This is the book of Adam's generations. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him.
Genesis 5 opens with a fresh heading: a written record of Adam's line, dated back to the day God made man in His own likeness. Two questions shape everything that follows. Why does the record restart at creation instead of at the fall? And what survived of that likeness once sin entered?
Genesis is built out of marked divisions, and this verse starts one of them. Writers note that the phrase functions as a title over what follows, not a continuation of the story just told.
This is plain that the writer gives a summary. But there is no word coupling the introductory statement of verse 1 with what follows. "This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man." It is not "And in the day." … For a summary gives in a few words that which is opened out afterwards.
The word "book" is worth noticing. It appears at this point and nowhere else among these genealogies.
Next in Genesis 5 we have, and here only, and very fittingly, "the book" of Adam's generations. … It is a summary of the world before the flood. Who could have drawn it up but Himself?
The chapter skips Cain and reaches back past the fall to the day of creation.
With Seth, Adam's line begins afresh, as if sin had never entered, as if it had never stained the page of human history. … So here "the generations of Adam" begin once more. No record of the fall is allowed to touch the blessed fact that "when God created man, He made him in the likeness of God." No Cain, nor even Abel, enters here.
In place of the fall, the record counts out years no human historian would have bothered with.
Of the men of this generation we are told only that they lived and died. Yet now, for the first time, we find something missing from Cain's line: God notes every year of their quiet lives. God takes interest in what holds none for man, and adds nothing to the world's history.
Two verses later, Adam fathers a son "in his own likeness, after his image." Writers treat the difference in wording as deliberate.
Genesis 1:26 says that God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness," and verse 27 repeats not His "likeness" but "image," twice. Here it says that on the day He created man, He made him in the likeness of God. Both were true, but they are not the same statement. An imitator or later editor, not being inspired, would have preferred to make them identical. He who knew the whole truth could use each in its right place, and did.
The difference matters far beyond word study. Man lost one at the fall and kept the other, and the one he kept guards his life.
It was no longer in the likeness of God, but in the image of God always. Man, now as ever, fallen or not, is in the image of God. But man lost the likeness of God through sin. … Suppose the crime depended on man keeping the likeness of God. Then someone could deny or excuse murder, since a man who was not like God could be killed on the plea of that unlikeness. But murder is a crime against man made in the image of God. That image stays, fallen or not, so the guilt of murder cannot be questioned.
Verse 2 adds that God called their name Adam — the man and the woman under one name.
Here the unity of the human race stands out again. Adam called his wife's name Isha, and later Eve, but God blessed them both and called their name Adam from the start. So Eve too was Adam, together with her husband. This is no surprise, since God designed the relationship of husband and wife as a picture of Christ and the church.
Genesis 5 is not the only book of generations in the Bible.
The Bible holds very many names and generations, but only two "books of generations" — "the book of the generation of Adam," and "the book of the generation of Jesus Christ." In the first (Genesis 5) we read over and over again, "and he died." Enoch is the exception. We need not say more — "death spread to all men." But in "the book of the generation of Jesus Christ" (Matthew 1) the sovereign mercy of God would include the names of four women. On their own they would have no claim to be there.
The same contrast runs to the end of the Old Testament and into the first page of the New.
The whole Old Testament unrolls for us the sad story of Adam and his race. It ends, with terrible fitness, in the word "curse." What great relief it is to turn from the generations of Adam to "the generation of Jesus Christ." Here we find the introduction of grace.
- Book. The word stands here alone among the genealogies of Genesis. It is God's own summary of the world before the flood.
- Beginning. The line restarts at creation, not at the fall. Cain is left out, and the fact of God's likeness stands untouched.
- Likeness. Man lost it through sin. Adam's son came in Adam's likeness, not God's.
- Image. Never lost, fallen or not. That is why taking a human life is a crime with no excuse.
- Book again. Adam's book repeats "and he died." The second book of generations, Christ's, brings in grace and names those who had no claim to be there.
Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.
Genesis 5 begins a long list of generations. Before the list starts, this verse says who man is: God made them male and female, and He gave them one name together.
The woman receives three names in Genesis. Only one of them comes from God:
It was Adam before the fall who called the woman Ishah, because she was taken out of Ish. It was Adam, after the fall but also the revelation of the woman's Seed, who called his wife's name Eve (Chavvah), because she was the mother of all living. Unbelief might naturally have called her Death, as the mother of all who die. But Adam looked in faith for her Seed, Who entitled him and them to better things than he and she had any right to. But here it is the racial name, common to both, which God called in the day of their creation.
So "Adam" here is the word for man — the name of the whole race, not one man's private name.
One writer draws a practical conclusion for marriage:
Though God created male and female, He called their name Adam (or Man). Because they were "one flesh" (ch. 2:24) they had one name. Society has wisely agreed with God's decision, in having the wife accept her husband's name. Some have resented this, but the only reason is pride and self-will, as though the creature is wiser than his Creator.
The shared name also points forward. One writer links it to the way Scripture speaks of Christ and His body under one title:
This stresses the unity of the human race again. Adam called his wife's name Isha (Genesis 2:23) and then Eve (Genesis 3:20), but God blessed them and called their name Adam from the outset. So Eve too was Adam jointly with her husband. This is not surprising, when we remember that God designed the relationship of husband and wife as a type of Christ and the church. So in 1 Corinthians 12:12 we have "Christ," or, more accurately, "the Christ," used in a way that covers both Christ personally and His body, the church.
Another writer draws out what that pattern says about completeness:
It is "Christ and the Church" — the mystery. The last Adam is not alone, but with His Eve, united with Him under a common name. So it was with the first Eve and Adam: she was bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. As Adam was incomplete without Eve, so the Christ of God's counsels and purposes is incomplete without "the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all." (Eph. 1:23.)
Verse 1 says God made man in His own likeness. Verse 3 says Adam fathered a son in his own likeness. That change of wording matters, and one commentator shows how much rests on it:
It was no longer in the likeness of God, but in the image of God always. For man, now as ever, fallen or not, is in the image of God; but man lost the likeness of God through sin. So Adam fathered Seth in his own likeness, not in God's… This matters all the more when we ask about the guilt of taking a man's life. The ground of that guilt is that God made him in His image. Man clearly never lost that image; it abides, whatever his state. Had the crime depended on man keeping the likeness of God, men might deny or justify murder. If a man were not like God, someone could use that unlikeness as an excuse for killing him. But murder is a crime against man made in the image of God. That image abides, fallen or not, so the guilt of murder is beyond question.
This preface heads a book of generations — and only one other book in Scripture carries that title:
The Bible holds very many names and generations, but only two "books of generations" — "the book of the generation of Adam," and "the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ." In the first (Genesis 5) we read over and over again, "and he died" (Enoch the exception). We need not elaborate — "death spread to all men." But in "the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ" (Matthew 1) the sovereign mercy of God includes the names of four women who otherwise would have no claim to be there. Three of them were open wrongdoers, and one was a stranger to God's people — a sweeping testimony to God's abounding grace.
- Made — God made man in His own likeness, male and female from the start.
- Blessed — God blessed the two together, before the list of generations began.
- Named — God Himself gave the pair one racial name, "Adam," meaning man; the other names for the woman came from her husband.
- Marred — sin cost man the likeness, and Adam's son bore his father's fallen likeness; the image of God stayed, and that is why murder is guilt.
- Answered — Adam's book of generations repeats "and he died"; Christ's book of generations names four women with no claim to be there — mercy answering death.
And Adam lived a hundred and thirty years, and begot [a son] in his likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth.
Genesis 5 opens a fresh record of the human race by recalling that God made man in His own likeness. Verse 3 then changes the wording — Adam passes on his own likeness, not God's — and what we inherit from our first father turns on that shift.
The verse uses two words: "likeness" and "image." One writer explains the difference.
When God made man (Genesis 1:26), He purposed it to be in His image, after His likeness. So He created him in His image, as Genesis 1:27 says twice. And we have already seen the difference: likeness resembles, image represents. This distinction is important to grasp, since it holds everywhere in Scripture. The "likeness" was the set of qualities matching God, such as no other nature on earth had. The image was man's place in presenting Him to others, a place not even the angels of heaven filled or could fill. But now that the head of the race was fallen, he "fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image." It was in his own likeness, not God's.
The likeness went; the image stayed. That is why taking a human life is still a crime, however far a person has fallen.
"Adam," Scripture says, "fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image." It was no longer in the likeness of God, but always in the image of God. For man, fallen or not, is in the image of God; sin destroyed the likeness... Suppose the crime depended on man keeping the likeness of God. Then someone could deny or justify murder: if a man were not like God, that unlikeness could excuse killing him. But murder is a crime against man made in the image of God. That image remains, fallen or not, so the guilt of murder stands beyond challenge.
Commentators differ on how complete the loss was. One writer sees something of the original left:
It may seem strange that Seth was not born until Adam was 130 years old. But however much time passed, Adam could only bear a child in his own likeness and image. In measure this was still in God's likeness and image, though it had been spoiled by sin.
Adam becomes a father only here, after the fall. That timing settles the condition of everyone who comes after him.
For our racial head we have to go back to Adam — and to Adam in his fallen condition. Only when fallen did he father sons and daughters. His fall came about by an act of sin, and that act produced a state of sin which spread through his very being. It changed his whole spiritual make-up so deeply that the change affected all his descendants. He could only father children "in his own likeness, after his image" (Genesis 5:3) — the likeness and image of a fallen man. Heredity of this sort is a terrible fact, and Scripture bears witness to it.
Adam himself had faith. One writer explains why he could not hand it down.
God made him a subject of grace, and he had and showed a living faith in a promised Saviour. But this was nothing natural; it was divine. And since it was not natural, nature had no power to pass it on. It was in no way hereditary. Adam could not leave or give his faith to Cain or Abel... Whatever was natural Adam could pass on; but nothing more. And since he, as a father, was in a condition of ruin, his son could only be in the same.
A nature reaches us by birth. The second nature reaches us the same way.
We get a nature from the first man by birth. In the same way we get a nature from the Second man by new birth. Once born, we share the nature of the first; once "born again," we share the nature of the Second. A newborn baby could never have done the act that brought Adam into a fallen condition, yet the baby shares his nature. In the same way a newborn child of God had nothing whatever to do with working out the perfect obedience of "the man Christ Jesus," yet shares His nature.
Eve's words at Seth's birth look ahead.
When Eve bore Seth she said, "God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him." These words were no doubt prophetic. Cain the natural man had killed Abel the man of faith. Now God had appointed another godly offspring, so that faith should not die out from the earth.
- Likeness resembles. These were the qualities in man that matched God. Sin destroyed them, so Adam could only father a son like himself.
- Image represents. Man's place of standing for God on earth never went. That is why murder is still a crime, even against a fallen man.
- Heredity is real. Adam had no children until after he fell, so a ruined father could produce only a race in his own ruined condition.
- Faith is not inherited. Adam believed, but he could pass on only what was natural. His faith came from God, and no one hands that down.
- Birth answers birth. Only new birth answers a nature we got by birth. And in Seth, God appointed the line by which faith survived.