What is the time period that the word generation refers to? Is it 100 years, 1000 years, longer?
The term “generation” (“Dor” in Hebrew) is used in a Biblical and Talmudic sense in many different contexts. There are two primary meanings for it. One is, as in the English language “one step or degree in the descent of a family” (Websters). However, in a historical context, in which we find it most often used, it refers to the lifetime of an individual person, and all that occurs in his “generation” would mean that which has occurred during his lifetime. For example, in Tractate Avos (5:2) we are taught that there were 10 generations from Adam to Noah, and 10 generations from Noah until Abraham. Although there were 1656 years until Noah, there were merely 392 years from Noah until Abraham. This is because the “lifetimes” counted were of varying length in the two sets of ten generations.
So the term “generation” itself does not lend itself to a specific number of years, rather it refers to the lifetime of an individual, in a historical context. Thus, you can have generations overlapping each other, when referring to the generation of Jacob, or Joseph, for example.
Take care,
Rabbi Aaron Tendler