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“And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, How old art thou?” (Genesis 47:8).
This month the oldest known living land animal in the world had a birthday! I am writing this in December, 2022, and a very large tortoise turned 190 years old this month. He was born in 1832, in the Seychelles islands in the Indian Ocean, and gifted to the British governor of the island of St. Helena in 1882, when he was fifty years old. St. Helena is in the southern Atlantic Ocean, almost 2,000 miles west of the coast of Africa. He has lived there on the property of the governor’s home ever since. His name is Jonathan.
We are amazed that any living creature can live that long, but it is entirely possible that there are other tortoises who live in the wild who are even older. However, this is the oldest one that we are aware of.
When Pharaoh asked Jacob how old he was, Jacob was 130 years old. In many parts of the world, even today, it is not considered impolite to ask people how old they are. But tomorrow we will see what Jacob’s answer was.
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