Today's reading starts in the ancient world before the great flood. It was an era when, according to the Bible, many people lived really long lives.

Take Methuselah for example. Genesis 5:27 tells us that he lived to be 969 years old. As far as we know, he lived longer than anyone else anywhere. Yet for all his years, we know remarkably little about him. We know that his father's name was Enoch and that he had some brothers and sisters. Methuselah had a son named Lamech and had some other sons and daughters. And that's about it. The most notable fact about him seems to be the number of years he lived.

I guess longevity is an achievement of sorts, provided, of course, he was a good man. But suppose he was a scoundrel. Suppose he beat his wife (or, in his case, probably a whole succession …