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Seth
Wikipedia
Seth
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Seth
Born 3982 BC
Died 3070 BC (aged
912)
Spouse Azura
(his sister)
Children In
Genesis: Enos
In The Book of Jubilees: Noam (Jubilees 4:13)
Parents
Adam (father)
Eve (mother)
Relatives In
Genesis:
Abel (brother)
Cain (brother)
Enos (son)
Kenan (grandson)
Mahalalel (great-grandson)
Jared (great-great-grandson)
Enoch (great-great-great-grandson)
Methuselah (great-great-great-great-grandson)
Lamech (great-great-great-great-great-grandson)
According to later traditions:
Aclima (sister)
Azura (sister)
Seth[a] is the third son of Adam and Eve within the
Abrahamic religions. The Hebrew Bible names two of his siblings as Cain and
Abel. According to Genesis 4:25, Seth was born after Abel's murder by Cain, and
Eve believed that God had appointed him as a replacement for Abel.
Biblical information
According to the Book of Genesis, Seth was born when Adam
was 130 years old (according to the Masoretic Text), or 230 years old
(according to the Septuagint), "a son in his likeness and image".
Genesis 5:4-5 states that Adam fathered "other sons and daughters"
before his death, when he was 930 years old.[1] According to the same account,
Seth died at the age of 912 (that is, 14 years before Noah's birth).[2]
His genealogy is repeated at 1 Chronicles 1:13.
Jewish tradition
Seth figures in the biblical texts of the Life of Adam and
Eve (the Apocalypse of Moses). It recounts the lives of Adam and Eve from after
their expulsion from the Garden of Eden to their deaths. While the surviving
versions were composed from the early third to the fifth
century,: 252 the literary units in the work are considered older
and predominantly Jewish in origin. There is wide agreement that the original
was composed in a Semitic language: 251 in the first century
AD/CE.: 252 In the Greek versions, Seth and Eve travelled to the
doors of the Garden to beg for some oil of the Tree of Mercy (i.e. the Tree of
Life). On the way, Seth was attacked and bitten by a wild beast, which went
away when Seth ordered it. Michael refused to give them the oil at that time,
but promised to give it at the end of time, when all flesh will be raised, the
delights of paradise will be given to the holy people, and God will be in their
midst. On their return, Adam said to Eve: "What hast thou done? Thou hast
brought upon us great wrath which is death." (chapters 514) Later, only
Seth could witness Adam's taking up in a divine chariot at his funeral, which
deposited him in the Garden of Eden.
Genesis refers to Seth as the ancestor of Noah and hence
the father of all humankind, all other humans having perished in the Great
Flood. It is said[by whom?] that late in life, Adam gave Seth secret teachings
that would become the Kabbalah.[3] The Zohar refers to Seth as "ancestor
of all the generations of the Egyptians or Tsetsaudim" (Hebrew: righteous
ones). According to Seder Olam Rabbah, based on Jewish reckoning, he was born
in 2130 BC AM. According to Aggadah, he had 2 sons and many wives. According to
the Seder Olam Rabbah, he died in 1042 AM.
Josephus
In the Antiquities of the Jews, 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 humankind
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 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. The perennialist writer Nigel Jackson identifies
the land of Siriad in Josephus' account with Syria, citing related Mandaean
legends regarding the "Oriental Land of Shyr" in connection with the
visionary mytho-geography of the prophetic traditions surrounding Seth.
Christianity
Saint
Seth
Patriarch
Born c. 130 AM
Died c. 1042
AM
Venerated in Catholic
Church
Eastern Orthodox Church
Oriental Orthodox Churches
Feast 31 December
(Catholic Church)
Sunday of the Holy Forefathers (Eastern Orthodox Church)
The second-century BC Book of Jubilees, regarded as
noncanonical except in the Oriental Orthodox Churches, also dates his birth to
130 after creation (AM). According to it, in 231 AM Seth married his sister,
Azura, who was four 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 3:2338.
The Sethians were a Christian Gnostic sect who may date
their existence to before Christianity. Their thinking, although predominantly
Judaic in foundation, was arguably strongly influenced by Platonism. Sethians
were named for their veneration of Seth, depicted in their creation myths as a
divine incarnation; consequently, the offspring or 'posterity' of Seth are held
to comprise a superior elect within human society.
Islam
Prophet
heeṯh
Alayhi as-Salam
شِيث
Seth
Sheth (right) teaching his son Anush
Prophet of Islam
Preceded by Adam
Succeeded by Idris
Personal life
Born Sheeth ibn Adam
Children Anush
Parents
Adam (father)
Hawwa (mother)
Known for
Being the third son of Adam
Being the second prophet in Islam
Relations Qabil
(brother), Habil (brother)
Religious life
Religion Islam
The Quran makes no mention of heeṯh ibn Ādam
(Arabic: شِيث ٱبْن آدم,
romanized: Shith ibn adm). He is respected within Islamic traditions as the
third and righteous son of Adam and Eve and seen as the gift bestowed on Adam
after the death of Abel. The Sunni scholar and historian ibn Kathir in his
tarikh (book of history), Al-Bidāya wa-n-nihāya (البداية
والنهاية), records that Seth, a
prophet like his father Adam, transfers God's Law to mankind after the death of
Adam, and places him among the exalted antediluvian patriarchs of the
Generations of Adam. Some sources say that Seth was the receiver of scriptures.
These scriptures are said to be the "first scriptures" mentioned in
the Quran 87:18. Medieval historian and exegete al-Tabari and other scholars
say that Seth buried Adam and the secret texts in the tomb of Adam, i.e., the
"Cave of Treasures".
Islamic literature holds that Seth was born when Adam was
past 100 and that Adam appointed Seth as guide to his people. The 11th-century
Syrian historian and translator Al-Mubashshir ibn Fātik recorded the
maxims and aphorisms of the ancient philosophers in his book Kitāb
mukhtār al-ḥikam wa-maḥāsin al-kalim and included a
chapter on Seth. Within Islamic tradition Seth holds wisdom of several kinds;
knowledge of time, prophecy of the future Great Flood, and inspiration on the
methods of night prayer. Islam, Judaism and Christianity trace the genealogy of
mankind back to Seth since Abel left no heirs and Cain's heirs, according to
tradition, were destroyed by the Great Flood. Many traditional Islamic crafts
are traced back to Seth, such as the making of horn combs. Seth also plays a
role in Sufism, and Ibn Arabi includes a chapter in his Bezels of Wisdom on
Seth, entitled "The Wisdom of Expiration in the Word of Seth".
Some traditions locate Seth's tomb in the village of
al-Nabi Shayth (lit. "The Prophet Seth") in the mountains above the
Beqaa Valley in Lebanon, where there is a mosque named after him. This tomb was
described by the 12th-century geographer Ibn Jubayr. A rival tradition,
mentioned by later medieval Arab geographers from the 13th century on, placed
the tomb of Nabi Shith ("Prophet Seth") in the Palestinian village of
Bashshit, southwest of Ramla village. According to the Palestine Exploration
Fund, Bashshit means Beit Shith, i.e. "House of Seth". The village
was depopulated with the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 , but the
three-domed structure said to be Seth's tomb survives in the Israeli moshav
Aseret built on the site. Another tomb in the city of Balkh, Afghanistan has
been identified as the burial site of Seth.
Local Muslims in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh in India believe a
12-foot-long (3.7 m) grave in Hazrat Shees Jinnati Mosque to be the maqam of
Hazrat Shees or the Prophet Seth. This belief is mentioned in a 16th-century
Mughal document Ain-i-Akbari and is also mentioned in the work India of
Aurangzeb of Jadunath Sarkar.
Mandaeism
Main article: Shitil
According to the Mandaean scriptures, including the
Qulasta, the Mandaean Book of John and Genzā Rabbā, Seth is cognate
with the angelic soteriological figure Shitil (Classical Mandaic: ࡔࡉࡕࡉࡋ,
romanized: itil), a son of Adam Kadmaya who taught John the Baptist with his
brothers Anush (Enosh) and Hibil (Abel). He is variously spoken of as a son of
Adam, a brother or son of Hibil, and the brother or father of Anush. Shitil is
one of the revealers of Mandaeism and a prophet, identified as the biblical
Seth.: 45
Yazidism
Main article: Shehid ibn Jerr
In Yazidism, Seth is known as Shehid ibn Jerr.
According to Yazidi oral literature, Adam and Eve each
deposited their seeds into separate jars. While Eve's seed developed into
insects, Adam's seed gave birth to Shehid ibn Jerr, the ancestor of the
Yazidis. Yazidis thus believe that they have been created separately and
differently from all other human beings (Kreyenbroek 2005 : 31).
Family tree
Adam[b] Eve[b]
Cain[b] Abel[c] Seth[d]
Enoch[e] Enos[f]
Irad[g] Kenan[h]
Mehujael[g] Mahalalel[i]
Methushael[g] Jared[j]
Adah[k] Lamech[g] Zillah[k] Enoch[l]
Jabal[m] Jubal[n] Tubal-Cain[o] Naamah[o] Methuselah[p]
Lamech[q]
Noah[r]
Shem[s] Ham[s] Japheth[s]
(Hebrew: שֵׁת,
Modern: ēt, Tiberian: ēṯ; Arabic: شِيْث,
romanized: īṯ, IPA: [ˈʃiːθ]; Greek:
Σήθ Sḗth; "placed", "appointed")
Genesis 4:1
Genesis 4:2
Genesis 4:25; 5:3
Genesis 4:17
Genesis 4:26; 5:67
Genesis 4:18
Genesis 5:910
Genesis 5:1213
Genesis 5:1516
Genesis 4:19
Genesis 5:1819
Genesis 4:20
Genesis 4:21
Genesis 4:22
Genesis 5:2122
Genesis 5:2526
Genesis 5:2830
Genesis 5:32
Shrines
Iraq
On July 26, 2014, forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and
the Levant (ISIL) blew up the Nabi Shiyt (Prophet Seth) shrine in Mosul,
Iraq.[4]
Sami al-Massoudi, the deputy head of the Shiite Endowment
Office overseeing holy sites, confirmed that destruction. He added that ISIL
took some of the artifacts to an unknown location.
Lebanon
There is a village named after him in Lebanon, that is
al-Nabi Shayth or al-Nabi Sheeth (meaning "The Prophet Seth"), which
is also considered to contain his shrine.[5]
Israel
The tomb of Bashshit is believed to be the grave of
Seth.[6][7] The tomb now sits in Aseret.[8][9][10]