Hi Jaianniah,

To what I found, these people actually lived that long. Time was calculated (as it is today) on a 24 hours basis.

This is one answer I heard a while back. There seems to be some validity to it. Use this information to help you get closer to the answer. You have something to work with.

Before the flood there was a canopy of water surrounding the earth. The water did something to the sun's rays, which affected life on earth a different way it is affecting us today. Life may have been extended. Today's rays are stronger and more scorching without the water canopy protection (more on this a little later). The earth was not tilted at that 23 degrees causing seasons or drastic climate changes and that temperatures was at some 72 degrees fahrenheit continually.

The earth's atmospheric condition was different then too because of this water surrounding it. Basically, the air pressure levels were greater then and the oxygen that was being breathed was much purer. It's much like being in a hyper beric chamber. This is a machine that increases the air pressure and the person in there is breathing higher levels of oxygen. The oxygenation on a cellular level is incredible.

Here is one example of what greater air pressure and breathing purer oxygen does. (Please bear in mind as you read that I'm going by memory.)

Some 15-20 years back, there was a little 3-5 year old girl in Texas that fell in a small diameter well. When she fell in, one leg was down the other up. It's like she was doing a split. She stayed in this hole some 72 hours. The people worked frantically to get her out.

When they got her out, one leg had turned blue-purple. The way she fell had cut off circulation in one leg. At the hospital the doctors had no choice but to amputate. One of the doctors suggested to try out the hyper beric chamber. If that treatment didn't work then they would amputate. I don't remember the time she spent in this chamber (a few days possibly). The leg returned to its normal pink color. The dead-dieing cells somehow revived.

Many diseases are being treated using these machines with great success. What would take many months to heal only takes days. More pure oxygen is making its way to the different cells and tissues of the body. I have also heard that many professional sport teams send their injured players into these machines for quicker recovery time.

If greater pressure and purer oxygen can work 'miracles', imagine living continually in an atmosphere of this kind. To what I deduce from this, is that sicknesses and diseases must have been rare. I say this based on other articles I have read.

So because the air pressure and the levels of oxygen was higher back then, people didn't have the sicknesses and diseases we have today thus they naturally lived longer.

After the flood, the human body was not able to recover as quickly with whatever sickness it had. Thus the death of the body occurred at an earlier age.

Also, after the flood, that water canopy disappeared. This changed the atmospheric pressure and the high levels of oxygen were reduced. (Again by memory) oxygen percentages in pre-flood time was some 40%. Post flood dropped to some 10-12%. (These figures are approximative.) The massive floods caused the earth to tilt as we have it today. This caused the earth to experience the different seasons.

If you keep reading the biblical account, after the flood, peoples life spans dwindled down to approximately 10-14 times less. I get these figures using Methuselah age.

Example: The oldest man to live was Methuselah. He died being 969 years old. If you divide 969 by 10 you get 96.9 years old, of if you divide 969 by 14 you get 69.2 years old. That seems to be approximately our years of life now.

The following is a genealogy of one of Noah's descendants through Shem's line.

Noah (preflood) Died at 950 years old. (Was 600 years old when the flood came. Lived 350 years in post flood)

Shem (preflood) Died at 600 years old. (Was 98 years old when the flood came. Lived 502 years in post flood)

Post Flood

Arphaxad 438 years old

Salah 433 years old

Eber 464 years old

Peleg 239 years old

Reu 239 years old

Serug 230 years old

Nahor 148 years old

Terah 205 years old

Abraham = 175 years old

Issac = 180 years old

Jacob = 147 years old

Moses = 120 years old

King David = 70 years old

As you can see, peoples life spans dropped to what we experience today.

I hope this answer will help you.

Frank

I don't remember where I heard it, but God created Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden to live forever. He gave them perfect bodies, so that they could be immortal. Hence, when they fell from the Garden of Eden, it took them (and the first few generations) a very long time to die, presumably because it took a long time for the wages of sin to take hold.

For my answer to your other question, see here.