generation Summary and Overview

Gen. 2:4, "These are the generations," means the "history." 5:1, "The book of the generations," means a family register, or history of Adam. 37:2, "The generations of Jacob" = the history of Jacob and his descendants. 7:1, "In this generation" = in this age. Ps. 49:19, "The generation of his fathers" = the dwelling of his fathers, i.e., the grave. Ps. 73:15, "The generation of thy children" = the contemporary race. Isa. 53:8, "Who shall declare his generation?" = His manner of life who shall declare? or rather = His race, posterity, shall be so numerous that no one shall be able to declare it. In Matt. 1:17, the word means a succession or series of persons from the same stock. Matt. 3:7, "Generation of vipers" = brood of vipers. 24:34, "This generation" = the persons then living contemporary with Christ. 1 Pet. 2:9, "A chosen generation" = a chosen people. The Hebrews seem to have reckoned time by the generation. In the time of Abraham a generation was an hundred years, thus: Gen. 15:16, "In the fourth generation" = in four hundred years (compare verse 13 and Ex. 12:40). In Deut. 1:35 and 2:14 a generation is a period of thirty-eight years.

In the long-lived patriarchal age a generation seems to have been computed at 100 years, #Ge 15:16| comp. Gene 15:13 and Eccl 12:40 but subsequently the reckoning was the same which has been adopted by modern civilized nations, viz. from thirty to forty years #Job 42:16| (Generation is also used to signify the men of an age or time, as contemporaries, #Ge 6:9; Isa 53:8| posterity, especially in legal formulae, #Le 3:17| etc.; fathers, or ancestors. #Ps 49:19|

GENERA'TION or GENERA'TIONS "has three secondary meanings in the A.V.: 1. A genealogical register, as Gen 5:1. 2. A family history, Gen 6:9; Gen 25:1, since early history among the Orientals is drawn so much from genealogical registers. 3. A history of the origin of things as well as persons -- e.g. of the earth." -- Smith.

Hebrew dowr, "revolution," period of time; 100 years in the patriarchal age (Genesis 15:13; Genesis 15:16; Exodus 12:40), afterward 30 or 40 years (Job 42:16; Luke 1:50). On the plural GENERATIONS, Hebrew toledowt, (See GENEALOGY. Mankind is ethnologically ranged under three heads in Genesis 10:3; Genesis 10:6; Genesis 10:22, "the sons of Japhet, Ham, Shem." Modern science by independent research arrives at a similar three fold division into Semitic, Aryan, and Turanian (Allophylian). Genesis, in accordance with modern ethnology, classifies together the Cymry or Celts (Gomer), the Medes (Madai), and the Ionians or Greeks (Javan); thus anticipating the Indo-European theory, which makes the European races (represented by the Celts and the Ionians) akin to the Aryans (represented by the Asiatic Madai or Medes). Also Scripture, in agreement with ethnology, groups together as "children of Shem" (i.e. Semitics) Asshur (Assyrians), Aram (Syrians), Eber (Hebrew), and Joktan (the Joktanian Arabs). Also it rightly classifies under the "sons of Ham" Cash (Ethiopians), Mizraim (Egyptians), Sheba and Dedan (certain southern Arabs), and Nimrod (i.e. the oldest Babylonians). (See BABEL) Sir H. Rawlinson truly terms "the generations (genealogy) of the sons of Noah" "the most authentic record we possess for the affiliation of nations" (Journal of the Asiatic Society, 15:230). Generation means also the men of an age: as Isaiah 53:8, "who shall declare His generation?" i.e. their wickedness, in parallelism to their oppressive "judgment." In Jeremiah 7:29, "generation of His wrath," i.e. with whom He is angry. Also generation is used with reference to the characteristic disposition of the age, "adulterous," "unbelieving," "untoward" (Matthew 11:16; Matthew 12:39; Matthew 17:17; Acts 2:40). In Luke 16:8, "the children of this world are in respect to their own (so the Greek) generation (i.e. in relation to men of their own kind, men of this world) wiser than the children of light," are in respect to their generation (men of their kind, godly, men of the world to come). In Matthew 3:7 generation means "brood of vipers." In Matthew 24:34 "this generation shall not pass (namely, the Jewish race, of which the generation in Christ's days was a sample in character; compare Christ's address to the generation, Matthew 23:35-36, in proof that generation means at times the whole Jewish race) until all these things be fulfilled," a prophecy that the Jews shall be a distinct people still when He shall come again.