I am in the process of writing my latest book, The Gospel of Life and Immortality, which I plan to publish later this year. While researching for the book I began doing a fairly in-depth study on Genesis 6:3 and the math associated with how long Adam’s descendants of the line of Seth lived, the most well-known being Noah. Most people know the story about how God told Noah to build an ark because He was going to wipe everyone out with a flood due to their evil, and this was one of the main Bible stories I learned as a young child. Long-term, this has had an impact on how I viewed God the Father, as He always seemed a very harsh taskmaster, while Jesus was always kind and loving.
This recent study I did caused me to go word-by-word through Genesis 6:3, studying not just the word meanings but having to retranslate the verse, and I was astounded by what I found. I had a hard time believing it at first, largely because the Bible has been translated so many times that it is hard for me to understand how so many different people have missed it, but what I found is a game-changer in how we view God and His nature as revealed in the Old Testament. I am going to share what I found, as well as a little bit of the other details of my study. It is going to get a bit nerdy and look at words in Hebrews, so bear with me as I think you will be pretty astounded by what I found too.
Genesis 6:3 says, “Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years” (NIV). I began looking at this because I wanted to see why people use this verse to put an “age-cap” on how long we are allowed to live. In doing math, it simply doesn’t work as ten generations of descendants of Noah lived far longer than 120 after this verse. Thus, while that’s not what the verse means, I don’t want to focus on that, as it isn’t the point of this article. What that realization did do, however, is make me look deeper at the verse, as if the verse wasn’t sharing a limit on human longevity, then what did it mean?
Before going further, we need to remember that translation is an art, not an exact science. Translators have to do some decision-making as to the author’s intentions when putting a work into a different language, as many words, parts of speech, and even word-order of the sentence do not match up across languages. I regularly read books online that I read, one chapter at a time as they are translated. What invariably happens is that later in the novel, a translator will realize a word they have been translating one way for dozens of chapters is better translated another way. He or she discovers this based on insights the author leaves in the text, but because those insights occurred later in the book, I am able to witness how the translator’s new perspective changes how they interpret word meanings. For someone who starts reading after the entire work is completed, it will all get changed and they will never know, but for those of us who read it in-process, we can not only tell that a change was made but can also recognize the difference in emphasis the change makes. In other words, translators have tough decisions to make, so it is understandable when things are mistranslated, as it’s rarely intentional. Nevertheless, we also need to be brave enough to identify when a translation needs to be updated to better reflect what the text should say.
The Bible is no different. Translators look at scripture verses and do their best to put the author’s intended meaning into another language. Mistakes are made, and sometimes there is no “correct” way to do it, so a translator has to make an educated guess. At times, translators make mistakes, and as we learn and grow in our understanding of who God is and what He is like, we are able to spot some of those mistranslations. Sometimes, as is the case here, it significantly changes what a sentence means.
In the NIV Genesis 6:3 says “Then the Lord said, ‘My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years’.” This verse is translated pretty congruently across many translations. In Hebrew the sentence says “Yĕhovah ‘amar ruwach `owlam diyn ‘adam gam basar shagag yowm me’ah `esriym shaneh. If you translate the thirteen words in this sentence based not just off of what one thinks it should mean based on what we have been taught, but instead based off of how the words are translated throughout the rest of scripture and following actual grammar rules, Genesis 6:3 is best translated as follows:
“God said, ‘my Spirit shall eternally plead man’s cause, but the length of time for flesh to sin and go astray is/will be 120 years of time.’ (emphasis mine)”
A BIG difference!
It is obvious that this translation significantly differs from other translations, so let’s look at why. The first three words, “Yĕhovah ‘amar ruwach, are pretty straightforward, and are generally translated correctly, saying “The Lord said, ‘My Spirit . . .’” Everything after that, however, is where it goes wrong.
First, there is no word of negation in this sentence, and certainly not in the first part where in needs to be. For those who aren’t familiar, a word of negation is something like “no” or “not”. It is a word or article that denotes the opposite or negative of something occurring. Where Genesis 6:3 is consistently translated as “my Spirit will not contend”, the “not” simply doesn’t exist in the Hebrew. The fourth word `owlam is usually translated in scripture as “everlasting, forever, perpetual, or eternal.” If there is no word for negation, then why did it get translated into “will not forever” if the “not” isn’t actually written there? Why have so many different translators inserted it there.
I think it’s pretty simple. Based on how they understand the verse they are translating, it doesn’t make any sense if God were to say “My Spirit will contend with man forever,” as logically, God is contending either for 120 years or forever, but not both. In order for the sentence to make sense to them, they added the “not” in there. The problem is that it totally changes the meaning of the sentence into something it never said to begin with.
Let’s continue to look at this sentence. The fifth word, diyn, means a series of things, including “to act as a judge, please a cause, contend, strive, and govern”. Of the five options, why did the translators choose the words contend or strive? I’m not sure, but it probably had a lot to do with their view of an angry God who was getting ready to judge the people of the world for their many sins, so they chose a translation option that fit their expectation of the sentence meaning. Remember, however, that since the first part of the sentence doesn’t include a word of negation, then continuing to translate the sentence this way makes it all break down. Why would God plan to contend or strive with us forever? That literally makes no sense. And since it doesn’t make any sense, then we need to pick one of the translation options that does make sense, especially since there are five of them. We know from scripture that God will not judge us forever because of Jesus, so that doesn’t make sense either. All we have left is for God to govern us forever, or to plead our cause forever. Of those two choices, it seems more reasonable that the sentence would say God is pleading our cause eternally. Why? God is the sovereign authority of all creation, so He doesn’t need to announce that He will govern us forever—that’s a given. This leaves the first five words of the thirteen-word sentence meaning “God said, ‘my Spirit shall eternally plead man’s cause . . .
Additionally, we have the benefit of hindsight and we know a good deal more about God’s nature as a result of Jesus coming to earth to reveal Him. The book of Hebrews shows us that God sent Jesus to plead our cause before Him eternally (Hebrews 7:25, 9:15), and that while we were enemies of God He came to die on our behalf (Romans 5:8-10), so it doesn’t make any sense that God would be judging us or fighting against us eternally anyway. We know from Scripture that Jesus and the Father are one (John 10:30) and Jesus revealed the Father’s nature (John 14:9-10) which means that if Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8) then God is the same in the beginning pre-incarnation as He is now, pleading our cause eternally to make us righteous in Him. Said simply, Jesus’ nature shows us God’s nature, and they are still one and the same, pleading our cause for eternity. If we look at the second half of the sentence, we start with the sixth word, ‘adam, which is straightforward, meaning “man” or “mankind”. The seventh word gam means “also”, “but”, “yet”, or “though”. The eighth, basar, means “flesh”, and the ninth, shagag, means “to go astray”, “commit sin”, or “error”. The tenth word, yowm, means “day”, “time” or “period of time”. The rest of the sentence is again straightforward with me’ah `esriym literally meaning the number one-hundred twenty, and the thirteenth word shaneh meaning “years” or “years of time”.
If we put the second half of the sentence together it says “. . . but the period of time for flesh to sin and go astray is/will be 120 years.” When we pull it all together, it says what I wrote earlier: “God said, ‘my Spirit shall eternally plead man’s cause, but the length of time for flesh to sin and go astray is/will be 120 years of time.’”
When I came across this, I was shocked. I mean, really shocked. I was thinking about it the rest of that night. Why? Because translating Genesis 6:3 this way totally changes how we have to view the events of the Great Flood. Now that we have identified what the verse is really saying, it shows us that the flood didn’t happen because God was angry and fed up with humanity. In fact, it said the exact opposite! It said that in spite of our sinful ways, God would always fight for us. Furthermore, it showed us God’s mercy in giving a warning that in under 120 years there would be some calamity that would come that would put a limit on the ability for all flesh to commit sin and go astray. In fact, not only does this not say that God caused the flood, but it causes us to really have to look at the fact that Jesus revealed in John 10:10 that the thief is the one who kills and destroys.
If the enemy is the one who causes death and destruction, and the Great Flood caused an immense amount of death and destruction, then we cannot blame the flood on God anymore. By translating Genesis 6:3 properly, it only further shows us that God was not actually against us, judging us by the flood, but pleading our cause forever instead! Not only that, but God actively worked to forestall the flood on our behalf. Sin causes death, and the outworking of sowing and reaping is enough to account for how the enemy gained access through our sin to cause the Great Flood in the earth and kill all land-dwelling creatures, not God.
Hindsight shows us that the flood actually been revealed to Enoch over 800 years prior, whereby he prophesied it in the naming of his son Methuselah. We have to remember that because Enoch was a prophet, and because Old Testament prophets would give their children prophetic names at the Lord’s direction, Methuselah’s name is likewise prophetic. Author and speaker Chuck Missler has done a revealing exposition on the meanings of the names in Genesis 5, but we will look at Methuselah’s name specifically. His name comes from two root Hebrew words: muth, a root word that means “death or to die”; and from shalach, which means “to shoot forth, send forth, or set free/release.” His name is a prophetic statement that literally means “death will bring it forth” or “death will release it”. Whose death? Methuselah’s. What will it bring forth? Well, doing some math from the genealogies in Genesis 5, Methuselah died the same year that the flood covered the earth. Is it a coincidence, then, or the fulfillment of a prophetic warning that his death would cause the flood to be released? Something about the righteousness on Methuselah’s life caused the judgment of the flood to be held back, and God in his mercy ensured that Methuselah’s life was extended longer than any other recorded human alive so as to spare everyone as long as possible.
I believe we have to reimagine our view of the Great Flood. While we used to see it as one of the ways God stood in firm judgment against humanity, what it actually shows us is a Heavenly Father in His infinite mercy who is standing on our side. He warned people of the flood at least a century in advance so they could prepare for it as well. If anyone else had heeded the advice God gave to Noah, they too would have been spared, but no one did.
As I realized this, and even now, I am having to re-work some of my long-held views about God and His nature. I cannot look at the Great Flood the same way any longer, as the scriptures simply do not support the narrative I have believed for years, and which I was taught as a child. Furthermore, it calls many other things into question. If we have badly misunderstood the Flood, one of the most well-known Bible stories, how many other stories did we get wrong? What else needs a better translation that actually more clearly reveals the heart of our Heavenly Father toward us? And how does this force us to change our view of God? I believe that the more God continues to reveal Himself in the scriptures, the more He will reveal His unending goodness, far more than we have ever realized before.
