Seth
Encyclopedia
Seth in Judaism
, Christianity
and Islam
, is the third listed son of Adam and Eve
and brother of Cain and Abel
, who are the only other of their children mentioned by name. According to , Seth was born after the slaying of Abel by Cain, and Eve believed God had appointed him as a replacement for Abel.
In , there is a folk etymology for Seth's name, which derives it from the Hebrew word for "plant" as in "plant a seed" (syt). Eve says, "God has planted another seed, under/replacing Abel's". Seth lived to the age of 911.
. According to the Book of Jubilees, in 231 AM Seth married his sister, Azura
, who was 4 years younger than he was. In the year 235 AM, Azura gave birth to Enos
.
(Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaqi) refers to Seth as the ancestor of Noah
and hence the father of all mankind, all other humans having perished in the Great Flood.
In gnosticism
, Seth is seen as a replacement given by God for Abel, whom Cain had slain. It is said that late in life, Adam gave Seth secret teachings that would become the kabbalah
. The Zohar
refers to Seth as "ancestor of all the generations of the tzaddikim" (Hebrew: righteous ones).
According to Seder Olam Rabbah
, based on Jewish reckoning, he was born in 130 AM
. According to Aggadah
, he had 33 sons and 23 daughters. According to the Seder Olam Rabbah, he died in 1042 AM
.
reveres Seth as the gift bestowed upon Adam after the death of Abel. Although not one of the prophet
s mentioned in the Qur'an, Muslim
s see Seth as a prophet
like his father, and the one who continued teaching mankind after the death of Adam
. Islamic lore
gives Seth an exalted position among the Antediluvian
Patriarch
s of the Generations of Adam
, and some sources even cite Seth as the receiver of a scripture. Islamic literature holds that Seth was born when Adam was past 100 and that, by the time Adam died, Adam had already made Seth the heir to him in guiding the "Children of Adam". Muslim
s hold that Seth was taught of the hours of day and night as well as of the Great Flood to come and was further taught to pray to God
during the hours of the night. Islam
, like Judaism
and Christianity
, traces the genealogy of mankind back to Seth, since Abel did not leave any heirs and Cain's heirs, according to tradition, were destroyed by the Great Flood.
Some Muslims believe that Seth's tomb is located in the village
of Al-Nabi Shayth
(literally meaning The Prophet Seth) where a mosque is named after him.
, Josephus
refers to Seth as virtuous and of excellent character, and reports that his descendants invented the wisdom of the heavenly bodies, and built the "pillars of the sons of Seth", two pillars inscribed with many scientific discoveries and inventions, notably in astronomy
. They were built by Seth's descendants based on Adam's prediction that the world would be destroyed at one time by fire and another time by global flood, in order to protect the discoveries and be remembered after the destruction. One was composed of brick, and the other of stone, so that if the pillar of brick should be destroyed, the pillar of stone would remain, both reporting the ancient discoveries, and informing men that a pillar of brick was also erected. Josephus reports that the pillar of stone remained in the land of Siriad in his day.
William Whiston
, a 17/18th century translator of the Antiquities, stated in a footnote that he believed Josephus mistook Seth for Sesostris
, king of Egypt
, the erector of the referenced pillar in Siriad (being a contemporary name for the territories in which Sirius
was venerated (i.e., Egypt
). He stated that there was no way for any pillars of Seth to survive the deluge, because the deluge buried all such pillars and edifices far underground in the sediment of its waters.
, says that in 231 AM
Seth married his sister, Azura
, who was 4 years younger than he was. In the year 235 AM, Azura gave birth to Enos.
Seth is commemorated as one of the Holy Forefathers in the Calendar of Saints
of the Armenian Apostolic Church
, along with Adam, Abel, and others, with a feast day on July 26. He is also included in the Genealogy of Jesus
, according to Luke 3:23–38.
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
, Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
and Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, is the third listed son of Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve were, according to the Genesis creation narratives, the first human couple to inhabit Earth, created by YHWH, the God of the ancient Hebrews...
and brother of Cain and Abel
Cain and Abel
In the Hebrew Bible, Cain and Abel are two sons of Adam and Eve. The Qur'an mentions the story, calling them the two sons of Adam only....
, who are the only other of their children mentioned by name. According to , Seth was born after the slaying of Abel by Cain, and Eve believed God had appointed him as a replacement for Abel.
In the Hebrew Bible
According to Genesis, Seth was born when Adam was 130 years old "a son in his likeness and image." The genealogy is repeated at . states that Adam fathered "sons and daughters" before his death, aged 930 years.In , there is a folk etymology for Seth's name, which derives it from the Hebrew word for "plant" as in "plant a seed" (syt). Eve says, "God has planted another seed, under/replacing Abel's". Seth lived to the age of 911.
Book of Jubilees
The Book of Jubilees also dates his birth to 130 AMAnno Mundi
' , abbreviated as AM or A.M., refers to a Calendar era based on the Biblical creation of the world. Numerous efforts have been made to determine the Biblical date of Creation, yielding varying results. Besides differences in interpretation, which version of the Bible is being referenced also...
. According to the Book of Jubilees, in 231 AM Seth married his sister, Azura
Generations of Adam
"Generations of Adam" is a concept in in the Hebrew Bible. It is typically taken as name of Adam's line of descent going through Seth. Another view equates the generations of Adam with material about a second line of descent starting with Cain in Genesis 4, while Genesis 5 is taken as the...
, who was 4 years younger than he was. In the year 235 AM, Azura gave birth to Enos
Enos
Enos or Enosh, may refer to:-People in religious scripture:* Enos , a genealogical figure in the Bible.* The Book of Enos, one of the books that make up The Book of Mormon...
.
In Jewish tradition
RashiRashi
Shlomo Yitzhaki , or in Latin Salomon Isaacides, and today generally known by the acronym Rashi , was a medieval French rabbi famed as the author of a comprehensive commentary on the Talmud, as well as a comprehensive commentary on the Tanakh...
(Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaqi) refers to Seth as the ancestor of Noah
Noah
Noah was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the tenth and last of the antediluvian Patriarchs. The biblical story of Noah is contained in chapters 6–9 of the book of Genesis, where he saves his family and representatives of all animals from the flood by constructing an ark...
and hence the father of all mankind, all other humans having perished in the Great Flood.
In gnosticism
Gnosticism
Gnosticism is a scholarly term for a set of religious beliefs and spiritual practices common to early Christianity, Hellenistic Judaism, Greco-Roman mystery religions, Zoroastrianism , and Neoplatonism.A common characteristic of some of these groups was the teaching that the realisation of Gnosis...
, Seth is seen as a replacement given by God for Abel, whom Cain had slain. It is said that late in life, Adam gave Seth secret teachings that would become the kabbalah
Kabbalah
Kabbalah/Kabala is a discipline and school of thought concerned with the esoteric aspect of Rabbinic Judaism. It was systematized in 11th-13th century Hachmei Provence and Spain, and again after the Expulsion from Spain, in 16th century Ottoman Palestine...
. The Zohar
Zohar
The Zohar is the foundational work in the literature of Jewish mystical thought known as Kabbalah. It is a group of books including commentary on the mystical aspects of the Torah and scriptural interpretations as well as material on Mysticism, mythical cosmogony, and mystical psychology...
refers to Seth as "ancestor of all the generations of the tzaddikim" (Hebrew: righteous ones).
According to Seder Olam Rabbah
Seder Olam Rabbah
Seder Olam Rabbah is a 2nd century CE Hebrew language chronology detailing the dates of biblical events from the Creation to Alexander the Great's conquest of Persia...
, based on Jewish reckoning, he was born in 130 AM
Anno Mundi
' , abbreviated as AM or A.M., refers to a Calendar era based on the Biblical creation of the world. Numerous efforts have been made to determine the Biblical date of Creation, yielding varying results. Besides differences in interpretation, which version of the Bible is being referenced also...
. According to Aggadah
Aggadah
Aggadah refers to the homiletic and non-legalistic exegetical texts in the classical rabbinic literature of Judaism, particularly as recorded in the Talmud and Midrash...
, he had 33 sons and 23 daughters. According to the Seder Olam Rabbah, he died in 1042 AM
Anno Mundi
' , abbreviated as AM or A.M., refers to a Calendar era based on the Biblical creation of the world. Numerous efforts have been made to determine the Biblical date of Creation, yielding varying results. Besides differences in interpretation, which version of the Bible is being referenced also...
.
In Islam
Islamic traditionTradition
A tradition is a ritual, belief or object passed down within a society, still maintained in the present, with origins in the past. Common examples include holidays or impractical but socially meaningful clothes , but the idea has also been applied to social norms such as greetings...
reveres Seth as the gift bestowed upon Adam after the death of Abel. Although not one of the prophet
Prophet
In religion, a prophet, from the Greek word προφήτης profitis meaning "foreteller", is an individual who is claimed to have been contacted by the supernatural or the divine, and serves as an intermediary with humanity, delivering this newfound knowledge from the supernatural entity to other people...
s mentioned in the Qur'an, Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s see Seth as a prophet
Prophet
In religion, a prophet, from the Greek word προφήτης profitis meaning "foreteller", is an individual who is claimed to have been contacted by the supernatural or the divine, and serves as an intermediary with humanity, delivering this newfound knowledge from the supernatural entity to other people...
like his father, and the one who continued teaching mankind after the death of Adam
Adam
Adam is a figure in the Book of Genesis. According to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions, he is the first human. In the Genesis creation narratives, he was created by Yahweh-Elohim , and the first woman, Eve was formed from his rib...
. Islamic lore
Lore
Lore may refer to:* Loré , a city and subdistrict in Lautém District* Lore , the region on each side of a birds face between eye and bill* Lore , a fictional android* Lore Sjöberg, an internet humourist...
gives Seth an exalted position among the Antediluvian
Antediluvian
The antediluvian period meaning "before the deluge" is the period referred to in the Bible between the Creation of the Earth and the Deluge . The narrative takes up chapters 1-6 of Genesis...
Patriarch
Patriarch
Originally a patriarch was a man who exercised autocratic authority as a pater familias over an extended family. The system of such rule of families by senior males is called patriarchy. This is a Greek word, a compound of πατριά , "lineage, descent", esp...
s of the Generations of Adam
Generations of Adam
"Generations of Adam" is a concept in in the Hebrew Bible. It is typically taken as name of Adam's line of descent going through Seth. Another view equates the generations of Adam with material about a second line of descent starting with Cain in Genesis 4, while Genesis 5 is taken as the...
, and some sources even cite Seth as the receiver of a scripture. Islamic literature holds that Seth was born when Adam was past 100 and that, by the time Adam died, Adam had already made Seth the heir to him in guiding the "Children of Adam". Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s hold that Seth was taught of the hours of day and night as well as of the Great Flood to come and was further taught to pray to God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
during the hours of the night. Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, like Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
and Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
, traces the genealogy of mankind back to Seth, since Abel did not leave any heirs and Cain's heirs, according to tradition, were destroyed by the Great Flood.
Some Muslims believe that Seth's tomb is located in the village
Village
A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...
of Al-Nabi Shayth
Al-Nabi Shayth
Al-Nabi Shayth is a village in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon. "Al-Nabi Shayth" is an Arabic word, it means "Seth the prophet". The village was called by that name because it contains the burial site of Seth son of Adam. A mosque was built on the burial site and it contains the grave of Seth inside...
(literally meaning The Prophet Seth) where a mosque is named after him.
In Josephus
In the Antiquities of the JewsAntiquities of the Jews
Antiquities of the Jews is a twenty volume historiographical work composed by the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in the thirteenth year of the reign of Roman emperor Flavius Domitian which was around 93 or 94 AD. Antiquities of the Jews contains an account of history of the Jewish people,...
, Josephus
Josephus
Titus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...
refers to Seth as virtuous and of excellent character, and reports that his descendants invented the wisdom of the heavenly bodies, and built the "pillars of the sons of Seth", two pillars inscribed with many scientific discoveries and inventions, notably in astronomy
Astronomy
Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...
. They were built by Seth's descendants based on Adam's prediction that the world would be destroyed at one time by fire and another time by global flood, in order to protect the discoveries and be remembered after the destruction. One was composed of brick, and the other of stone, so that if the pillar of brick should be destroyed, the pillar of stone would remain, both reporting the ancient discoveries, and informing men that a pillar of brick was also erected. Josephus reports that the pillar of stone remained in the land of Siriad in his day.
William Whiston
William Whiston
William Whiston was an English theologian, historian, and mathematician. He is probably best known for his translation of the Antiquities of the Jews and other works by Josephus, his A New Theory of the Earth, and his Arianism...
, a 17/18th century translator of the Antiquities, stated in a footnote that he believed Josephus mistook Seth for Sesostris
Sesostris
Sesostris was the name of a legendary king of ancient Egypt who led a military expedition into parts of Europe, as related by Herodotus.-Account of Herodotus:...
, king of Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
, the erector of the referenced pillar in Siriad (being a contemporary name for the territories in which Sirius
Sirius
Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. With a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, it is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. The name "Sirius" is derived from the Ancient Greek: Seirios . The star has the Bayer designation Alpha Canis Majoris...
was venerated (i.e., Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
). He stated that there was no way for any pillars of Seth to survive the deluge, because the deluge buried all such pillars and edifices far underground in the sediment of its waters.
In Christian tradition
The 2nd century BC Book of Jubilees, regarded as non-canonical except by Coptic ChristianityCoptic Christianity
The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria is the official name for the largest Christian church in Egypt and the Middle East. The Church belongs to the Oriental Orthodox family of churches, which has been a distinct church body since the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451, when it took a different...
, says that in 231 AM
Anno Mundi
' , abbreviated as AM or A.M., refers to a Calendar era based on the Biblical creation of the world. Numerous efforts have been made to determine the Biblical date of Creation, yielding varying results. Besides differences in interpretation, which version of the Bible is being referenced also...
Seth married his sister, Azura
Generations of Adam
"Generations of Adam" is a concept in in the Hebrew Bible. It is typically taken as name of Adam's line of descent going through Seth. Another view equates the generations of Adam with material about a second line of descent starting with Cain in Genesis 4, while Genesis 5 is taken as the...
, who was 4 years younger than he was. In the year 235 AM, Azura gave birth to Enos.
Seth is commemorated as one of the Holy Forefathers in the Calendar of Saints
Calendar of Saints (Armenian Apostolic Church)
-January:* 1 Third Day of the Fast of the Nativity* 2 Fourth Day of the Fast of the Nativity* 3 Fifth Day of the Fast of the Nativity* 4 Sixth Day of the Fast of the Nativity* 5 Eve of the Nativity and Theophany of our Lord Jesus Christ...
of the Armenian Apostolic Church
Armenian Apostolic Church
The Armenian Apostolic Church is the world's oldest National Church, is part of Oriental Orthodoxy, and is one of the most ancient Christian communities. Armenia was the first country to adopt Christianity as its official religion in 301 AD, in establishing this church...
, along with Adam, Abel, and others, with a feast day on July 26. He is also included in the Genealogy of Jesus
Genealogy of Jesus
The genealogy of Jesus is described in two passages of the Gospels: Luke 3:23–38 and Matthew 1:1–17.* Matthew's genealogy commences with Abraham and then from King David's son Solomon follows the legal line of the kings through Jeconiah, the king whose descendants were cursed, to Joseph, legal...
, according to Luke 3:23–38.