family history
Derived from the root whose basic meaning is the act of bringing forth the birth of a child (including the father's part in it), the noun toledoth—always in the plural and in a construct state—refers to what has been brought forth by someone. It is often rendered in English translations as "generations" (KJV, RSV, ESV, NASB), "genealogy" (NKJ), or "descendants" (NRS) but these can be quite misleading. While it can be used simply in the sense of a genealogy (as in Gen 36:9, e.g.), more frequently it introduces a historical accounting of what has been brought forth. In the patriarchal narratives, e.g., "'This is the family history of X' typically heads a section, which commences with the death of X's father and closes with X's own death. Thus 'This is the family history of Ishmael' takes up the story of Ishmael after Abraham's death and ends with a mention of Ishmael's death (25:12-18; cf. 25:19-35:29)."1 NIV's "account" comes partway towards capturing the sense of the Hebrew noun.
It used once to be the fashion to think of the book of Genesis as divided into ten sections marked by the formulaic expression "this is/these are the toledoth of."2 Commentators now recognize that this is not supported by a closer examination of the Genesis narrative. The expression may once have been used at the beginning of ancient texts documenting the individual family histories. The author of Genesis most likely used these ancient documents as his sources—these expressions in the book being the vestiges of these documents—but seem to have subsumed them under a different literary structure in composing the book.
1. G. J. Wenham, Genesis 1-15 (WBC 1; Waco, Tx: Word, 1987), 55.
2. See, e.g., W. S. LaSor, D. A. Hubbard, & F. Wm. Bush, Old Testament Survey: The Message, Form, and Background of the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982), 68;
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