What Does Genesis 11:10 Mean?
These are the births of Shem. Shem was a hundred years old, and brought forth Arphaxad two years after the flood.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
These are the generations of Shem: Shem was an hundred years old, and begat Arphaxad two years after the flood:THE KEY
Shem (שֵׁם, shem, “name”) is carried into תּוֹלְדֹת (toledot, “begettings”), turning a name into a living line.
THE MEANING
A name’s nature continues in what is brought forth from it. The verse holds a birth after the flood, so continuation remains possible after a rupture that feels final.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that a devastating ending leaves no future: this verse places a birth after the flood.
THE ROOT
תּוֹלְדֹת
toledot
GROWS FROM
י־ל־ד
y-l-d
To bear, beget, bring forth.
“births” in this verse is toledot. “Generations” and “begat” arise from the same seed: bringing forth. English separates the lineage from the act of birth, while the Hebrew binds them together, the line is what keeps being brought forth.
ALSO GROWS
yalad: The verb for bearing or begetting.
יָלַד
The verse uses this seed in “begat,” linking the generations to the act that brings them forth.
yeled: A child, one who has been brought forth.
יֶלֶד
A child is held inside the word-family of generations; Arphaxad is the next life in the line.
THE PATTERN
A name’s nature continues in what is brought forth from it.
This is the book of the births of Adam. In the day that God created the ground-being, in the likeness of God he made him.Now these are the births of Perez. Perez brought forth Hezron.The book of the origin of Jesus, the anointed one, son of David, son of Abraham.THE THREAD
This is the book of the births of Adam. In the day that God created the ground-being, in the likeness of God he made him.The same word translated “generations” appears there, formed from the birth-root that also gives this verse its “begat.” Genesis 5:1 ties the line to God’s likeness, so the shared birth-language carries creation forward through descendants.
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