[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by New Era

Should also be mentioned that the average life expectancy during this time was 35-40 years. So we are talking about an oral tradition about someone it is highly likely these people never met. Oral retellings are not exactly good at maintaining detail and many times completely reshape narratives all together over time. Just go back to playing telephone in school for an example. Now multiply that by a generation or two. Great stories, but so were the stories from the Old Testament. Both are probably as accurate.

Originally Posted by Oling_Roachinen

That's because of infant mortality. Life expectancy is an average, life span is what you should be looking at.

Roman Consul's at the time had to be at least 43 years old to serve. Emperor Augustus lived until he was 75, he was followed by Tiberius who lived for 77 years.

If you lived past childhood and could avoid war, the occasional plague and of course getting crucified, you were expected to live a lot longer than 40 years.

Genesis 9:29

Noah lived a total of 950 years, and then he died.