The Toledoth as Decalogue

Is there any logic to the ten “generations” markers in the book of Genesis?

The word “generations” is toledoth. Beginning with Genesis 2:4, there are ten of them scattered through the first book of the Bible. These markers indicate that there were earlier sources for the texts than Moses. They were ancestral documents passed down and added to over the centuries by those whom God chose to be recipients (input) and scribes (output). Indeed, the toledoth themselves are steps in a lengthy process of “choosing.” Each subsequent recipient was the next “messiah” who would carry upon his shoulders the authoritative history of God’s work. (The Hebrew word masiah is derived from the verb masah, meaning to smear or anoint).

The root of the word toledot is yalad, which means “to bear, bring forth, beget.” It is used in Genesis 3:16: “In pain you shall bring forth children.” So in effect, Genesis 2:4 could be translated “these are the offspring of, or what came out from, or the begettings of, the heavens and the earth…” It is probably no coincidence that Cain and Abel were named in honor of their “grandparents.” Cain’s name relates to the earth (the kingly domain) and Abel’s name relates to the heavens (the priestly domain). Together, these two brothers, united in service, were named that they might be a cloud on a mountain, since that would be their ministry. Man was (and still is) required to submit to heaven before God gave him dominion upon the earth, so it seems that Cain’s sin was not the nature of his offering but its timing. What displeased God was the act of making his offering before the priestly offering of atoning blood by Abel. But this ministry concerning the mitigation of the curses upon the womb (firstborn blood) and the land (firstfruits crops) was “brought forth” in Adam’s children through Adam’s own failure. Likewise, the toledoth steps throughout Genesis are a mitigation of the natural outcome of sin in humanity, a linear chain of inheritance that was regularly assessed and periodically pruned (or purged) to allow further growth in maturity and holiness. Jason DeRouchie writes:

Genesis 1:1–2:3 provides the prefatory lens into the toledot units, with the blessing-commission of 1:28 playing a central role in understanding the development and narrowing in the book.

Grasping properly the intended role of the toledot units will likely only be accomplished when they are interpreted in light of the book’s preface, which climaxes in the blessing-commission of Genesis 1:28.

In the beginning, God’s call was not simply for humanity’s growth and oversight in the world. These activities were to be performed by divine image bearers. It was those that resemble, reflect, and represent their father God (see 5:1–3) that were to be fruitful, multiply, and fill, subdue, and have dominion over the earth (1:26–28).

The commission was about God’s greatness being put on display in all places and from generation to generation. This fact suggests that the developing toledot in Genesis have something to do with clarifying how this vision of spreading a global passion for God’s supremacy would be accomplished, especially in light of humanity’s proneness to sin.¹Jason DeRouchie, The Toledot Structure of Genesis: A Textlinguistic, Literary, and Theological Analysis, 9-10.

All biblical covenants follow a five-point pattern that begins with the authority of God, leads to a crisis requiring faithful obedience, and ends with inheritance being given to the one/s who obeyed. Thus, the toledoths are all about the transference of authority from fathers to sons, or, more importantly, from a chosen father to a chosen son.²In contrast to the Old Testament, which is concerned with generations, the New Testament, after the coming of the promised Seed, is concerned with regenerations. Paedosacramentalist rites are … Continue reading

The first toledoth is the provisional delegation of the authority of God (the Father in Heaven) to Adam. If he were obedient (that is, meek before God), Adam would be given the “succession” of heaven as an image-bearer. If not, he would die, losing not only what he desired but also that which he had (Matthew 13:12). Of course, even though he had “seized kingdom,” Adam was not cut off because God the true king and judge humbled Himself to serve as a priest and offered substitutionary blood on Adam’s behalf. The curses in Genesis 3 are merely limitations on the promised blessings. However, although Adam’s life continued (nature), his office (supernature) was given to his sons. They became the image-bearers regarding the ministry of mediation between heaven and earth.

It is the failure of Cain and his descendants that leads to the next “generations” marker, which traces the lineage of the “chosen” through to Noah. This second toledoth is the generations of Adam in Genesis 5, a “succession” list made unique—and bittersweet—by its repetitive use of the phrase “and he died.” This genealogy not only completes the first major fivefold covenant structure in the biblical text but also “precapitulates” the overall theme of each book of the Pentateuch:

In the case of Genesis 1-5, the five steps are like a thumb (God’s actions) and four fingers (man’s history). This also explains why Genesis stands apart from the rest of the Torah as “transcendent,” that is, a book that was directed and gathered by God rather than Moses.

An important factor to notice is that as humankind multiplied, the toledoth narrowed. As history’s tapestry grew to cover the earth, the toledoth maintain a steady focus on a single messianic thread, making crucial judgments at each genealogical fork in the road. DeRouchie writes:

The toledot are transitional headings that progressively direct the reader’s focus from progenitor to progeny and narrow the reader’s focus from all the world to Israel, through whom all families of the earth will be blessed.

Kenneth A. Mathews has rightly identified the toledot in Genesis as transitional headings, “echoing from the preceding material a person’s name or literary motif and at the same time anticipating the focus subject of the next.” By their very nature, the toledot address what is produced from a progenitor and not the progenitor itself. In the words of Victor P. Hamilton, “[They] suggest movement from a starting point to a finishing point, from a cause to an effect, from a progenitor to a progeny.”

More than this, as Joseph Blenkinsopp has recognized, when Genesis is taken as a whole, the toledot witness an intentional narrowing of focus, beginning with the whole world and ending with “the descendants of Abraham in the direct line as sole claimants to the land of Canaan.” The book, therefore, helps place Israel and her mission within the context of the whole world, a fact adding to the book’s missional thrust.³DeRouchie, 8-9.

Besides serving as a sequence of outcomes, is there any logic to these ten “generations” markers in the book of Genesis? James B. Jordan sees the toledoths as the fundamental structure of Genesis, a recapitulation of the heptamerous pattern of Creation in Genesis 1. He writes:

Genesis has a sevenfold structure. Many books of the Bible, including Revelation, have the same structure. The book is marked out in sections by a phrase that is found about ten times in the book: these are the generations of. Chapter 5:1: “These are the generations of Adam.” Chapter 6:9: “These are the generations of Noah.” The word “generations” in Hebrew is toledot. The “ot” is a feminine plural ending. “Sabbaot”—Lord of sabbaoth—Lord of hosts—armies. “Im” is masculine plural—“Elohim”—plural of “El” or God—majestic God, or many gods. Toledot is the plural of generation—toledah, and the reason I mention that is that these sections of Genesis are called toledah sections.

There are ten of these sections, but if you look at it more carefully you notice that some of the sections are grouped so that we come up with seven sections. The structure of Genesis consists of an introduction and then seven sections that correspond to the seven days of Genesis 1…

This sequence of seven speech actions is the way God always works with the world… That is why Genesis has seven sections, and why the first seven books of the Bible follow the same format. Genesis is the book of the first day. Exodus is where the firmament is made—the firmament people—that is the Tabernacle. Leviticus has to do with flesh and blood, plants and seeds. Numbers has to do with stars. Deuteronomy has to do with the organisation of a group of people. Joshua has to do with planting of a people in the land. Judges has to do with sin bringing a time to its fulfillment on the Sabbath Day. The Spirit works that way, and that is why the Bible is written as it is.⁴James B. Jordan, “The Life of Jacob,” Biblical Horizons No. 258, July 2017.

His explanation, with an evening/morning pattern that is equivalent to the father/son transition, is summarized as follows:

Although Jordan achieves a sevenfold result, fourteen steps are required to make up the heptamerous “evening and morning” pattern, yet we only have ten toledoth. Some of the toledoth are grouped together, but this is not necessarily a problem. It is possible that similar pairings occur in the list of the sons of Jacob (see Jacob’s Tabernacle). The problem with Jordan’s arrangement is that there are gaps, so he is forced to paper over the cracks. Another problem is that his typological correspondences of each step with the days of Creation are not natural but contrived. For instance, he says that the sons of Noah and the sons of Shem are the “light-bearers,” but this could be said of the subjects of any of the ten steps. There is nothing in the actual sequence that would naturally lead to the use of this imagery in the fourth step but not in the others. The toledoth thus do not follow the Creation pattern step by step. Instead, Jordan has pressed them arbitrarily into the Creation mold like clay and filled the gaps with synthetic putty. (See The Sevenfold Structure of Genesis for Jordan’s description of each “day.”)

The actual sevenfold structure of Genesis is far more straightforward, and related to subject matter rather than the toledoths. In this case the “stars” of Day 4 are the ones which Joseph saw in his second dream.

The Creation pattern is indeed ubiquitous throughout the Bible (as I learned from James Jordan), but its sevenfold historical sequence is the outcome of the fivefold covenantal sequence. The central point of the covenant pattern (Ethics) becomes threefold as an expression of the triune office: priest (hear God – Table), king (act for God – Lampstand), prophet (speak as God – Incense Altar).

Moreover, the fivefold covenant pattern is the outcome of the threefold pattern of the Trinity. This is expressed in architectural terms in the cruciform layout of the Tabernacle of Moses, which is at once threefold (above, beside, below, Exodus 20:4), fivefold (including the demarcations of purity made by the tent which mediated between the domains), and sevenfold (since the Holy Place contained three pieces of furniture that related to the three holy offices).

Since there are ten toledoth, and the Ten Words (the “Decalogue”) are comprised of two tablets, five dyads, that follow the fivefold pattern, it is more likely that this covenantal sequence, rather than the Creation sequence, explains the logic of the toledoth. Since the pattern of the Ten Words is also found in the historical events from Genesis 1 to 11 (see Nimrod in the Court of God), the toledoth do not have to structure the book itself. They are merely one more sequence within the book itself, a sequence with a unique message that contributes to the whole rather than governing it. The same pattern is even found in miniature in Genesis 3:16, which contains teledi, the first use of the word from which toledoth is derived.⁶This chart is from Michael Bull, Schema Volume 2, “Covenant Structure in Genesis 3.” Please note that the numbering of the Ten Words here is that of the Jewish scroll division. It seems obvious that this is the correct division because it has multiple corroborating “witnesses.” It not only accords with the fivefold covenant structure, providing a liturgical process vertically, but also gives us a clear “Adam-and-Eve” or “Word-and-response” dyad for each step horizontally. ⁷See Moshe Kline, The Decalogue. For a brief summary see God-in-a-Box. For a detailed discussion see “Why Ten Words on Two Tablets?” in Schema Volume 1.

If we apply this tenfold matrix to the toledoth, our application will be vindicated if there are enough points of typological correspondence, and indeed there are.

As is the case with all uses of the matrix in its various forms, the correspondence between the Toledoth and Decalogue is not direct or immediate. Rather, they are both governed by, and expressions of, the same architecture. In this case, the word-response dyads are obviously not Adam-Eve but Father-Son, a passing of the baton, both vertically and horizontally.

As mentioned, the horizontal historical sequence is a process of refinement, much like the whittling down of Israel to the family of Achan, but, in this case, it is for blessing not cursing.

Forming (Head)		Filling (Body)
1 Heavens and earth No false gods	TRANSCENDENCE ABOVE Most Holy Place – Ark	2 Adam No false oaths
3 Noah Honor the Sabbath	HIERARCHY Veil	4 Sons of Noah Honor parents Live long in the land
5 Shem No murder	ETHICS BESIDE Holy Place – Table, Lampstand, Incense	6 Terah No adultery
7 Ishmael No theft	OATH/SANCTIONS Laver	8 Isaac No false witness
9 Esau No coveting house	SUCCESSION BELOW Court of Sacrifice – Bronze Altar	10 Jacob No coveting contents

• The TRANSCENDENCE row puts the Law between God and Adam in the Garden. As with Israel in later history, the external commandment was to become internal, the priestly Law written on flesh, after which the prohibition on the forbidden kingly food would become obsolete. Adam failed to “take God’s name” and become His legal representative. Jesus, of course, succeeded, and received a name that is above every name.
• The HIERARCHY row begins with Noah (whose name means “bringer of rest”) and ends with his sons. Between them is the Veil violated by Ham who entered into Noah’s tent to steal the inheritance of the firstborn (we know this from the subsequent curses pronounced by Noah, who was not on his deathbed but only resting “in the Spirit”). Notice also that it was the son of Ham, Canaan, who would be dispossessed of his land as a result of his father’s sin. The structure of the toledoth predicts the promise to Abraham and the conquest under Joshua. This “Exodus” row also corresponds the vertical waters of the Great Flood with the horizontal waters of the Red Sea.
• The ETHICS row is an arcane one unless we consider its context. If we arrange these ten toledoth as an X, Shem and Terah are together at the center, which is exactly what we find in Genesis 11:10-32.

• The significance is their placement in the midst of Babylon, the city of man. As we know from biblical history, and especially that of David, murder and adultery are both kingly sins. Assassination and concubines relate to the desire to establish and maintain a kingly dynasty. Except for his failure concerning Bathsheba and Uriah, David never lifted a finger to either seize (from Saul, his “father”) or regain (from Absalom his son) his throne. When a city was invaded it was as a “virgin impregnated.” There was blood and there was seed. The men were killed (murder) and the women were raped (adultery). So the centrality of Shem and Terah is somehow related to a temptation to compromise with, or succumb to, idolatry and/or adultery — like the sons of Seth before the Flood, and like Israel in the wilderness. The events of Babel take place somewhere near the middle of the Shem toledoth, so Satan has drawn the lineage to the tower (these are the ones who “traveled from the east”). Joshua 24:2-3 tells us that Terah was a worshiper of pagan gods, most likely a syncretist who knew of the true God but made some “household additions” as Israel did later on. In Genesis 31:53, Laban says to Jacob, “The God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.” He does not mention Terah by name, so possibly refers to Shem. This would also explain why Abram sought a bride for Isaac from the city of Nahor, who was a believer. These two central toledoth are preceded by the judgment of Babel. Immediately after them is the call of Abram to come out of Ur of the Chaldees. Since the toledoth are two tablets, two trees, two legs, or two bronze pillars, Shem is “inscribed” on the kingly pillar (as Boaz) and Terah is “inscribed” on the priestly pillar (as Jachin). Thus, in each case, the inheritance of the king is passed to the priestly son/s. The genealogy of Shem gives the succession to Terah. The genealogy of Terah preempts chapter 12 by mentioning the departure from Ur before we find out about the actual call of Abram only to mention that the wife of Abram was barren. (When the Bible lists things out of chronological order it does so for the same reason that film and TV scriptwriters do it.) Thus, just as the preceding pericope took the Hebrews into Babylon, so the next pericope brings them out. The Messianic line passed through the fire and came out without even smelling of smoke. But the genealogy sets us up for a shock when we find out that it was actually Abram who was called. Since Sarai was barren, this would mean the end of the toledoth. God would have to reverse this situation for the second half of the X to be completed. This crisis is thus the crux of the toledoth story, even though it is not the center of the heptamerous narrative of Genesis.
• The crux also shifts the rows from being comprised of fathers and sons to divisions between sons by the father. This means that the baton-passing pattern works through the X from left to right as well as from top to bottom. The OATH/SANCTIONS row is Abraham’s wise division between the natural son and the miraculous one.
• The SUCCESSION row repeats this action of favoring the second-born as God’s firstborn. In this case, it is Rebekah, who had been told by God that the elder would serve the younger (Genesis 25:23), who is wiser than a serpent and outcrafts her own husband because his eyes are not “open” to the red dragon who brings him food. The final row brings an end to the story of the toledoth of Genesis but not to Genesis itself. The book would end as it began, with a serpent and a rainbow, but the rainbow would be a garment of praise and the serpent would be a uraeus on the head of a faithful son who possessed the wisdom of God and purchased the nations for his master. This man was an image of the true Messiah, the one who would receive the entire deposit of covenant history, end the recorded “generations” (forming) and begin the regenerations (filling).

Image: Royal Game of Ur, British Museum.

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