How Did They Live So Long?

I've often wondered how people back in the beginning of the Bible lived to be so old. Some lived to be around 200 years old (or older). I never quite understood this so I've recently looked into it. Turns out, our calendar that we follow today has changed quite a bit.

How many months are in a year? Well, on our calendar there are 12 months. On the original Roman calendar, there were only 10 months.


Due to the unbalanced arrangement of the calendars back in those days, where the seasons began to fall out of order (hot in the winter months, cold in the summer months), a change was called for in order to predict the seasons and temperatures. This called for at least 2 more months to be added.

When the first two leaders of the Roman empire (the Caesars) attempted to solve this problem, the months were originally:

January, February, March, April, May, June, September, October, November and December.

Think about it...

December ("Dec" means 10)

November ("Nov" means 9)

October ("Oct" means 8)

September ("Sept" means 7)

This corresponded with the months it portrayed. However, when the two Caesars stepped in, they added two months. First attempt was Julius Caesar adding the month of "July" as we know it. Next was his successor Augustus Caesar adding the month of "August."

So, this means that the years in the past were different than now. Who knows, maybe back in the beginning there were only 6 months in a year (or less). Maybe when someone lived to be 200 years old, they were really 100 years old on our calendar. 150 years old then could be 75 years old to us now. I just thought this was interesting to think about.

When we hear the age of a man all the way back in the beginning, we relate this to our calendar today, however a lot has changed since then. This may open things up as far as the age topic goes to see things more realistically.

Another thought... Did they have "24" hours in a day? This would have an affect as well.

What do you think?