These are the generations of Shem. The new section, opening with the usual formula (cf. Genesis 2:4; Genesis 5:1; Genesis 6:9; Genesis 10:1), reverts to the main purpose of the inspired narrative, which is to trace the onward development of the line of promise; and this it does by carrying forward the genealogical history of the holy seed through ten generations till it reaches Abram.
Taken along with Genesis 5:1-32; with which it corresponds, the present table completes the chronological outline from Adam to the Hebrew patriarch. Shem was an hundred years old (literally, the son of an hundred years, i.
e. in his hundredth year), and begat Arphaxad. The English term is borrowed from the LXX; the Hebrew being Arpaehshadh, a compound of which the principal part is כשד, giving rise to the Chashdim or Chaldeans; whence Professor Lewis regards it as originally the name of a people transferred to their ancestor (cf.
Genesis 10:22). Two years after the flood. So that in Noah's 603rd year Shem was 100, and must accordingly have been born in Noah's 503rd year, i.e. two years after Japheth (cf. Genesis 5:32; Genesis 10:21).
The mention of the Flood indicates the point of time from which the present section is designed to be reckoned.