Genesis 5:23

Summary

Genesis 5:23 states the total number of years lived by Enoch: three hundred sixty-five years. The verse uses the standard formulaic structure found throughout Genesis 5 for reporting a patriarch's lifespan.

Key words

• yeHi ("it was", H1961) — qal verb, third person, establishing the narrative report "and it came to be" that introduces the total count of days.
• yeMei ("days of", H3117G) — masculine plural construct, linking to chaNokh to form "the days of Enoch," the subject whose total lifespan is being declared.
• chaMesh ("five", H2568) — cardinal number, common gender, the first numerical component of the total (5).
• veShishim ("and sixty", H8346) — masculine plural cardinal, joined by the conjunction ve ("and", H9002) to chaMesh, forming "five and sixty" (65).
• sheLosh meOt ("three hundred", H7969 + H3967) — construct chain, sheLosh in construct form governing the feminine plural meOt ("hundreds"), yielding "three of hundreds" = 300.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence opens with the narrative verb yeHi ("it was", H1961), which in Genesis 5 consistently introduces the summary statement of a patriarch's total years. The subject of this verb is the construct phrase kol-yeMei chaNokh ("all the days of Enoch"), where kol ("all", H3605) governs the construct yeMei ("days of", H3117G), which in turn is bound to the proper name chaNokh ("Enoch", H2585H). This construct chain literally reads "all the days of Enoch" as the grammatical subject of "it was."

The numerical predicate follows a distinctive Hebrew ordering: units first, then tens, then hundreds — the reverse of the English "three hundred sixty-five." The text states chaMesh veShishim shanah ("five and sixty year[s]", H2568 + H8346 + H8141), literally "five and sixty, a year," followed by usheLosh meOt shanah ("and three hundred, a year[s]", H7969 + H3967 + H8141), literally "and three of hundreds, a year." The noun shanah ("year", H8141) appears twice, once after each numerical block, a pattern typical of Hebrew number syntax in this genealogical chapter. The construct form of sheLosh ("three of...", H7969) before meOt ("hundreds", H3967) shows the "three" is grammatically bound to "hundreds," producing the value 300, before this whole unit is joined to the 65 already stated.

Differences between versions

The LXX (Swete) renders the number in a different internal order — τριακόσια ἑξήκοντα πέντε ("three hundred sixty-five") — placing hundreds first, then tens, then units, the reverse of the Hebrew's units-tens-hundreds sequence. The Vulgate (trecenti sexaginta quinque) follows the same hundreds-tens-units order as the LXX. Modern translations (RV1909, BSB, SBLIBRE) likewise present the number in the hundreds-tens-units order familiar to their target languages, differing from the Hebrew's word order though not from its numerical value.