After Shem’s report the Handbook will again follow the procedure used in chapter 5 of commenting only on information that departs from the fixed pattern and on some of the names.

These are the descendants of Shem serves as a title for this division of the text. These points ahead to the nine names that follow. Descendants translates the Hebrew toledoth, meaning “generations”; in this context it refers to the successive reports of the named fathers, and so descendants, “line of descendants,” “line of offspring” are appropriate. See discussion under “generation” at 5.1.

When Shem was a hundred years old: see discussion of this expression in 5.3.

He became the father of: see discussion in 4.18 and 5.3.

For Arpachshad see 10.22. There Arpachshad is the third of Shem’s five sons. Now, however, Arpachshad is selected because it is from his line that Abraham will come.

Two years after the flood means two years after the end of the flood, that is, two years after the flood dried up. Revised Standard Version follows the Hebrew structure, but in some languages this phrase may have to be moved forward. See Good News Translation.

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Genesis. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .