Genesis 5:1
INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS 5
This chapter contains a list or catalogue of the posterity of Adam in the line of Seth, down to Noah; it begins with a short account of the creation of Adam, and of his life and death, Ge 5:1 next of five of the antediluvian patriarchs, their age and death, namely Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Ge 5:6 then a particular relation of Enoch, his character and translation, Ge 5:21 then follows an account of Methuselah, the oldest man, and Lamech's oracle concerning his son Noah, Ge 5:12 and the chapter is closed with the life and death of Lamech, and the birth of the three sons of Noah, Ge 5:30.
Ver. 1. This is the book of the generations of Adam,.... An account of persons born of him, or who descended from him by generation in the line of Seth, down to Noah, consisting of ten generations; for a genealogy of all his descendants is not here given, not of those in the line of Cain, nor of the collateral branches in the line of Seth, only of those that descended one from another in a direct line to Noah:
in the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him; this is repeated from Ge 1:27 to put in mind that man is a creature of God; that God made him, and not he himself; that the first man was not begotten or produced in like manner as his sons are, but was immediately created; that his creation was in time, when there were days, and it was not on the first of these, but on the sixth; and that he was made in the likeness of God, which chiefly lay in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, and in dominion over the creatures.