His Days Shall Be 120 Years

A friend of mine recently posted this passage from Genesis on Facebook.  It struck me as fascinating that, 2,000 years ago, writers were thinking about human beings living to be 120 years old.

“When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose. Then the Lord said, ‘My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.'”

Of course, the Bible, like the other holy books of its ilk, bears multiple interpretations.  To dive into a literal interpretation of books written with such passion and inspiration is, in my humble opinion, derogatory to their best value. But I’m not re-posting this passage here as a means to sermonize.  I just happen to think that there is something to people living longer than their life expectancy – and not necessarily by artificial means, but through better living and cooperation with the land, infused with the wisdom gleaned from 10,000 years since hunting and gathering.  Or, perhaps, returning to the wisdom which carried through the 500,000 years of hunting and gathering itself.

It makes for interesting story material.  Its a trope, somewhat, maybe, this idea of people living longer – we’ve seen it in a variety of science fiction works.  I wrote my own short story about living longer called Enceladus, but I stuck it away in the desk drawer.  Maybe this passage gives me the inspiration to dust it off and see if I can make it presentable enough for sharing.

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