11 And after the birth of Arpachshad, Shem went on living for five hundred years, and had sons and daughters:
And God gave them his blessing and said to them, Be fertile and have increase, and make the earth full and be masters of it; be rulers over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing moving on the earth.
And after the birth of Seth, Adam went on living for eight hundred years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Adam's life were nine hundred and thirty: and he came to his end. And Seth was a hundred and five years old when he became the father of Enosh: And he went on living after the birth of Enosh for eight hundred and seven years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Seth's life were nine hundred and twelve: and he came to his end. And Enosh was ninety years old when he became the father of Kenan: And after the birth of Kenan, Enosh went on living for eight hundred and fifteen years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Enosh were nine hundred and five: and he came to his end. And Kenan was seventy years old when he became the father of Mahalalel: And after the birth of Mahalalel, Kenan went on living for eight hundred and forty years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Kenan's life were nine hundred and ten; and he came to his end. And Mahalalel was sixty-five years old when he became the father of Jared: And after the birth of Jared, Mahalalel went on living for eight hundred and thirty years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Mahalalel's life were eight hundred and ninety-five: and he came to his end. And Jared was a hundred and sixty-two years old when he became the father of Enoch: And Jared went on living after the birth of Enoch for eight hundred years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Jared's life were nine hundred and sixty-two: and he came to his end. And Enoch was sixty-five years old when he became the father of Methuselah: And after the birth of Methuselah, Enoch went on in God's ways for three hundred years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Enoch's life were three hundred and sixty-five: And Enoch went on in God's ways: and he was not seen again, for God took him. And Methuselah was a hundred and eighty-seven years old when he became the father of Lamech: And after the birth of Lamech, Methuselah went on living for seven hundred and eighty-two years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Methuselah's life were nine hundred and sixty-nine: and he came to his end. And Lamech was a hundred and eighty-two years old when he had a son: And he gave him the name of Noah, saying, Truly, he will give us rest from our trouble and the hard work of our hands, because of the earth which was cursed by God. And after the birth of Noah, Lamech went on living for five hundred and ninety-five years, and had sons and daughters: And all the years of Lamech's life were seven hundred and seventy-seven: and he came to his end. And when Noah was five hundred years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
See, sons are a heritage from the Lord; the fruit of the body is his reward. Like arrows in the hand of a man of war, are the children of the young.
Your wife will be like a fertile vine in the inmost parts of your house: your children will be like olive plants round your table. See! this is the blessing of the worshipper of the Lord.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Genesis 11
Commentary on Genesis 11 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 11
The old distinction between the sons of God and the sons of men (professors and profane) survived the flood, and now appeared again, when men began to multiply: according to this distinction we have, in this chapter,
Gen 11:1-4
The close of the foregoing chapter tells us that by the sons of Noah, or among the sons of Noah, the nations were divided in the earth after the flood, that is, were distinguished into several tribes or colonies; and, the places having grown too strait for them, it was either appointed by Noah, or agreed upon among his sons, which way each several tribe or colony should steer its course, beginning with the countries that were next them, and designing to proceed further and further, and to remove to a greater distance from each other, as the increase of their several companies should require. Thus was the matter well settled, one hundred years after the flood, about the time of Peleg's birth; but the sons of men, it should seem, were loth to disperse into distant places; they thought the more the merrier and the safer, and therefore they contrived to keep together, and were slack to go to possess the land which the Lord God of their fathers had given them (Jos. 18:3), thinking themselves wiser than either God or Noah. Now here we have,
Gen 11:5-9
We have here the quashing of the project of the Babel-builders, and the turning of the counsel of those froward men headlong, that God's counsel might stand in spite of them. Here is,
Gen 11:10-26
We have here a genealogy, not an endless genealogy, for here it ends in Abram, the friend of God, and leads further to Christ, the promised seed, who was the son of Abram, and from Abram the genealogy of Christ is reckoned (Mt. 1:1, etc.); so that put ch. 5, ch. 11, and Mt. 1, together, and you have such an entire genealogy of Jesus Christ as cannot be produced, for aught I know, concerning any person in the world, out of his line, and at such a distance from the fountain-head. And, laying these three genealogies together, we shall find that twice ten, and thrice fourteen, generations or descents, passed between the first and second Adam, making it clear concerning Christ that he was not only the Son of Abraham, but the Son of man, and the seed of woman. Observe here,
Gen 11:27-32
Here begins the story of Abram, whose name is famous, henceforward, in both Testaments. We have here,