To The Land Of Canaan

Call to Worship

Philippians 3:13–21 NKJV

Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you. Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us be of the same mind. Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk, as you have us for a pattern. For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame—who set their mind on earthly things. For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.

This is the Word of the Lord

Thanks be to God

Intro

Body

Genesis 11:10–26 NKJV

This is the genealogy of Shem: Shem was one hundred years old, and begot Arphaxad two years after the flood. After he begot Arphaxad, Shem lived five hundred years, and begot sons and daughters. Arphaxad lived thirty-five years, and begot Salah. After he begot Salah, Arphaxad lived four hundred and three years, and begot sons and daughters. Salah lived thirty years, and begot Eber. After he begot Eber, Salah lived four hundred and three years, and begot sons and daughters. Eber lived thirty-four years, and begot Peleg. After he begot Peleg, Eber lived four hundred and thirty years, and begot sons and daughters. Peleg lived thirty years, and begot Reu. After he begot Reu, Peleg lived two hundred and nine years, and begot sons and daughters. Reu lived thirty-two years, and begot Serug. After he begot Serug, Reu lived two hundred and seven years, and begot sons and daughters. Serug lived thirty years, and begot Nahor. After he begot Nahor, Serug lived two hundred years, and begot sons and daughters. Nahor lived twenty-nine years, and begot Terah. After he begot Terah, Nahor lived one hundred and nineteen years, and begot sons and daughters. Now Terah lived seventy years, and begot Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

The age of Shem

Shem was 100 years old 2 years after the flood

That means he was 98 during the year of the flood.

Genesis 5:32 “And Noah was five hundred years old, and Noah begot Shem, Ham, and Japheth.”

Genesis 7:11 “In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.”

If Shem was 98 the year of the flood, Noah had to be 502 years old the year Shem was born, meaning that Shem was not the firstborn.

It had to be either Japheth or Ham who was born when Noah was 500.

Genesis 10:21 “And children were born also to Shem, the father of all the children of Eber, the brother of Japheth the elder.”

The Hebrew here could be translated as either Shem or Japheth being the oldest.

So if we take all these verses together,

Japheth was the eldest born when Noah was 500

Shem was born when Noah was 502

Ham is the youngest

Genesis 9:24 “So Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done to him.”

Declining life spans

Masoretic

Shem lived 100 years, begot Arphaxad, and lived another 500, for a total of 600 years

Arphaxad lived 35 years, begot Salah, and lived another 403 for a total of 438 years

Salah lived 33 years, begot Eber, and lived another 403 for a total of 436 years

Eber lived 34 years, begot Peleg, and lived another 433 for a total of 467 years

Peleg lived 34 years, begot Reu, and lived another 209 for a total of 243 years

Reu lived 32 years, begot Serug, and lived another 207 for a total of 239 years

Serug lived 30 years, begot Nahor, and lived another 200 for a total of 230 years

Nahor lived 29 years, begot Terah, and lived another 119 for a total of 148 years

Abraham would live to be 175

Isaac 180

Jacob 147

Joseph 110

Different ages in the Septuagint and the addition of Cainan in between Arphaxad and Salah

Arphaxad lived 135 years, begot Cainan, and lived another 430 for a total of 565 years

Cainan lived 130 years, begot Salah and lived another 330 for a total of 460 years

Salah lived 130 years, begot Eber, and lived another 403 for a total of 533 years

Eber lived 134 years, begot Peleg, and lived another 370 for a total of 504 years

Peleg lived 130 years, begot Reu, and lived another 209 for a total of 339 years

Reu lived 132 years, begot Serug, and lived another 207 for a total of 239 years

Serug lived 130 years, begot Nahor, and lived another 200 for a total of 230 years

Nahor lived 79 years, begot Terah, and lived another 129 for a total of 208 years

How long after the Flood was Peleg born?

Masoretic - 104 years

Septuagint- 531 years

427 extra years until Babel in the Septuagint.

How long until Abram from the Flood?

Masoretic- 295 years

Septuagint- 1072 years

Why does this matter?

Scripture is inerrant and infallible, but this only applies to the original manuscripts

Moses autographs were perfect, but the copies weren’t

Joseph Smith had his own translation of the Bible; do we trust it?

The JWs have their own translation; is it reliable?

Scribes made mistakes

Translators make errors.

But God has preserved His Word

From the time of the Apostles to this day, God has preserved the Gospel message in the Church.

Though false teachers have come and gone, though heresies have prevailed for a time, a remnant of faithful has remained and brought reformation.

God can use even perverted translations like Joseph Smith Bible or Watchtower translation to convey his Gospel message.

God has also physically preserved His Word.

Though we don’t have a perfect copy of the original manuscripts today, we have 1000s of manuscripts which together contain what was in the originals.

We can compare variations of the texts to come to a conclusion of what the originals most likely said.

Because we have all the possibilities, we know we’re not missing out on what God “really said.”

So how do we determine which variation is correct?

Some variations are simple copyist errors

missing a letter or word, or adding a letter or word.

Some are a little bit more noticeable, like skipping a line as one was copying a page.

Others mistakenly included scribal footnotes as part of the main text

We can compare the different versions and see what the original said.

A silly example of what a variant in English could be: Did King whatshisname purchase 700 horses for his army, or 700 houses for his army?

It seems more likely that an army would need horses, so we could safely assume ‘horses’ was the correct variant.

So should we go with the Septuagint Genealogy or the Masoretic?

The Masoretic text is a Hebrew textual tradition that most modern translations use.

It was standardized around 1000 years after Christ.

Some of the variations between it and the LXX are potentially antichristian.

Since the faithful Jews followed Christ, those that remained followed in the traditions of the Pharisees.

There was obviously motive for them to alter certain texts if it could discredit Jesus as Messiah.

This isn’t proof, however, that the text was altered intentionally.

The Septuagint, or LXX, was a Greek translation of the Hebrew, completed a couple hundred years before the birth of Christ.

It was the Old Testament used among Greek Speaking Jews and the early Church.

Most old Testament quotations in the New Testament are from the Septuagint.

Sometimes, a new testament citation of the old testament won’t line up if you check the OT reference.

This is most likely because your translation uses the Masoretic for the OT, but the New Testament author used the LXX for it’s citation.

Isaiah 7:14: The MT reads "almah" (young woman), while the LXX reads "parthenos" (virgin), which Matthew identifies as being Messianic prophecy.

Other examples: Some argue that the MT downplays or alters other messianic prophecies in the LXX.

Both traditions have variations with the exact numbers, but I think we should consider the Septuagint to be closer to the original writing of Moses, at least in this Chapter, for 3 reasons.

It makes more sense with the extra years in the Septuagint for both the birth of Abram, and the events at Babel.

If Babel happened only 100 years after the Flood, why didn’t Noah and his sons rebuke the people?

However, if Babel was over 500 years after the flood, Shem had been dead for about 30 years by the time Babel occurred, and it would provide more time for the people needed to build a city and tower to rebel against God.

If Abram was born about 300 years after the flood, Noah would have still been alive and we would be further in time to the pilgrims landing at Plymouth Rock than Abram was to the great Flood.

However, Abram was born over 1000 years after the Flood, it would make sense how sinful the world had become, since those who had witnessed the judgement of God in the Flood had been dead for Centuries.

It also makes the “begetting age” and the decline of lifespan more consistent and gradual than the Masoretic.

Shem started begetting at 100, then all of his descendants started in their 30s or late 20s until Terah came along who started at 70.

We are not given an exhaustive list and are not told if the son begotten is the eldest or not, but if 8 generations before Terah had started having sons around 30 and Terah didn’t until he was 70, it just flows more smoothly, showing the gradual decline and decay in the lifespan of humanity.

Lastly, the Septuagint timeline lines up nearly perfectly with Egyptian and Mesoptamian Dynastic timelines.

Scripture is our authority, we don’t look to extra biblical sources to determine what is true about Scripture, but when we have two possibilities, like the horse/house example, what makes more logical sense?

God’s Word is true, but we have two possibilities for what God’s Word is saying, it’s okay to use extra biblical insight to determine which one is more likely closer to God’s original manuscripts.

This is not an excuse to use naturalistic and evolutionary timelines to force millions and billions of years into the text of Genesis 1.

Lastly, in Luke Chapter 3, Luke gives us a genealogy of Christ from Adam, and he includes Cainan, meaning at a minimum, he believed there should be an extra patriarch in the lineage between Shem and Abram.

This alone would cause me to trust the Septuagint Geneaology over the Masoretic, (if not the exact numbers), since it includes a figure completely omitted from the Masoretic timeline and I’m allowing Scripture to determine Scripture.

In conclusion on this subject, I believe the Septuagint timeline is probably more accurate, but neither one changes the Gospel message.

This is not something to divide over or to require for salvation.

Genesis 11:27–32 NKJV

This is the genealogy of Terah: Terah begot Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Haran begot Lot. And Haran died before his father Terah in his native land, in Ur of the Chaldeans. Then Abram and Nahor took wives: the name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor’s wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran the father of Milcah and the father of Iscah. But Sarai was barren; she had no child. And Terah took his son Abram and his grandson Lot, the son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram’s wife, and they went out with them from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan; and they came to Haran and dwelt there. So the days of Terah were two hundred and five years, and Terah died in Haran.

Terah was an idolater

Joshua 24:2 “And Joshua said to all the people, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘Your fathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, dwelt on the other side of the River in old times; and they served other gods.”

Although Abram is listed first and we might assume that Abram was the first born of Terah at the age of 70 years from verse 26

Acts 7:4 “Then he came out of the land of the Chaldeans and dwelt in Haran. And from there, when his father was dead, He moved him to this land in which you now dwell.”

Genesis 12:4 “So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken to him, and Lot went with him. And Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.”

So if we take Terah’s lifespan of 205, subract Abram’s departure age of 75, Terah would have been 130 when Abram was born, meaning he was not the eldest.

This would also make more sense of his brother Haran dying before Abram and Lot not being that much younger than Abram.

Application

God made man perfect (Adam)

Man fell and sin entered into creation.

Mankind fell into apostasy

After 10 generations, God started over with the family of one faithful man (Noah) by destroying all the earth.

Sin quickly reasserted its dominion

After 10 generations, God calls out Abram to start a new nation.

Creation is full of repeating patterns

They are a reminder to us of the truth of God, the reality of sin, and the need of Christ.

Terah set out from Ur, heading towards Canaan, but he died in Haran.

Not all who set out for the Promised Land make it.

See the pattern of Terah, reject your idols, repent of your sin, finish the journey to Canaan, to the Promise Land, to Salvation found in Jesus Christ.

Take the pattern that was set before us by our parents and grandparents

the things that were good, emulate

the things that were bad, reject and repent of.

Terah started to Canaan, but did not forsake all his false gods, and ended up dying in Haran.

Abram would come to reject the gods of his father and follow the true God to Canaan and arrive in the promised land.

In our faith, let us not copy the pattern of Terah, who only made it halfway to Canaan and died in his sin

Let us copy Abram, who fully forsook the gods of his father, embracing the living God, and finished his journey to the promised land of Canaan.

Hebrews 12:1–3 “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.”