PART 3

That Which Was Lost

The Adamic Millennium

Overview

The amount of time from the creation of Adam to the birth of Noah is 1,056 years. As stated in the preface to the series, each millennium has the birth of an important biblical figure, or historical event, give or take 50 years, or so. Therefore this millennium is called The Adamic Millennium since Adam begins the millennium. The second millennium begins with Noah, thus called The Noahic Millennium, but it intersects two worlds. The first part of Noah's life is lived in the antediluvian world, whereas the remainder of his life is lived in the post-diluvian world, which is the subject of the next volume. This volume is only concerned with the world that was before the Flood. That world totals 1,656 years of existence before it was destroyed. When we say destroyed, we mean most of the life that existed. We still live on the same planet, of course, but it has been greatly transformed.

To read details of timeline, click on image.

The timeline shows only the first 1,000 years. As the model in the preface to the series showed, there are two lines drawn. The top line marks out (in a relative scale broken up in 200 year increments) the lives of the righteous. These are the men listed in Genesis chapter 5, and are the messianic lineage. Josephus refers to these men as the governors [1] of the world. The ages and births are carefully recorded in the Genesis, and provide the scale for the timeline. The second line shows Cain's descendants up to the three sons of Lamech, who developed the crafts of civilization. No ages are given in the Bible for this line, therefore, liberty has been taken to line them up by sequence of generations parallel to the righteous line. In the series, this line will be used to note significant events and births in world history. In this volume, it only approximates possible times of secular events narrated in Genesis. No ages are given for Cain and Able, so they are approximated. The birth of Seth is given with the age of Adam, so the chronology begins with Seth.

The Lifeline Chart uses the biblical information of ages and births to mathematically plot out the length of lives in comparison to the succeeding generations. The chart demonstrates some significant information. First of all, Adam lived 930 years which means that he was still alive before Enoch was translated, and died just after Lamech, Noah's father was born. Noah was born almost 200 years later and Seth had died as well, but Enos (Adam's grandson) was still alive, as well as all the other antediluvian patriarchs. Noah would have the chance to know the creation story, the promise of the Messiah, and thoroughly understood the antediluvian world. This knowledge would be passed on to his sons and the early inhabitants of the post-diluvian world.

Since the Lifeline includes Noah's complete life, a glimpse of the early post-diluvian world is given, as well. As can be seen, major changes occurred early in that ancient time. New races began quickly with the changed environment; the languages were divided soon after the Flood; and after the men were scattered, they were separated by a rapid continental division, which promoted the development of many cultures. It is not likely that this existed in the pre-flood world. We know for sure that everyone spoke one language, since Genesis 11:1 says so. With a uniform global climate and environment, the genes for racial division probably remained recessive until the canopy was shattered, so the antediluvians were probably all one race. And since all the land was connected, they were probably not separated which means only one culture with two subdivisions existed. That culture was the one set up by Adam and Seth's line as ordained by God, with the subdivision being Cain's descendants in rebellion. But even they held to common standards that was merely modified, so it was still one culture. More on the post-flood events will be discussed in the next volume.

Very little information is given about the lives of the antediluvians, but much can be gleaned from the meaning of their names. Even in the post-flood world, importance was given to the naming of children. An effort to describe something significant about their character or a peculiar circumstance occurring at their birth was reflected in their names. Many times the names were a correct reflection of the child's character. But many times they were not. What is more likely to be correct, is that the naming of the child reflects something about the parents. In writing about the lives of these people, the speculation given on the child's name places more importance upon what might have been happening to the parents.