g., the Samaritan Pentateuch) have "full of days" and the Vulgate and LXX of this verse also say "full of days." The Syriac and a Targum manuscript, which is from Onqelos, also contain the phrase “full of days.”

Some have alleged that there is a contradiction here because even Abraham’s own father, Terah, was 130 when Abram/Abraham was born.1 And another ancestor recorded in Genesis 11 (Shem) had his first son at 100 years of age. But Abraham is not basing his inward skepticism on his ancestry; rather, he is honestly reckoning with his own vitality and the infertility of his wife. It is perhaps the nature of those looking for a contradiction here that they conveniently forget the timeline of events and Sarah’s (up to this point) barrenness.

A Review of the Timeline of Genesis 16 and 17

Genesis 16:16 says Abram was 86 years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to him. Then Genesis 17:1–2 tells us that 13 years have passed: because Abraham was now 99 years old. God then reiterates his covenant with Abraham (previously given in Genesis 12:2–3, 13:14–17, 15:5–6, and 15:18–21): “I am God Almighty; walk before Me and be blameless. And I will make My covenant between Me and you, and will multiply you exceedingly” (Genesis 17:1-2 NKJV ). It is at this time that God changes the name of Abram (great father) to Abraham (father of multitudes).

We know that Abram and Sarai (as they were then called, but hereafter called Abraham and Sarah in this article) had been married for several years and had no children. Knowing that Abraham was 10 years older than Sarah (based on Genesis 17:17) and assuming that Sarah had married at the average age of the time (about 16), then by the time Ishmael was born, Abram and Sarai had possibly been married 60 years and still had no children. Sarah was definitely barren . . . and there’s no doubt from reading Scripture that it wasn’t for lack of love between them nor for lack of trying as Abraham was a righteous man and believed God’s promise (Genesis 15:6). Furthermore, Sarah was considered beautiful (perhaps even youthful) as she aged (for example Genesis 12:10–20): in Genesis 20 we read that King Abimelech attempted to take 90-year-old Sarah as his wife.

But since the birth of his first child, Ishmael, with Sarah’s maid Hagar, another 13 years went by, and there were still no children with Sarah. So any hope that Abraham would ever have children with Sarah (humanly speaking) seems to be foolishness. And Abraham realizes he’s another 13 years older and may even begin to doubt that he could have any more children even with another concubine . . . which of course he would not even want to consider, realizing how much pain one time inflicted upon Sarah.

This was no small or bare promise by God: this was something so magnanimous that Abraham could not even fully grasp it.

Then God had told Abraham, not just that he would have one child, but God had told him he would make Abraham exceedingly fruitful, and “will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you” (Genesis 17:6). This was no small or bare promise by God: this was something so magnanimous that Abraham could not even fully grasp it. So in light of all that, Abraham says, “Shall a child be born to a man who is one hundred years old? And shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?” By this time Abraham and Sarah have now potentially been married over 70 years and still had produced no children.

But What About Abraham’s Long-Lived Ancestors Listed in Genesis 11?

Abraham may have been thinking of his forefathers: after Shem, who had his first son at 100, nobody in his family line is recorded as having their firstborn son after the age of 70 (see Genesis 11:12–26). Even assuming that the men had five-to-ten-year–younger wives, it is obvious that both men and women post-flood were getting past peak fertility times by the time they were 70 for men and 60 for women (assuming that the child was born to the first wife), with the “best case scenario” being 100 for men. We are not told what the upper age limit of childbearing was for women, but Sarah’s being 90 at the birth of Isaac had to be an outlier (if not unheard of) by this time. If the husband and wife hadn’t had their first child by then, based on the genealogies of Genesis 11, it seems the odds were that they wouldn’t have any. If the couple had children before that age, it seems that the men could have children until maybe 130–140 years of age at the outer edge (as his father Terah did with both him and Sarah, e.g., Genesis 20:12). But it may have been a younger wife for Abraham’s birth after Terah’s first wife had died, and that almost certainly was the case with Sarah since she was Terah’s daughter by a different mother than Abraham’s. Plus, one very important point to make here: since both Abraham and Sarah were to be in the line of the Messiah, God quite likely providentially kept Terah fertile in his older years long past the normal years of fertility.2

By contrast, Abram’s first child was at 86. By the time of Genesis 17, he was 99 and had to be wondering if he would be more fertile than Shem. That seems impossible seeing how all Shem’s subsequent children had seen a drop in lifespan and fertility lifespan.3 And Sarah, at 90, had yet to prove that she could ever have children. And even if by some miracle she could get pregnant, could her body handle childbirth at this age, and would she live through it? As far as Abraham was concerned, she was barren and seemingly would always be barren as she perhaps (and most likely) had hit menopause (as she indicated later in Genesis 18). As an example, consider that the average age of menopause in US women is 51 years4 and the average lifespan is 81 years.5 Taking that “maximum fertility percentage” of 62.9% of life and extrapolating it to Sarah’s 127 years, we get a “maximum age for fertility” of 80 years old. If it was the case that Sarah had gone through menopause already, then Abraham knew that humanly speaking, it was game over! He might as well ask God to just make Ishmael the child of promise and move forward (which he did in Genesis 17:18).

But God Had Other Ideas

It has everything to do with Sarah’s barrenness and Abraham’s age at the birth of his firstborn, and perhaps Abraham was beginning to notice his vigor wasn’t as strong as it was 13 years prior.

When viewed this way, from the likely perspective of the actual people involved, this has nothing to do with supposed “evidence for shorter lifespans.” It has everything to do with Sarah’s barrenness and Abraham’s age at the birth of his firstborn, and perhaps Abraham was beginning to notice his vigor wasn’t as strong as it was 13 years prior. Other concerns were for Sarah being able to actually take a baby to term even if she did get pregnant. And again, humanly speaking, Sarah almost certainly had already hit menopause, and Abraham knew that it was “impossible” for Sarah to have children. But even if she hadn’t yet (in Genesis 17), within the next few months she definitely had, as Genesis 18:11 makes clear.

If Abraham did stop to think about his ancestors, he realized that everyone after Shem had their firstborn by the time they were 70 years old. Plus he was aware that most of his ancestors had lived longer lives and that lifespans, and consequently fertility lifespans, were dropping.

But what is impossible humanly speaking is very possible with God (Genesis 18:14; Matthew 19:26; Luke 18:27). God had promised Abraham over and over that he would be the father of many nations. In Genesis 17:15–16, God had specifically promised that Sarah would bear Abraham a son. But both Abraham and Sarah struggled to see how God would accomplish this with their failing mortal bodies.

We know that Abraham trusted God, and lest we be too harsh on Sarah, she knew full well that she was physically beyond the age and ability to bear children naturally (Genesis 18:11–12). And although she did laugh, but then denied she had done so (Genesis 18:15), it may be that it was more out of despair with her own body and fear of having her innermost thoughts known than because of a skeptical mistrust. She knew she was past childbearing years, and her statement in Genesis 18:12 may also hint that Abraham was “past his prime” as well.6 One year later however, God’s supernatural restoration of Sarah’s womb and Abraham’s vitality resulted in the promised son, Isaac. Abraham and Sarah’s moment of too much inward focus and not enough focus on God’s ability to do the impossible was a brief interlude to an otherwise trusting and believing relationship, as the author of Hebrews attests.

By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore. (Hebrews 11:11–12)

The Last Few in the Line of Patriarchs

There is no contradiction between Genesis 11 and Genesis 17:17 through chapter 18. Lifespans and fertility were decreasing. Since Babel, mutation and genetic drift had begun to affect people in the smaller populations that had migrated away based on newly acquired languages. Loss of technology, agricultural, medical, and herbal knowledge, etc., for some groups meant a dramatic decrease in age. Abraham, at 175, died in a good old age but did not live to be as old as his forefathers and ironically did not live to be as old as his son Isaac (Genesis 35:28). But Abraham’s father, Terah, and son, Isaac, were the two outliers in an otherwise steady decline from Eber to Joseph with few exceptions for the rest of Old Testament history.

There is no contradiction between Genesis 11 and Genesis 17:17 through chapter 18. Lifespans and fertility were decreasing.

When the data from Genesis 11 is examined, it shows that the human lifespans of those born after the flood follow an exponential decay curve. Abraham, like Jacob after him (Genesis 47:9) recognized that his lifespan did not match his forefathers, but God’s supernatural revitalization of Sarah’s womb and his own vitality meant that his slightly myopic outlook would be swept aside, not just with the birth of Isaac but with several sons with his next wife Keturah, after Sarah died (Genesis 25:2). God’s promise to Abraham of nations coming from his loins was vindicated, and most importantly, it was through Isaac and Jacob that the Messianic line would be established and through which Christ would come.

Footnotes

1. With some careful examination of Genesis 11:26 and comparing that verse to Genesis 11:32 and 12:4, as well as Acts 7:4, we know Terah was 130 when Abraham was born.
2. For this article, “fertility issues” in regard to men is meant to include both biological causes (such as reduced sperm count) as well as physiological causes (physical performance issues).
3. By necessity, a significant drop in lifespan meant a drop in fertility lifespan. If Noah and his wife had children at age 600+ (for him), and his wife was perhaps 50–60 years younger, then fertility was 550–600 years. But by the 4th generation after the flood, lifespans had dropped to 230–250 years, hence fertility lifespan was cut in half at the very least. But we also notice that nobody in Genesis 11 is definitively recorded as having a child after age 140 (as would be the age at which Terah fathered Sarah). Based on Genesis 25:1–7, we know that Abraham had children by Keturah possibly as late as 140 years of age, like his father Terah, but no one else in Scripture post-flood except for Job (Job 42:12–13) is recorded as having a child past 100 years old.
4. Mayo Clinic, “Menopause,” https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/menopause/symptoms-causes/syc-20353397.
5. Statista Research Department, “Life expectancy in North America 2020,” January 20, 2021,
https://www.statista.com/statistics/274513/life-expectancy-in-north-america/.
6. Her statement in Genesis 18:12 (NKJV), “After I have grown old, shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?” almost certainly implies that Abraham might have had some physical performance issues that negated not only childbirth but also physical pleasure for Sarah. And Hebrews 11:12 is no less gentle, calling Abraham “as good as dead” with the Greek word νεκρόω (nekroo) having a secondary definition of “impotent.” Keep in mind that it was said of Moses at 120 years that his vigor was “unabated” (Deuteronomy 34:7), which of course means that men’s vigor was failing long before they were 120 in Moses’ time. And as Moses was kept unusually youthful to fulfill his purpose, so Abraham was also rejuvenated, living another 76 years and fathering at least four other children.