The Roll For The Main Character Has Been Cast!

Congratulations to Michael Murphy for landing the roll of "MAN" in the short film, "CRAP!"  He blew us away with his comedic genius.  Not kidding.  His timing, his instinct, his improvisation were all so good that he had us both laughing in the middle of his audition.  Then I took the video home and showed it to my wife and mother-in-law.  They were in stitches.  Can't wait to shoot the promo in of couple weeks.

Fundraising Leads to Auditions for CRAP!

Karen Covey (my producer and general partner in crime) and I, have been struggling with how to raise the $30,000 it will take to make the movie CRAP!.  Obviously we need to use kickstarter.com but how to do so effectively was our issue.  Lot's of people beg for money on kickstarter but only about half of them succeed.

We decided that it was important to create an entertaining pitch (a commercial on kickstarter.com in which we beg for money) and the best way to do that is with a movie trailer.  The problem with that is it means we have to cast the movie.  We hadn't planned to do casting until we had the funds in place to secure the location and the crew.  Never the less, it became obvious that we needed to cast the movie now in order to make the trailer/pitch.

To that end, I placed an ad in Backstage magazine last night. and we will take submissions until March 11th.  Then we will hold auditions March 16th and 17th.  The bummer about that is that by the time we finish the trailer/pitch we will have lost almost two months.  Figure another six weeks of actual fundraising and we are not looking at shooting the actual movie until May.

On the upside, the trailer/pitch I wrote is going to be fun!  I wrote a kind of spoof of the movie that accomplishes the following goals:
1.) It is funny so people will actually watch it.
2.) It is a microcosm of the movie so if you like the trailer/pitch you will like the movie.
3.) It addresses and dispels the notion that this movie is just a bunch of adolescent poop humor.
4.) It demonstrates my competence as a Director
5.) It introduces the lead actor and demonstrates his comedic skills.
6.) It asks for money in a way that isn't the usual, pathetic, "we can't do this without you" sort of pitch.
7.) Because the trailer/pitch is basically a two minute version of the movie, shooting it will give us a very clear picture of what the actual shoot will be like.  So, if there are any issues that have not occurred to us yet, they will become clear during the shooting of the trailer/pitch, allowing us to correct them before shooting the actual movie.

Now that the auditions have been announced it will be exciting to see the actors who submit for it.

CRAP!

I have finished writing a screenplay that has been on my mind for years - decades really.  It is called CRAP! and the entire thing takes place in a public men's room and we never see any of the faces of the various characters who come in and out.  Only their feet from under the stall door.  Of course we do see the main character's face.  In fact, the success of this film will depend almost entirely on the actor's ability to perform exaggerated facial expressions in reaction to the situations the main character faces in there (it is a dark comedy).

Now I have to plan the production.  First, I have to create my story boards in a previz program called FrameForge.  Then I have to secure the location which I think I have already done.  Next I have to get a camera man, lighting person, and hold auditions for the parts. ancillary characters must perform off-screen dialog and on-screen... uh, footwork.  I see the main character  as a cross between Jim Carrey and Mathew Perry.

Oh, and of course there is one more really important pre-production item I need.  Music!  Preferably, original songs from an unknown band.  However, I am very picky about the musical score of my works and unless I get lucky and find a true diamond in the rough I'm not likely to actually go that route.  Which leaves me with having to use SmartSound or some other canned music source.  I hate that because there is no better way to set a film apart than to use good, original music that everyone likes.

So I have my work cut out for me.  Wish me luck.

Repurposing

So, originally my idea for this blog was just to post new chapters of the book I am currently writing called , "The Bible for Big Fat Sinners,"(a book that no christian will want to read because of its irreverence and no atheist will want to read because of its lack of contempt).  But, I've decided to expand its purpose to include... well, all things Daniel Lee Baker, I suppose.

The book, along with the one I've already written will be available on the Writer page (see tabs at top of home page).  My actor's reel will now have a place on the Actor page.  My directorial endeavors will appear on the FIlmmaker page, and of course anything else I have to say, including but not limited to new chapters of the book, will appear as posts here on the home page (or the Blog page).

It just makes sense to do all of this in one place rather than on multiple websites.  For now, I will keep the Making Late website as it is but  I may fold that into the Filmmaker page soon.

The Bible for Big Fat SinnersChapter 8 - How to Swindle a Pharaoh

This is the fifth installment in a series; each one composing a separate chapter of the book, "The Bible: for Big Fat Sinners," by Daniel Lee Baker.   See previous posts:
 Introduction  *   Chapter 1 - In the Beginning  *   Chapter 2 - Adam and Eve   *    Chapter 3 - Cain and Abel  *  Chapter 4 - Noah  *  Chapter 5 - The Tower of Babel    *  Chapter 6 - The Genealogies  *  The Call of Abram (Abraham) 

How to Swindle a Pharaoh 

No sooner does Abram arrive than does a famine strike the Promise Land.  So, Abram decides to move down to Egypt where the milk and honey still flows freely.  His plan is to hang out by the Nile River and enjoy the good graces of the Egyptian people for a year or two until the Promise Land starts growing food again.  There is only one small detail that needs to be ironed out first.

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It seems that Abram’s wife, Sarai was one hot looking chick (way to go Abram!).  Not a problem when you are living the life of a wanderer and hardly ever come into contact with city folk.  But now that they were moving into Egypt, Sarai’s hotness was going to be a problem.  
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Apparently, while the Promise Land was experiencing a food famine, Egypt was having a famine of beautiful women (probably because the Pharaoh was taking all the hotties for himself).  Abram knows that when they get to Egypt, the men there are going to see Sarai and want some-o-dat.  So Abram stops just outside of town to have a chat with Sarai about the situation.
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He says to her, in effect, “Look, you’re more woman than these guys have ever seen and if I introduce you as my wife, they’ll kill me just to make you single again so that one of them can have you.  If, on the other hand, they think you are single, they will treat me well in order to win your hand in marriage.  So, don’t tell them you’re my wife.  Tell them that you are my sister.  After all, you were my sister before you became my wife, so we’re not really lying.”  (Genesis 12:10-13)
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So, telling the truth about Sarai's marital status will result in Abram's death; that seems true enough.  Still, this deception is likely to result in riches coming his way and Abram knows this.  When he tells Sarai that they will “treat me well for your sake,” not only does that mean that they won't kill him; it means he will likely be given many gifts for the purpose of persuading him to give up his "sister" in marriage.  That was how it worked in the middle east back then.  By our western standards it is only a step or two above slave trading but in their culture, marriage had much more to do with the economy than with love.
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You must understand.  Life was hard back then.  There was no running water.  If you needed water you went down to the river and fetched it.  There was no gas or electricity.  If you needed to cook something you had to find some wood and build a fire.  If you wanted wheat for flour, you plowed the ground, planted the seed, reaped the fields, and ground the wheat with stone tools.  Everything required physical effort, and lots of it.  When it comes to such a physically demanding environment, women could not compete the way they do now in the information age.
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So, for a man to take a woman as a wife meant he wold have to see to her well being - food, clothing, shelter.  She would, in his eyes, be something of a burden.  Why should a man take on more of burden than he already had?  Well, LUST is one very big reason, though not the only one.  But let's stay with lust for a moment.  If a woman was beautiful there were plenty of men willing marry her.  But if that beautiful woman happens to be my daughter or my sister, I want to make sure she is well taken care of.  If you want to marry her, you need to demonstrate that you can provide for her.  Giving me extravagant gifts might help convince me of it.  And while I might appreciate your fine gift, there are many other suitors bearing gifts as well.  So, I'll wait and enjoy all the fine gifts coming in before I make a decision.  If you really want my beautiful daughter or sister, you need to impress me.
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In a situation like this, a guy could clean up!  On the other hand if my daughter or sister is not beautiful, the situation is reversed.  In order to get some guy to marry her, I need to sweeten the pot with a dowry.  You may not find my ugly daughter or sister sexually attractive, but would you take her if I threw in thirty sheep and a donkey?  Besides, you may not be able to afford a hot chick anyway, and an ugly wife is better than no wife because she can still bear you lots of children who will all work in your fields one day.  So you see, marriage is very much about economics, and very little about love.
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Now, here we have Abram and Sarai.  Abram is a foreigner and therefore not particularly welcome in the first place.  If he shows up with a wife who is hotter than any of the Egyptian wives they are going to like him even less.  On the other hand, if he shows up with a hot sister he will become everyone's favorite foreign invader.  But how much are they going to like him when they find out that he is a fraud?  After they have given him tons of gifts for Sarai's sake only to learn that she is not a virgin, but in fact, is married?
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The famine back home was bad enough that Abram needs to stay here for at least a year or two.  So, he will have to string these suitors along for the whole time he is here.  All the while, these men will be "treating Abram well" (showering him with gifts).  Then, when Abram finally decides to go back to the Promise Land, he and Sarai will have to quickly and quietly pull up stakes and get the heck out of Dodge before anybody knows he’s gone; otherwise he’s dead.  The only alternative would be to simply give Sarai up and actually let her marry one of them, never revealing that she was his wife.
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All of this is clear in his mind when he discusses it with Sarai.  But, what can he do?  He can't go home to the Promise Land yet, and he can't introduce Sarai as his wife without getting killed.  As unpleasant as it is, calling her his sister seems like the only solution.  The fact that he will profit from it is just a nice bonus.  Instead of Abram getting killed, a few Egyptians lose some of their possessions.  Works for me!  But it is a dangerous game that could cost them both their lives.
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As it turned out, Abram didn’t have to worry about a bunch of different men competing for Sarai.  He only had to worry about one, the Pharaoh!  Once the Pharaoh found out about Sarai he took her for himself.  This is a disaster because you can’t string the Pharaoh along.  He takes what he wants and if you are lucky he will "treat you well" in the process.  Luckily for Abram, he does treat him well - very well! 

“And when Pharaoh’s officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh, and she was taken into his palace. He treated Abram well for her sake, and Abram acquired sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, menservants and maidservants, and camels.” (Genesis 12:15-16)

Abram is in a serious pickle!  It was going to be hard enough to pull one over on a bunch of regular Egyptian citizens.  But the Pharaoh has an army.  He will hunt Abram to the ends of the earth if he tries to take Sarai away now.  And that is assuming he could even get her out of the palace in the first place.  He probably has no choice now but to let the Pharaoh have her and never reveal that she is his wife.  God, however, cannot allow this.  He has already promised Abram that he would bless him with innumerable descendants.  That requires that Abram and Sarai have children, which they do not yet have.
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Now, the Bible doesn’t say whether or not the Pharaoh had his way with Sarai.  We could assume that God kept this from happening, but we really don’t know.  We do know that God was not pleased with the whole thing and showed his displeasure by afflicting Pharaoh’s entire house with disease.  We can assume that God communicated with the Pharaoh somehow and explained the reason for this punishment because Pharaoh confronts Abram about it in verse 18.
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“So Pharaoh summoned Abram. ‘What have you done to me?’ he said. ‘Why didn’t you tell me she was your wife? Why did you say, “She is my sister,” so that I took her to be my wife? Now then, here is your wife. Take her and go!’ Then Pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men, and they sent him on his way, with his wife and everything he had.’  (Genesis 12:18-20)

The fact that Pharaoh doesn't kill Abram over this incident is another indicator that God explained the situation to Pharaoh, probably included a warning not to harm Abram.  The fact that Pharaoh lets Abram keep all of the gifts he had given him shows that the Pharaoh really had the fear of God put in him.  Interestingly, for all of his harsh treatment of the Pharaoh, God doesn’t so much as shake his finger at Abram for creating the deception in the first place.  Maybe God agreed with Abram that he didn’t have any choice because the men of Egypt would have killed him.   But, we must not forget that Abram has been forced to move to Egypt by a famine in the Promise Land.
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Really?  A famine in the Promise Land?  The land, flowing with milk and honey?  Hmm, seems to me like God wanted Abram to go down to Egypt.  But that doesn't make sense ether because if God wanted Abram to go down to Egypt he could have just told him, "Go," and Abram would have obeyed.  I suppose we could say that the famine was just a natural occurrence, a fluke, a bit of bad luck, but given how close Abram and God were, it seems unlikely that God had no hand in this major, life changing event.  I think we have to conclude that God was driving this whole thing.
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Indeed, it will become clear later that God definitely wanted Abram to go down into Egypt, and he definitely wanted Abram to get into a situation that would require God to bail him out of.  Why?  To provide symbolism and analogy for future generations.  You see, throughout the Bible Egypt represents "sin."  Abram's journey down into Egypt (sin), and then being delivered from it by God, is analogous to mankind falling into sin and God delivering us from it.
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Given the fact that Pharaoh’s entire house had been struck with disease by the God of Abram, it is not surprising that the Pharaoh did not ask for all those gifts to be returned.  But shouldn’t Abram have given them back anyway?  Was it really right to take them, given the false pretenses under which they were given to him?  
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Pharaoh got the short end of the stick here.  He hadn't done anything wrong by taking an unmarried woman into his palace as a concubine or a wife.  That's what Pharaohs did back then and it would only have been considered oppressive if he had knowingly taken a married woman.  In this case, Pharaoh not only believed that Sarai was single, but dealt fairly with the man he believed to be her brother, Abram; lavishing gifts upon him to the point where he was a wealthy man.  And what did the Pharaoh get for it?  A slap in the face from God almighty!
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God didn’t just wink at this deception; he set it up and even allowed Abram to profit from it.  This is a good thing if you are Abram, but it sucks to be the Pharaoh.  You may respond by saying something like, “Well, that’s just too bad.  God didn’t like any of the Pharaohs because they were all arrogant and claimed to be gods.”  Fine.  But God didn't smite the Pharaoh for that.  He smites him for wanting to marry the hottest chick he had ever seen and for not being able to read her mind; for believing her when she posed as a single woman.  Seems a bit unfair to me, especially for all of the servants and slaves who had the misfortune of working in the palace during God's moment of displeasure.
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The clear message here is that if you are someone whom God likes, then you can do whatever you want to everyone else – lie, cheat, steal, whatever.  Arabs and Jews (both descendants of Abram) seem to understand this about God, even today.  Christians, Don't exist yet, and won't for another few thousand years.  When they do arrive, they will have a radically different view of God.
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Christians think of God as being infinitely fair and high minded.  They believe that God expects each of them to also be fair and high minded.  Christians love their enemies, do good to those who spitefully use and abuse them, turn the other cheek, love their neighbors.  All of those ideas, at least as religious tenets, are foreign to Abram, and they do not appear to have occurred to God yet either.

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All of this may have given you the impression that Abram is kind of a sleazy guy, and not a very bright one at that.  The only reason that the fiasco in Egypt ended well is because God stepped in and backed him up.  In fact, this experience worked out so well for Abram that he has no reason to change his behavior in the future and repeats this exact same deception again with another king named Abimelech, as we will see shortly.  Still, there is much more to Abram’s personality than meets the eye at this point and we are about to see some of his finer qualities.
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Right or wrong, Abram has left Egypt a wealthy man and continues to prosper from that point forward.  Along the way his nephew, Lot has had the good sense to stick with him through thick and thin - and in the process, has become wealthy in his own right.  In fact, after a short time the two men have become so wealthy together that the Promise Land cannot sustain both of their estates in the same vicinity.  Abram sees that they need to go their separate ways.  The question is how to tell Lot to get lost without hurting his feelings.
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The fact is, God has already promised the entire land of Canaan to Abram.  He could have coldly taken lands he wanted and assigned Lot to what ever patch of ground was left over.  Instead, Abram is warm and magnanimous with his nephew.
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“So Abram said to Lot, ‘Let’s not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.’”  (Genesis 13:8-9)

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It is fascinating to see how differently Abram deals with the members of his own family as compared with everyone else.  Next to God’s will, Abram’s concern for his family’s happiness and well-being is consistently the most important thing to him throughout the book of Genesis; a fact that is demonstrated even more clearly in the events that are about to unfold.
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Lot looks around and picks the finest land available:

“Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, toward Zoar. (This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.) So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out toward the east. The two men parted company: Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom.”  (Genesis 13:10-12)

Now, I know what you are thinking.  Bad choice!  By selfishly choosing the best land for himself he has placed his entire estate smack dab in the center of God’s crosshairs; because as we all know, God winds up destroying Sodom and Gomorrah.  But even without that fate waiting for him a few years from now, Lot has still chosen badly.  You see, for the past fourteen years or so the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, along with six other cities, have been under the control of an enterprising young despot named, Kedorlaomer.  We’ll just call him “Ked,” for short.
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Each of these cities has its own “king,” but they all submit to Ked who is already the king of his own city called, Elam.  Ked is a sandbox-bully who doesn’t play nicely with others.  Basically, Ked has been putting together his own little empire and now it is time for him to deal with his first uprising.  Five of his cities have banded together and rebelled.  As it happens, Sodom (the city Lot chose to settle near) is one of them.
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Now, Ked puts together an army from the four cities that are still loyal and goes after the rebels.  The rebels have assembled an army to meet him.  Ked kicks their butts and proceeds to take the spoils of war from their conquered cities, which basically means everything.  Rebel survivors will now be slaves, and everything they once owned is now the property of the great and terrible Ked.  Among the slaves and property are Lot and his entire estate.
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You will recall that Abram went the opposite direction from Lot and that he preferred to live away from the cities.  So, Abram is untouched by the disaster that has befallen his nephew.  However, when Abram hears that his nephew has been taken prisoner, he takes immediate action.
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Interestingly enough, Abram just happens to have three hundred and eighteen “trained men” in his employ, sitting around his house waiting for just this sort of opportunity to use their fighting skills (I’m assuming that they are trained as fighting men not basket weavers or something like that).  He gathers them and rides after Ked’s army, intent on rescuing his nephew, Lot.  When they get close to the enemy camp, Abram divides his men and attacks.  He routes the enemy and recovers his nephew, along with everything else that the enemy had taken, including all of the other prisoners.
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Needless to say, Abram is a hero.  As he is returning from the battle, the King of Sodom comes out to meet him.  Apparently the King of Sodom has survived the war without being captured.  Now that Abram has recovered everything the King of Sodom is anxious to resume his role.  However, he is not ungrateful to Abram for his service.  As a token of his gratitude he tells Abram to keep all of the possessions he has recovered from the Ked-monster.  All he asks is that Abram return the people who had been captured.  He turns it down.
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Abram is already a wealthy man.  He does not need the fortune that has just been offered to him, but that is not why he turns it down.  He turns it down because he does not want the King of Sodom to be able to claim, later on, that Abram’s wealth came from him.  So Abram takes nothing for a reward and as a result, the King of Sodom remains indebted to him, not the other way around.  He simply frees his nephew, compensates his men for their service in this endeavor, and goes on about his business.  After all, his goal was to save Lot, not to obtain more wealth.
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The impression I always got from Sunday school was that Abram was just a lowly sheep herder.  But what kind of sheep herder has three hundred and eighteen trained fighting men hanging around waiting for something to do?  I'll tell you what kind.  The wealthy kind.  The kind that has a lot of assets that need to be protected from marauders.  The kind of man who knows that the world is full of people who will take everything you own unless you are prepared to kill them for trying.  So this man, who starts out seeming like a not-so-bright, somewhat cowardly, con artist, whose short sightedness places his own wife in peril, now emerges as a shrewd, valiant, loyal, compassionate, wise leader of men.  Not to mention God's favorite guy.

The Bible for Big Fat SinnersChapter 7 - The Call of Abram (Abraham)

This is the fifth installment in a series; each one composing a separate chapter of the book, "The Bible: for Big Fat Sinners," by Daniel Lee Baker.   See previous posts:
 Introduction  *   Chapter 1 - In the Beginning  *   Chapter 2 - Adam and Eve   *    Chapter 3 - Cain and Abel  *  Chapter 4 - Noah  *  Chapter 5 - The Tower of Babel    *  Chapter 6 - The Genealogies

The Call of Abram

Every now and then, God finds a man that he likes.  Abel was perhaps the first example of this; although he didn’t like Abel enough to protect him from being murdered by his own brother.  Then there was Enoch.  God liked him so much that he took him away somewhere; probably to heaven but no one really knows for sure.  Then there was Noah; the first man that God ever called to perform a particular task.  Finally we come to Abram, God’s new favorite guy.
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God begins the relationship by telling Abram to move away from his current residence, a place called Haran (located in the place we now call southern Turkey), to a land called Canaan (located in the lands we now call Israel and Palestine).  Included in this command is a promise; a promise that will change the world forever.
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“The Lord had said to Abram, ‘Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.’” (Genesis 12:1-3)

Not that I would know, but I would assume that when God pops in on you and tells you to move, you move.  Abram certainly saw it that way and immediately packed up his family to go.  His nephew, Lot also decided to come along for the ride.
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Now that he is all packed up and ready for his journey, where is he supposed to go?  God could have said, “… and go to the land of Canaan,” but he doesn’t.  He says, “… and go to a land I will show you.”  This required faith on the part of Abram, who simply had to trust that God would lead him.  This is significant because Abraham is known for his great faith in God.  Sure enough, Abram winds up in the right place, the land of Canaan.  You remember Noah’s grandson, Canaan.  The guy Noah cursed?  Well at the time of Abram, that curse does not appear to have kicked in yet, because Canaan’s descendents have successfully settled a stretch of land around the Jordan river that will one day be referred to as the Promise Land; “a land flowing with milk and honey.”  (Exodus 3:8) It is to this land that God leads Abram.  And when he gets there, God promises to give all of that land to him – well, to his descendants, anyway. (Gen 12:7)  The fact that the Canaanites consider it their land isn’t even an issue.  God will honor Noah’s curse upon Canaan, and that will be that. 

However, none of this will happen until five hundred years later when the Children of Israel (Abram’s descendents) take the land by force under the command of Joshua.  Abram, himself, does not take possession of the land during his life time.  He dwells in the land, but he lives the life of a wanderer for the most part; never claiming the land, or confronting its inhabitants in any way.  Well, actually that is not entirely true.  We will see shortly that Abram is not a pacifist by any stretch of the imagination.  But when he imposes his will on others it is on behalf of people he cares about and he takes nothing for himself in the process.
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God repeats his promise to Abram again in chapter thirteen:  “The Lord said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, ‘Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you.  So Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the Lord.’” (Gen 13:14-18)

So just in case you haven’t figured it out yet, Abram is God’s number one guy.  HANDS DOWN!  Even Noah doesn’t hold a candle to him.  And the only thing Abram has had to do (so far) to win that honor is pack up and start traveling when God said, in effect, “pack up and start traveling.”  Seems like a pretty sweet deal doesn’t it?  Well, there is a catch or two along the way, but you don’t get to be the father of God’s chosen people without at least a few bumps in the road.  We’ll get to those bumps soon enough, but first it will be interesting to take a closer look at who this guy, Abram really is as a person.  We will do that in the next chapter.

The Bible for Big Fat Sinners Chapter 6 - The Genealogies

This is the fifth installment in a series; each one composing a separate chapter of the book, "The Bible: for Big Fat Sinners," by Daniel Lee Baker.   See previous posts:
 Introduction  *   Chapter 1 - In the Beginning  *   Chapter 2 - Adam and Eve   *    Chapter 3 - Cain and Abel  *  Chapter 4 - Noah  *  Chapter 5 - The Tower of Babel     

The Genealogies

It seems like every time the Bible starts getting interesting, the author throws in a genealogy list to put you back to sleep.  However, there are little gems thrown in here and there that almost make the genealogies worth wading through.  Almost.  Let's just hit the highlights, shall we?

One thing we need to cover before we go any further, is the fact that from this point forward the entire Bible, including the genealogies, concerns itself with a man by the name of Abram (Abraham) and his descendents.  His descendents will become a nation called, Israel; the history of which, the Bible chronicles.  Everything that has happened so far has been leading up to the introduction of this man, Abram.  And everything that follows the telling of this man's story will be a result of the life he led.  Before we can meet him or his descendents, however, the Bible insists that we first be formally introduced to all of his ancestors, even though we have already met the most important ones – Adam, Noah, and Shem.  This chapter will introduce you to four more: Methuselah, Enoch, Peleg, and Terah.
  
Note:  Abram is the man’s birth name, and the name he uses most of his life, until God changes it to Abraham.  Thus, you will find that sometimes I refer to him as Abram, and sometimes as Abraham.

The genealogies record the bloodline from Adam to Abraham which flows from male to male with no women in the line.  There are only twenty generations from Adam to Abram but when you try reading them it feels more like a thousand.  Here is a small sample:

Genesis 5: 3-9 – “When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth. After Seth was born, Adam lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Adam lived 930 years, and then he died. When Seth had lived 105 years, he became the father of Enosh. And after he became the father of Enosh, Seth lived 807 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Seth lived 912 years, and then he died. When Enosh had lived 90 years, he became the father of Kenan…“ and so on, and so forth for twenty generations until we get to Abram (Abraham).  
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The first thing that pops out at you is how long these guys lived.  The one who lived the longest was Noah’s grandfather, Methuselah.  He made it to the ripe old age of nine-hundred-and-sixty-nine.  He might have lived even longer if God hadn’t killed him in the flood.  
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Why did Methuselah live so long?  Well, maybe it was because he was a good son to his parents.  Later on in the Bible when God gives the Ten Commandments, he makes a distinct connection between living a long time and obeying the fifth commandment – “Honor thy father and mother.”  So, maybe Methuselah honored his parents... a lot.
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Methuselah’s father, Enoch certainly seems worthy of such honor.  When the genealogies get to him there is some extra information given.  We are told that he, “walked with God.”  There is no explanation of what that means but it sure sounds like a good thing.  Even if it was meant literally, there is no other example in the Bible of God enjoying someone’s company so much as to go walking with them regularly.  God must have really enjoyed those walks, because one day he just up and took Enoch.  (Genesis 5:21-24)  We assume he took him to heaven with him, but the Bible doesn’t really say where he took him.
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Now, Methuselah may have lived longer than anybody else (969 years), but not by much.  Adam lived nine-hundred-and-thirty years and Noah lived nine-hundred-and-fifty years.  Adam actually lived to see his great, great, great, great, great, great grandson, Lamech who was Noah’s father.  Noah actually lived to see his great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandson, Ishmael who was the first born son of Abram (Abraham) and the father of the Arabian people.  That means, obviously, that Noah was still alive during the Tower of Babel fiasco and he was still alive during most of Abraham’s life, including the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.  As we read the story of Abraham we don’t usually think about the fact that Noah was still kicking around somewhere here on earth but according to the genealogies, he was.
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You may remember that when we talked about Nimrod in the last chapter I mentioned that he is identified with the Sumerian king, Gilgamesh.  Well, in the Sumerian story, Gilgamesh (Nimrod) goes searching for, and finds Noah!  Of course the Sumerians have a different name for him, Utnapishtim, but there is no mistaking his identity... well,  unless there was another worldwide deluge that the Bible forgot to mention, and another Ark filled with animals.  However, one key difference in the Epic of Gilgamesh is that Utnapishtim is given immortality after the flood, whereas Noah only gets to be the last human to break the age of 900.
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After the flood, these long life spans began to diminish.  Consequently, people started having babies earlier in life – typically around the age of thirty instead of one-hundred or more.  For example, Shem, who was born before the flood, had his first son right at the age of one-hundred – but his son, Arphaxad started his family at the age of thirty-five; a trend which caught on and produced more generations in less time.
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The name Peleg means, “division” because the earth was divided around the time he was born. (Genesis 10:25)  We assume that this dividing of the earth is a reference to the Tower of Babel incident when God divided the people by language.  However, I have also heard the theory that it refers to the dividing of the earth’s continents.  The theory is that all the earth’s continents are pieces of one large continent which broke up into the separate continents we know today.  (Google “Pangea” for more info on this idea).  The geologic record, however, suggests that this break up happened millions of years before Peleg was even a twinkle in his daddy’s eye.  Actually, the geologic record differs with the Bible in a number of areas but no one’s faith appears to be waning over it.  Instead there are lots of creative ways of explaining it which I am not inclined to go into here.  I will wait, and discuss it in a later chapter, so stay tuned.
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Peleg’s great, great grandson was Terah, Abram’s father.  Terah had three sons, Abram, Nahor, and Haran.  Haran had a son named, Lot (of Sodom and Gomorrah fame) and a daughter named, Milcah.  Abram’s brother, Nahor married Milcah, his neice.  This, of course, was incestuous by our standards, but this was long before the Law of Moses, in which God prohibited incest.  In fact, Abram actually married his own half-sister, Sarai.  Just as there are ways of explaining the geological issues, there are ways of explaining the genetic issues. The theory is that genetics worked differently back then and that sibling marriages were necessary to repopulate the earth.    
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Do you remember when we talked about Cain and how he suddenly found himself married to a woman with no explanation of where she came from?  And remember how he founded a city in the land of Nod which was populated with people who suddenly seemed to pop into existence?  Well the most popular explanation for that is that Adam and Eve had other children and that Cain married one of his sisters.  In fact, Adam and Eve are said to have had lots of other children who married each other and they each had lots of children who married each other.  Basically, it was perfectly acceptable back then, both socially and genetically, for a man to marry ones own sister.  This is difficult for geneticists to swallow, but it’s the commonly accepted view among people of faith.  However, it is important to note that this explanation is only speculation.  The Bible says nothing about it.  All we know from the Bible is that Cain married... someone, who came from ... somewhere. However, the fact that Abram's uncle married his own niece, and Abram himself married his own half-sister certainly lends support to the prevailing theory.
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Congratulations!  You’ve just survived the genealogies chapter.