Methuselah

Methuselah (; Məṯūšélaḥ, in pausa Məṯūšālaḥ, "His death shall send" or "Man of the javelin" or "Death of Sword"; Mathousalas) was a biblical patriarch and a figure in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He had the longest lifespan of all those given in the Bible, having died at the age of 969. According to the Book of Genesis, Methuselah was the son of Enoch, the father of Lamech, and the grandfather of Noah. Elsewhere in the Bible, Methuselah is mentioned in genealogies in 1 Chronicles, Genesis, and the Gospel of Luke. His life is described in further detail in other texts such as the Book of Enoch, Slavonic Enoch, and the Book of Moses. Bible commentators have offered various explanations as to why the Book of Genesis describes him as having died at such an advanced age; some believe that Methuselah's age is the result of a mistranslation, while others believe that his age is used to give the impression that part of Genesis takes place in a very distant past. Methuselah's name has become synonymous with longevity, and he has been portrayed and referenced in film, television and music. In the Bible Methuselah is a biblical patriarch mentioned in Genesis 5:21–27, as part of the genealogy linking Adam to Noah. The following is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible: According to the Hebrew Bible, Methuselah begets Lamech and then lives 782 more years. When Lamech is 182 he begets Noah, and the Genesis Flood comes when Noah is 600 years old. This would imply that Methuselah dies the year of the Flood, but the Bible does not mention this. (In the Septuagint, most of the ages in this section are different. Lamech begets Noah at age 188, and Methuselah lives 802 years after begetting him.) He was also the oldest of all the figures mentioned in the Bible. Methuselah is mentioned once in the Hebrew Bible outside of Genesis, in . Methuselah is mentioned a single time in the New Testament, when the Gospel of Luke traces Jesus' lineage back to Adam in Luke 3.