payres of al sortes shal enter in with thee, that they may liue. 21Thou shalt take therfore with thee of al meates, that may be eaten, and thou shalt lay them vp with thee: and they shal be meate for thee and them. 22Noe therfore[1] did al thinges, which God commanded him.
ANNOTATIONS. CHAP. VI.
2. Sonnes of God.] The progenie of Seth, professing true faith & Religion, were called the sonnes of God: and those of Cains issue and congregation, folowing erronious and wicked opinions, were called the sonnes of men. Which were then the distinctiue termes of true and false Religion, as afterwardes were the termes of Iewes and Gentiles: after Christ, Christians and Paganes: and lastly true and false Christians are distinguished, by the names of Catholiques and Heretikes. As S. Augustin teacheth, in his questions vpon Genesis, & other places. Which is confirmed by the like iugement of S. Ciril Alexandrinus li. 9. aduers. Iulianum. S. Ambrose li. de Noe & arca. c. 4. S. Pacianus epist. ad Symphorianum. Theodoret. & manie others vpon this place.
3 An hundred and twentie yeares.] Mans life was not here shortned to an hundred and twentie yeares, as some haue misunderstood this place. For after this diuers liued much longer, as appeareth in the genealogie of Sem to Abram in the 11. chapter of Genesis. And Abraham liued. 175. yeares (c. 25.) Isaac 180. (c. 35.) Iacob 147. (c. 47.) and Ioiadas borne 1500. yeares after, liued 130. yeares (2. Par. 24.) But 120. yeares were granted before the floud for that generation to repent in, as the Chaldee Edition expresseth more plainely: Terminus dabitur ei centum viginti annorum si forte conuertatur. The tearme of an hundred and twentie yeares shal be geuen them, if perhaps they may conuert. And so S. Chrisostom. S. Hierom. and S. Augustin expound this Scripture. Yet whether God cut of 20. of these yeares, and brought the floud after a 100 (for Noe had his sonnes when he was 500. yeares old, & the floud came in the 600. yeare of his age) or that this warning was geuen twentie yeares before anie of his sonnes were borne, is not so easely decided by the holie Doctors. How easie soeuer Protestants say al Scriptures are. Though vnder correction of better iudgement, it semeth more probable, thar Moyses by anticipation ioyneth the birth of Noes sonnes (when he was 500. yeares old) to the rest of the geneologie of the first Patriarkes, in the former chapter, and then telleth of this admonition, geuen 20. yeares before their birth. And so God expected the peoples repentance the whole time of 120. yeares prescribed.
4. Giants were vpon the earth.] Some haue thought that these giantes were not men, nor begotten by men, but that either diuels, which fel at first from heauen, or other Angels allured with concupiscence, begate them of the daughters of Cain. Philo Iudeus in his booke de Gigantibus, writeth that those whom Moyses here called Angels, the Philosophers called Genios. Qui sunt animalia aërea, which are liuing creatures with ayrie bodies Iosephus (li. 1. Antiq.) saith that Angels begate these giants. Tertullian also li. de habitu muliebri) holdeth the same error, and diuers more otherwise good authors.
- ↑ A right example of a iust man.
