Welcome again everyone to the Methodist Voice podcast and Happy Thanksgiving to you this year of 2023. Today we are going to delve into some conjecture that is drawing conclusions that are formed on the basis of incomplete or unsure information. For the record, I do not consider any of the other information I have shared to be conjecture. I believe that information is based on solid evidence and thinking, but I'll be upfront about more speculative information we share here.
So that being said, I wouldn't be sharing this if I didn't think it was true. So we're not just off in La La Land here. I have been reading several books by an author I just stumbled upon named Ken Johnson. I discovered him through the Remnant Radio podcast, a very good podcast you should check out.
So the insights I'm going to be sharing today on the genealogies of Genesis 5 are based upon his research into the Dead Sea Scrolls as well as other ancient texts that quite frankly are not as reliable as the Dead Sea Scrolls are. It's for that reason that I call this information conjecture. Some of these documents like the ancient book of Jasher are suspect. Now just because the book itself is suspicious doesn't mean the information it contains is inaccurate.
In fact, much of the information in Jasher can be resourced also in Second Temple Jewish scholarship. So it isn't fabricated, it isn't legend, it just isn't as reliable as other texts such as the Dead Sea Scrolls. We know these documents are very important even though they aren't authoritative like canonized scripture is authoritative because much of the information found in those documents functions as source material for what we find in canonized scripture.
So let me give you an example of that. In 2 Peter chapter 2 verse 5 Noah is called a preacher of righteousness. Now upon reading that I always wondered where did Peter get that from? It doesn't say anywhere in Genesis, the Genesis stories that Noah preached to anyone. Well like a lot of other New Testament commentary on the Old Testament, that information can be found in extra biblical sources like the Book of Jubilees found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
You will also find it recorded in Second Temple Jewish literature like the Babylonian Talmud. And since the Holy Spirit guided Peter to record this information in actual scripture, it's right and it's useful source material. Now I could give you several other examples but I don't want to beat a dead horse and I want to move on.
So according to Ken Johnson's research from his book The Ancient Mysteries of the Essenes, what Genesis chapter 5 is communicating isn't just the godly bloodline of Adam as most commentators will point out, but it is also detailing an ancient line of prophet-priest kings that Adam would eventually be represented by the mysterious Melchizedek figure found in Genesis 14.
We can deduce from scripture that Adam was a king from Genesis chapter 1 because he's commissioned to have dominion over all the earth. That is what kings do. His priestly duties become necessary as a consequence of the fall. Now mediation between God and man is necessary. That's what a priest does, mediates between God and human beings. That's necessary as a consequence of the fall, but before the fall no mediation is required so that priestly office would not have been necessary.
As we mentioned on a previous episode, Adam learns animal sacrifice, a priestly duty, from God himself as God kills an animal to make a covering for Adam and his nakedness. It's likely on the threshing floor of Arana or Mount Moriah or Mount Zion, whatever you want to call it, that's where the original Jewish temple once stood is currently occupied by the Al-Aqsa mosque that this instruction from God took place.
Now it says that according to the Babylonian Talmud, it was close to here on the side of the altar, the threshing floor of Arana, that God gathered the earth was formed into Adam. It was on this rock that Adam and later Cain and Abel and Noah offered sacrifices to God. Now these men listed in Genesis 5 were also prophets in that God instructed them in advance what was going to come in the future.
So here's what is recorded in the book of Jasher about the prophet-priest-king mentioned in Antiquity after Adam. And Canaan, Canaan is the son of Enos, Enos is the son of Seth, and Canaan grew up and he was 40 years old and he became wise and had knowledge and skill and all wisdom. And he reigned over all the sons of men and he led the sons of men in wisdom and knowledge.
And Canaan knew by his wisdom that God would destroy the sons of men for having sinned upon the earth and that the Lord would in the latter days bring upon them the waters of the flood. And in those days Canaan wrote upon tablets of stone what was to take place in time to come and he put them in his treasures. That's from the ancient book of Jasher. Ken Johnson goes on to point out, Canaan reigned over the whole earth and he turned some of the sons of men to the service of God.
The next king after Canaan was a man named Enoch. Here's what Jasher, the book of Jasher says about Enoch. Enoch reigned over the sons of men 243 years and he did justice and righteousness with all his people and he led them in the ways of the Lord. Now we know this is correct information because it's verified in scripture in Genesis chapter five. But we have an ancient book of Enoch that was found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Not only that, the book of Enoch is cited by the Bible, the New Testament, in two places and is directly quoted in one of the books. So this is no unimportant book. It was hotly debated by the early church fathers as to whether or not it should be included in the canon, which it wasn't, and it probably shouldn't have been. But keep in mind, the Dead Sea Scrolls predate the books of the New Testament by orders of hundreds of years. So I want to read to you a prophecy from the book of Enoch.
God gave Enoch a prophecy that the Messiah would come 70 generations from his time. And so here's what that prophecy actually says. This is from Enoch 10-11. The Lord said to Michael, Michael the Archangel, go tell Simeazah, Simeazah is one of the angels that rebelled against God that we're going to read about in Genesis six. Go tell Simeazah and his associates who have defiled themselves by marrying women that they and all those they contaminated will be destroyed.
When they have seen their sons slay one another and all their loved ones destroyed, bind them for 70 generations under the valleys of the earth, that would be a place called Tartarus, that word is used in the New Testament, until the day of their judgment and of their end till their last judgment be passed for all eternity. So they're to be bound in this prison called Tartarus. You'll find that in ancient Greek mythology.
So Greek mythology kind of overlaps with the Bible in some of these stories because they're all based upon real events as we'll read about in Genesis chapter six and we'll also read from the book of Enoch. But the point for here is this is a prophecy Enoch receives hundreds of years, the oldest documents we have of Enoch are hundreds of years older than the New Testament, found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
We know they have authority and it says 70 generations from Enoch, these beings that rebelled against God, we're going to read about in Genesis chapter six, are going to receive their final judgment. Now I want to read to you a passage from the New Testament. This is from first Peter chapter 318.
It says for Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison because they formerly did not obey when God's patient waited in the days of Noah while the ark was being prepared in which a few, that is eight persons were brought safely through in water. Now listen, think about this.
Jesus Christ, once he died and made atonement for humanity, went to those spirits to give them the orders that they had been defeated, their work had been defeated and they were finally judged. What is most remarkable of all about this story is that in the genealogy of Luke of Jesus, that's Luke chapter three verses 23 through 28, it verifies in Luke that Jesus Christ is the 70th generation from Enoch. Wow. That's amazing.
And it says in the book of Genesis chapter five, Enoch walked with God and he was not for God took him. So Enoch was an amazing prophet. He named his son Methuselah. Now that name, we're getting back to Ken Johnson's work now. That name is made up of two Hebrew words. First one is meth, meaning death. I wonder why they, that's why they call it crystal meth, crystal death. Meth meaning death and seila meaning to send. These two words put together form a Hebrew sentence.
Methuselah's name means when he is dead, it shall be sent. If you look carefully at the genealogical records given in Genesis five, Jasher five through six, the Cedar of Olam, it is clear that Methuselah died in the year of the flood. Think about that. After Enoch is taken, his son Methuselah was made the next king of righteousness. All the days that Enoch lived upon the earth were 365 years.
And when Enoch had ascended into heaven, all the kings of the earth rose and took Methuselah his son and anointed him. And they caused him to reign over them in the place of his father. And Methuselah acted uprightly in the sight of the God as his father Enoch had taught him. And he likewise during the whole of his life taught the sons of men wisdom, knowledge and the fear of God. And he did not turn from the good way either to the right or to the left.
That was a quote from the ancient book of Jasher. But it was not long until another apostasy came and the people turned away from God and his ways. So here's another quote from Jasher. But in the days of Methuselah, the sons of men turned from the Lord, they corrupted the earth, they robbed and plundered each other and they rebelled against God and they transgressed and they corrupted their ways and would not harken to the voice of Methuselah, but rebelled against him.
So Methuselah had a son whom he called Lamech. Lamech then had a son whom he named Noah. Noah was born in 1056, year 1056. We're not told much of Lamech, but Jewish legend states that he was not a very godly man. Methuselah knew by inspiration of the Holy Spirit that his grandson Noah would be the one, not the Messiah, who would be 70 generations from his father Enoch, but that Noah would be the next king of righteousness, the next prophet, priest, king in the line.
Noah grew up and followed the ways of God as taught by his grandfather, Methuselah. Noah was given all the patriarchal writings from Adam to his time. During this time, even the descendants of Seth became corrupt. Now this is from, I'm reading to you now from Josephus Antiquities. Josephus was a famous Jewish historian around the time of Jesus. Now this posterity of Seth continued to esteem God as the Lord of the universe and to have an entire regard to virtue for seven generations.
But in the process of time, they were perverted and forsook the practices of their forefathers and did neither pay those honors to God, which were appointed them, nor had they any concern to do justice towards men. But for what degree of zeal they had formerly shown for virtue, they now showed by their actions a double degree of wickedness whereby they made God their enemy. So in closing out this chapter, that's the genealogy from Adam to Noah.
So what we have in chapter five, it is listing a line of prophet, priest, kings that are inherited based upon worthiness. And so we've identified the Melchizedekian priests, because Melchizedek is the priest and the king and the prophet all rolled into one. And that list includes Adam, Canaan, Enoch, Methuselah, and Noah.
And we'll be discussing this line of thinking a little bit later because it continues on in the story and it's actually really important in regards to things like what we're talking about in church on Sundays, for instance.
If you go to the foundrypress.org, I've got a series on the book of Ezekiel where this obscure group of priests known as the priests of Zadok are kind of a continuation of the Melchizedekian idea and how God has eternal plans and purposes to combine these offices into one and for people to continue this tradition of ruling politically and religiously as a mediator between God and other people and to teach and instruct in the wisdom, the correct
thinking, the deep wisdom of God and communicating that and growing in it with other people. So it's an important idea and I've been fascinated by it. So we're going to talk more about it in the future. Next week we'll cover Genesis 6. That gets a little weird but it's not obscure. It's not hard to figure out. It's a consistent testimony in all of antiquity as to what that story is telling. So we'll tell it next week and look forward to sharing that information with you when the time comes.
Be blessed. Have a great Thanksgiving. Enjoy your family. Love each other and hope all the best for you. Blessings. Bye bye.