Jared or Jered ( he, ''Yereḏ'', in pausa ''Yāreḏ'', "to descend"; gr, Ἰάρετ ''Iáret''; ar, أليارد ''al-Yārid''),The etymology "to descend" is according to in the

Book of Genesis The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning") ...

, was a sixth-generation descendant of

Adam and Eve Adam and Eve, according to the creation myth of the Abrahamic religions, were the first man and woman. They are central to the belief that humanity is in essence a single family, with everyone descended from a single pair of original ancestors. ...

. His primary history is recounted in .

Modern scholarship

The biblical details about

Jared Jared is a given name of Biblical derivation. Origin In the Book of Genesis, the biblical patriarch Jared (יֶרֶד) was the sixth in the ten pre-flood generations between Adam and Noah; he was the son of Mahalaleel and the father of En ...

, like the other long-lived patriarchs, are in the book of Genesis. In terms of the

documentary hypothesis The documentary hypothesis (DH) is one of the models used by biblical scholars to explain the origins and composition of the Torah (or Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy). A vers ...

, the passage about the descendants of Adam (Genesis 5:1-32) is attributed to the Priestly source. A parallel passage (Genesis 4:17-22) which contains a genealogy of the descendants of Cain, is attributed to the Jahwist, another ancient version of the same original genealogy. The two genealogies contain seven similar names, and the Jahwist's version of the genealogy has Irad in the place of Jared.

Tradition

His father

Mahalalel Mahalalel (, ) is an Antediluvian patriarch named in the Hebrew Bible. He is mentioned in the Sethite genealogy as the grandfather of Enoch and subsequently the ancestor of Noah. Etymology The meaning of the name could be translated as "the ...

, great-grandson of

Seth Seth,; el, Σήθ ''Sḗth''; ; "placed", "appointed") in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Mandaeism, and Sethianism, was the third son of Adam and Eve and brother of Cain and Abel, their only other child mentioned by name in the Hebrew Bible. A ...

, son of

Adam Adam; el, Ἀδάμ, Adám; la, Adam is the name given in Genesis 1-5 to the first human. Beyond its use as the name of the first man, ''adam'' is also used in the Bible as a pronoun, individually as "a human" and in a collective sense as " ...

, was 65 years old when Jared was born.65 according to the Masoretic Text, but 165 according to the Septuagint. Larsson, Gerhard. �
The Chronology of the Pentateuch: A Comparison of the MT and LXX
” ''Journal of Biblical Literature'', vol. 102, no. 3, 1983, p. 402. In the apocryphal ''

Book of Jubilees The Book of Jubilees, sometimes called Lesser Genesis (Leptogenesis), is an ancient Jewish religious work of 50 chapters (1,341 verses), considered canonical by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as well as Beta Israel (Ethiopian Jews), where it is ...

'', his mother's name is Dinah. ''Jubilees'' states that Jared married a woman whose name is variously spelled as Bereka, Baraka, and Barakah, and the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

speaks of Jared having become father to other sons and daughters (). Of those children, only

Enoch Enoch () ''Henṓkh''; ar, أَخْنُوخ ', Qur'ān.html"_;"title="ommonly_in_Qur'ān">ommonly_in_Qur'ānic_literature__'_is_a_biblical_figure_and_Patriarchs_(Bible).html" "title="Qur'ānic_literature.html" ;"title="Qur'ān.html" ;"title="o ...

is named specifically, born when Jared was 162 years old (, , , , ). Enoch went on to marry Edna, according to ''Jubilees'', and the sole named grandchild of Jared is Enoch's son

Methuselah Methuselah () ( he, מְתוּשֶׁלַח ''Məṯūšélaḥ'', in pausa ''Məṯūšālaḥ'', "His death shall send" or "Man of the javelin" or "Death of Sword"; gr, Μαθουσάλας ''Mathousalas'') was a biblical patriarch and a f ...

, the longest-living human mentioned in the Bible (, , ). Additionally, Jared was a forefather of

Noah Noah ''Nukh''; am, ኖህ, ''Noḥ''; ar, نُوح '; grc, Νῶε ''Nôe'' () is the tenth and last of the pre-Flood patriarchs in the traditions of Abrahamic religions. His story appears in the Hebrew Bible (Book of Genesis, chapters 5– ...

and his three sons. Jared's age was given as 962 years old when he died (when Noah was 366), making him the second-oldest person mentioned in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...

and the

Septuagint The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond th ...

. In the

Samaritan Pentateuch The Samaritan Torah ( Samaritan Hebrew: , ''Tōrāʾ''), also called the Samaritan Pentateuch, is a text of the Torah written in the Samaritan script and used as sacred scripture by the Samaritans. It dates back to one of the ancient version ...

, his age was 62 at fatherhood and only 847 at death, making Noah the oldest and Jared the seventh-oldest.

Islam

Jared (Yarid) is also mentioned in

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

in the '' Qisas Al-Anbiya'', which mentions him in an identical manner.

Family tree

Allusions

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...

, in his novel,

The Return of the Native ''The Return of the Native'' is Thomas Hardy's sixth published novel. It first appeared in the magazine ''Belgravia'', a publication known for its sensationalism, and was presented in twelve monthly installments from January to December 1878. Be ...

(1878), referenced Jared as one who betokened an advanced lifetime: "The number of their years may have adequately summed up Jared, Mahalaleel, and the rest of the antediluvians, but the age of a modern man is to be measured by the intensity of his history." (London:

Folio Society The Folio Society is a London-based publisher, founded by Charles Ede in 1947 and incorporated in 1971. Formerly privately owned, it operates as an employee ownership trust since 2021. It produces illustrated hardback editions of classic fic ...

) (1971

880 __NOTOC__ Year 880 (Roman numerals, DCCCLXXX) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Byzantine Empire * Battle of Cephalonia: A Byzantine Empire, Byzantine flee ...

at p. 150.

References