Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE MAN. Moses describes the creation of the earth and of man in two forms; a detailed narrative in chaps, i. and ii. 1-3, and a recapitulation in ii. 4-7. The latter opens with the title: " These are the generations of the heavens and the earth." Here we meet for the first time with an intimation of the distribution into several sections of the Book of Genesis. The division into fifty chapters was made by the rabbins, for the convenience of the synagogues, and is of no higher authority. But the distribution of the Book of Genesis into sections, called generations, was made by Moses, by virtue of the Divine inspiration which guided him in the composition of the text. These " generations " are, in some instances, a history of the creation or of a particular family; as, the " generations of the heaven and the earth" (ii. 4), and "the generations of Noah" (vi. 9). In other places the word signifies simply a genealogical table; as, the "generations of Shem " (xi. 10). There are eleven of these sections: — The Introduction, from i. 1 to ii. 3. 1. The primeval history from the creation to the birth of Seth, — ii. 4 to chap. iv. 2. Adam's descendants down to Noah, — chap. v. to vi. 8. 3. Noah's family till his death, — vi. 9 to the end of chap. ix. 4. History of the sons of Noah, — x. 1 to xi. 9. 5. Genealogy of Shem to Terah and Abraham, — xi. 10-26. 6. Terah's posterity, including Sarah and Rebekah, and the biography of Abraham, — xi. 27 to xxv. 11. 7. Ishmael's posterity, — xxv. 12-18. UNITY OF THE MAN AND THE WOMAN. 31 8. The history of Isaac and his family, from the death of Abraham to his own death, — xxv. 19 to the end of xxxv. 9. Esau's offspring, — xxxvi. 1-8. 10. Esau in Mount Seir, — xxxvi. 9 to xxxvii. 1. 11. The histo...