Genesis 11:11

11 And Sem lived, after he had begotten Arphaxad, five hundred years, and begot sons and daughters, and died.

Genesis 11:11 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 11:11

And Shem lived, after he begat Arphaxad, five hundred years,
&c.] So that his whole age was six hundred years, and therefore must live to the times of Abraham, and even throughout the life of that patriarch, or near the end of it; and if he was the same with Melchizedek, as is the general opinion of the Jews, and is embraced by many Christians, they had an interview with each other:

and begat sons and daughters;
of whom we have no account, because the Messiah did not spring from them; the design of this genealogy being to carry down his direct line from Shem to Abraham: it is to be observed, that in the account of the patriarchs, and their children after the flood, it is not added as before the flood, "and he died", their lives being long, that remark is made; but the lives of these being shorter, and gradually decreasing, it is omitted. An Arabic writer ^F24 says, that Shem died in the month Elul, on a Friday, at the close of the year of the world 2758. A Jewish writer ^F25 says, he died in the fifteenth year of Jacob, and that he saw twelve generations; according to Bishop Usher, he died A. M. 2158.

---

FOOTNOTES:

F24 Elmacinus, p. 13. apud Hottinger. Smegma, p. 258.
F25 R. Gedaliah, Shalshalet, fol. 1. 2.

Genesis 11:11 In-Context

9 On this account its name was called Confusion, because there the Lord confounded the languages of all the earth, and thence the Lord scattered them upon the face of all the earth.

10 And these the generations of Sem: and Sem was a hundred years old when he begot Arphaxad, the second year after the flood.

11 And Sem lived, after he had begotten Arphaxad, five hundred years, and begot sons and daughters, and died.

12 And Arphaxad lived a hundred and thirty-five years, and begot Cainan.

13 And Arphaxad lived after he had begotten Cainan, four hundred years, and begot sons and daughters, and died. And Cainan lived a hundred and thirty years and begot Sala; and Canaan lived after he had begotten Sala, three hundred and thirty years, and begot sons and daughters, and died.