Board index ‹ Noah's Ark & the Flood

[Humerus]

Non-Christian reading the Bible for the first time. Genesis 6:5 describes God's reason for sending a flood to exterminate mankind: "And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." God spares Noah because he is a righteous man, but God certainly doesn't expect mankind to remain righteous after Noah's family repopulates the Earth: "And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done." - Genesis 8:21 Indeed from the time of the flood to Abraham humanity is basically reverting to its pre-flood behavior. What, then, did the flood accomplish, and why did God find it right to "smite all living" for the wickedness of man once and then vow never to do so again?

[jimwalton]

The flood fulfilled two purposes. First, it was an act of judgment carried out by God in response to the moral degradation that had come to characterize humanity.

Second, order and disorder were some of the primary aspects of the ancient world view. God had brought the world to functionality and order in Genesis 1. Sin brought disorder into what God had done. Evil (bringing disorder) had reached an unprecedented level, and God acted to restore order. God uses non-order (the cosmic waters) to obliterate disorder (evil and violence). Though it doesn't eliminate disorder (8.21), it resets the ordering process, and God indicates that the established order will not again be reset by a flood.

Third, the flood wasn't global. The "all" language is hyperbole, a rhetorical device to express his theological point.

[JM Wuss]

The "local flood" interpretation doesn't make sense for a few reasons.

If the flood was local, then Noah could have just moved out of the region, rather than spending 100 years building a boat.

And why pack the boat full of animals? A local flood would not have been an extinction event requiring a remnant to be saved. They too could have just left the area.

And if the flood was only a local event, then God's promise in 9:9-13 doesn't make any sense. God promised "neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth." But if this is referring to a local flood, then God has broken this promise thousands of times over.

[jimwalton]

> If the flood was local, then Noah could have just moved out of the region, rather than spending 100 years building a boat.

Yes he could have, but there were other important lessons to be learned. There were symbolic things going on and theological lessons. There were reasons God had him build rather than move, just as there were reasons God had Joshua assemble armies instead of God just striking cities dead, and Jesus healing people one at a time rather than waving a hand over the city.

Noah was living out a parable that God was using to represent many different truths, and as such the ark represented other realities. Some of those are:

1. The ark was shaped like a coffin, and so Noah was "subjected to death" and then "risen out of the tomb."

2. The deluge of water represents baptism, and again, the idea of being saved from death.

3. Being saved through the storm is a spiritual truth; running away from danger is not.

There are plenty of people in the Bible whose literal lives are also parables for the rest of us: Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Jonah, even the nation of Israel. Noah is the same. God instructs him to do the ark thing because of all it's going to represent.

And as for 100 years, it's not so. There is no mention in the Bible of a 100-yr time span during which Noah did anything. There is no mention in the Bible of Noah taking 100 years to build the ark. It's just, if I may say so, fake news.

> And why pack the boat full of animals?

The local fauna still needed to be saved. This flood would have been so huge that just running away would not have done it.

> And if the flood was only a local event, then God's promise in 9:9-13 doesn't make any sense.

One of the two important theological themes going on the with flood is the restoration of order after humankind had brought disorder to creation with their sin. What God is saying in 9.9-13 is that he would never again have to use this mechanism to restore order. Therefore he has not broken this promise 1000 times over.

[JM Wuss]

First want to say I respect your input and efforts on this forum. I do not want to shut down your inputs, only want to make sure both sides of the issue are represented.

> there were other important lessons to be learned

Indeed, and everything you say about the lessons of the ark are true. This is common ground between us. As such, none of that contributes to the appropriateness of a local flood interpretation.

If historical or linguistic accuracy is of no importance; if symbolic events are merely educational skits that God has orchestrated for our edification, then in fact there is no reason that any of the Bible have any historical truth at all. All that would matter is that we learned from the stories.

But no. If the flood was truly global, then not only does everything you said about the ark still apply, but the ark was actually necessary, as was the flood itself.

If the flood or the ark were not absolutely necessary, then the historicity of the story has negative implications for God’s moral character.

In the same way, God had Joshua assemble armies rather than striking dead the enemies of Israel, because He was actually accomplishing something thereby, which would not have been accomplished otherwise. Namely, for one, God proved to the world that the God of Israel needed to be taken seriously. It was important that the God of Israel be known to the world, because it was through Israel that God’s plan would come to fruition. This would not have been accomplished if God simply struck everyone dead, and then had the children of Israel move in behind the wave of death.

In the same way, Jesus healed people through direct, personal interactions rather than through corporate magics, because He was working toward a state of affairs in which He becomes every man’s personal savior and intercessor. Furthermore, God’s saving grace was to be something that God offered, but does not impose on anyone. Thus, people would have to come to Him to be healed. Those that seek, would find. But those that stayed home should remain in darkness.

All of these things necessarily had to be accomplished exactly the way that God did it. God is not arbitrary. He always accomplishes the greatest good in the way that entails the least possible suffering. Otherwise, He would not be perfectly righteous.

> There is no mention in the Bible of Noah taking 100 years to build the ark. It's just, if I may say so, fake news.

I took the 100 years as implied by the fact that Noah’s age of 500 years is given in the last verse of Chapter 5, right before God’s justification for flooding the earth are spelled out in Chapter 6, along with God’s instructions on how to build the massive ark. Then it is noted in Chapter 7 that Noah was 600 years old when the flood began.

It does appear that a few more clues are given, which I had overlooked, which suggest a time to build topping out around 75 years, and potentially as few as 20 years (since all three of Noah’s sons were not only born, but had wives when God commanded Noah on how to build the Ark).

Nevertheless, my argument did not hinge on a 100 year timeline. Even in 20 years, both Noah’s family and any animals which needed to be saved, could have been directed to leave the region. Assuming a local flood, the Ark would not have been necessitated by the circumstances. The lesson that we receive would then be the only reason for the ark.

Which again, makes God arbitrary. If our edification was the only reason for the ark, then the historicity of the story is not necessary. The story would have accomplished the exact same end as a mere story. This fails the test of accomplishing the greatest good by means which entail the least suffering.

> This flood would have been so huge that just running away would not have done it.

Sure it would, with enough notice. 20-75 years (or 120 years if 6:3 marks the point at which God determined the necessity of the flood) is plenty of notice to get everything out of the area that needed to be saved.

> What God is saying in 9.9-13 is that he would never again have to use this mechanism to restore order. Therefore he has not broken this promise 1000 times over.

You are adding to the text.

God did not say “I will never do X in order to achieve Y.” If He had said that, then, as you say, He could have done X any number of times without breaking His promise, so long as He was not fulfilling the purpose of Y.

No. God said “I will never do X again.” Full stop. But if X = local flood, then that that promise is broken.

The wording of a promise matters.

[jimwalton]

> If historical or linguistic accuracy is of no importance; if symbolic events are merely educational skits that God has orchestrated for our edification, then in fact there is no reason that any of the Bible have any historical truth at all. All that would matter is that we learned from the stories.

I agree 100%. Historical and linguistic accuracy is of utmost importance, but we also have to take the text (as much as we can) the way the author intended it to be taken. If he used hyperbole, we have to understand it as such. If he used figurative language, rhetoric, or other literary genres, we have to take it as such. We can't just assume our English words are the way to go. We need to understand the author's cognitive environment, the worldview at the time of the writing, and the intent of the work (Genesis 1-11) as a whole. These factors all cause us careful analysis beyond any superficial understanding of the English terms and concepts.

> If the flood or the ark were not absolutely necessary, then the historicity of the story has negative implications for God’s moral character.

Again I agree. I believe that the flood and the ark were necessary. The theological history of Genesis 1-1 is focused on the issues of divine presence, the establishment of order, and how order is undermined by sin. The ancient cognitive environment and worldview cared about order, disorder, and non-order. The flood account focuses more on how God is reestablishing a modicum of order in the world as he uses nonorder (the cosmic waters) to obliterate disorder (evil and violence). Though it doesn’t eliminate disorder (8.21), it resets the ordering process, and God indicates that the established order will not again be reset by a flood. The flood account specifically has the role of showing how God reestablished order after bringing the waters of the nonordered cosmos to wipe out the disorder that had come to dominate the antediluvian world. In this way the flood account recapitulates creation. This is why the narrator includes the story here in Genesis 1-11. He is showing how God had worked to bring about order in the past (creation and flood). This serves as an introduction to YHWH’s strategy to advance order yet again through the covenant. The covenant is an order-bringing strategy using the mechanisms of election, relationship, and revelation as the foundation for reestablishing his presence on earth (initially through the tabernacle). So the flood and the ark were absolutely necessary to the theological construction of the book, and for the world God is ordering.

In addition, the flood was an act of judgment carried out by God in response to the moral degradation that had come to characterize humanity by the time of Noah.

> I took the 100 years as implied by the fact that Noah’s age of 500 years

Right, but there's no reason to assume that Noah spent the 100 years building. There's really no warrant for that conclusion. That's all I was saying. And I'm still not sure I even agree with the 20 years. We just don't know. But regardless, the ark was necessary for many reasons. God didn't want them just to relocate.

> Assuming a local flood, the Ark would not have been necessitated by the circumstances.

I assume the flood was massive, not just local. I'm not talking Hurricane Katrina here, but more like continental in scope.

> If our edification was the only reason for the ark, then the historicity of the story is not necessary.

But our edification is not the only reason. (1) God was judging sin and (2) God was re-ordering the world. The historicity of the story is necessary.

> You are adding to the text.

What I'm doing is looking at the reason for the text, the scope and purpose of Genesis 1-11, and the worldview of the ancients. In the ancient world, what mattered was order, disorder, and non-order. That was their worldview and it saturated their theology. Unless you understand that, you will undercut all of what Genesis 1-11 are about.

[JM Wuss]

We have a lot of common ground, and that’s great. I mostly understand your grounds for rejecting a global flood, but there are two points that I don’t understand.

First, your assertion of a continental-scope flood is novel to me. I have discussed with a few that interpreted Noah’s flood either as 100% myth, or else just regional in scope. I find it hard to imagine how Noah’s flood could have been continent wide, with waters higher than the highest mountains, and those waters taking months and months to recede, and yet the rest of the globe was unaffected? This puts in my mind a kind of venn diagram configuration of the waters and land masses of the earth. How would that be possible? Are you thinking that Noah’s continent sank during this time? Did the other continents rise?

Furthermore, a continent-wide flood ought to have left behind geological markers which are not found in the continents unaffected by the flood. But what we find on each continent is a very similar configuration of fossil bearing sediment layers, all apparently laid down by water.

Secondly, I’m not sure I follow your assertions about the “ancient cognitive environment”. In general, I reject interpretive methods that rely on obscure historical assertions to materially alter the meaning of a passage, as it would be understood from the language alone.

This is not to say that our understanding of scripture isn’t bolstered by historical context. Historical understanding can add to the meaning of a passage. But if God intended the Bible to be perspicuous, then historical context ought not to materially change or negate the meaning of a passage.

Consider that in the story of Noah, the language used strongly implies in various ways that the flood was global in scope. Ask yourself, if God did want us to understand that the flood was actually global in scope, then what could He have said that was not already said in the text we have received? Would you expect the author to plainly deny that he was using hyperbole? “No really, you guys. The WHOLE world. No joke!” Thus, the alleged historical context which you offered results in a material change in the meaning of the passages.

In comparison, consider the folded face cloth from John 20:7. Now, the historical significance which some attribute to this passage is something that I cannot verify. It’s sort of cool, if true, but since it doesn’t change the meaning of the story communicated in the plain language, and since the meaning that is supposedly added via the historical context does not contradict with other scriptural ideas, I’ve taken it with a grain of salt.

If you are unfamiliar, the story goes that Jesus folded his face cloth, rather than merely tossing it aside in a crumpled heap. Some say that at the time, if the master of a house left the table during a meal, he would fold his napkin to communicate to his servants that he intended to return, and thus they would not take away his plate. If the master did not intend to return, he would crumple up his napkin, and the servants would know to begin cleaning up the table and the dishes. Thus, it is supposed that Jesus’s folding of the napkin was a symbolic gesture indicating His imminent return.

The historical context here adds to the meaning contained in the passage, but does not change the interpretation of the language employed in the passage.

Furthermore, I am not so sure that our own culture is so uninterested in order and disorder as to materially skew our understanding of the scope of a flood. Thus, though your historical knowledge may be dead on, I don’t see how that contributes to your justification for an interpretation of the global language as hyperbole.

[jimwalton]

> I find it hard to imagine how Noah’s flood could have been continent wide, with waters higher than the highest mountains, and those waters taking months and months to recede, and yet the rest of the globe was unaffected?

In the ancient world, the "high mountains" were the temples of the gods, the pillars of the Earth, holding up the firmament and holding back the cosmic ocean, and were not considered truly part of Earth's geography. They were more cosmic geography. The text is not necessarily claiming that the Alps and the Himalayas were submerged.

Second, when Gn. 7.19 refers to the mountains being covered, it uses the Pual form of the verb *ksh*. This verb is used for a wide variety of "covering" possibilities.

* A people so vast they cover the land (Nu. 22.11)
* Weeds covering the land (Prov. 24.31)
* clothing covering someone (1 Ki. 1.1)
* something can be covered in the sense of being overshadowed (2 Chr. 5.8 * the cherubim over the ark; clouds in the sky, Ps. 147.8)

So what does the author mean by "covered"? It doesn't necessarily mean "submerged."

Third:

* Job 38.34; Jer. 46.8; Mal. 2.13: in these verses "covered" is figurative!
* If Genesis 7:19 is taken the same way, it suggests that the mountains were drenched with water or coursing with flash floods, but it does not demand that they were totally submerged under water. One can certainly argue that the context does not favor this latter usage, and I am not inclined to adopt it. The point is that it is not as easy as sometimes imagined to claim that the Bible demands that all the mountains were submerged.
* See also Ex. 1.7, where the Israelites "filled" the land (a different Hebrew word, but the same concept). It speaks of their great number, not literally meaning that they filled the country.

Fourth: "Fifteen cubits above." In Gn.7:20, the Hebrew text says, "15 cubits from above [milme’la] rose the waters, and the mountains were covered." It is therefore not at all clear that it is suggesting the waters rose 15 cubits higher than the mountains. It can mean "above"; it can mean "upward" or "upstream". If this were the case in Genesis, it would suggest that the water reached 15 cubits upward from the plain, covering at least some part of the mountains. It's pretty difficult to know, but we shouldn't just jump to modern conclusions (what you were taught in Sunday School).

Fifth: "tops of the mountains visible". Again, it's possible the author wasn't speaking of the "pillar" mountains, but the local ones. The logic of not including the fringe mountains is that they were believed to support the heavens, and the waters are not seen as encroaching on or encountering the heavens.

> Furthermore, a continent-wide flood ought to have left behind geological markers which are not found in the continents unaffected by the flood.

It's hard to say. There are things we know and things we don't, but not everything leaves behind geological evidence. Some we know about:

* The geology of the Black Sea suggests a flooding that occurred when the then-small lake in the center of the Sea rapidly became a large sea. This happened when waters from the Mediterranean found a pathway to the much lower Black Sea area. This change in the lake has been known since the 1920s. Since then, it has become clear that the flooding occurred about 7500 years ago (5500 BC) and that about 60,000 square miles (more than 100,000 square km) of the coastal areas of the lake became part of the sea in a relatively short time.
* Recent disclosures concerning the geological background of Lower Mesopotamia claim that not very long ago, as geological ages are reckoned, waters from the Persian Gulf submerged a large coastland area, owing probably to a sudden rise in the sea level. If that rise was precipitated by extraordinary undersea eruption, the same phenomenon could also have brought on extremely heavy rains, the whole leaving an indelible impression on the survivors.

Since we don't know when the Flood was (most educated guesses are before 10,000 BC, and possibly before 20,000 BC), and the further back we go the harder it is to get at evidence.

Did the tsunami that happened in Japan and Indonesia about 10 years ago leave any geological trace? Not that I believe the Flood was a tsunami, but just that geological evidence doesn't necessarily tell us *everything*.

> I reject interpretive methods that rely on obscure historical assertions to materially alter the meaning of a passage, as it would be understood from the language alone.

I'm not referring to obscure historical assertions, but to the ancient worldview that is apparent from material remains.

> Would you expect the author to plainly deny that he was using hyperbole? “No really, you guys. The WHOLE world. No joke!” Thus, the alleged historical context which you offered results in a material change in the meaning of the passages.

The REAL question is: How did the ancients understand this story? And for that we don't have record. Did they read it as order and disorder, as hyperbolic rhetoric, and as historical narrative? Since no records of that in particular remain, we are left with jigsaw pieces. We have other Mesopotamian flood accounts enough to motivate us to conclude something happened there, and we are getting different theological interpretations of it.

> John 20.7, folded face cloth, "if you are unfamiliar."

I'm quite familiar with it. Thanks for the consideration, though.

The face cloth at least speaks of no haste and no wild confusion, probably not the way a corpse-thief would have left it. And the disciples probably would have taken it with them if they stole the body. A thief defying Rome would not have taken time to fold the thing.

> I am not so sure that our own culture is so uninterested in order and disorder as to materially skew our understanding of the scope of a flood.

But it was the primary world view of the ancient Near East. Our paradigms are things like information, technology, precision, and science.

> I don’t see how that contributes to your justification for an interpretation of the global language as hyperbole.

The Bible uses hyperbole to describe historical events, such as the conquest of Canaan in Joshua 1-12. We know the ancient culture (Egyptian, Sumerian, Mesopotamian) often spoke in hyperbole. It was a prominent literary genre of the era. And since we know the bible is not at all averse or slow to use hyperbole in its writings, it's plausible to think it's hyperbolic. Also, as everyone well knows, there is no geology that tells us there was a global flood, and we believe that God speaks in both science and Scripture, so we listen to both when we figure things out. We muster as much knowledge as we can from as many different areas. Since nature also reveals God's truth, it will never contradict the Bible and the Bible will never contradict science when both are rightly understood.

[Spinner]

> So let's talk about the tops of the mountains covered in water by multiple cubits. First of all, in the ancient world, the high mountains (what we call the Himalayas and the Alps, for instance) were not considered "mountains" but pillars holding up the firmament. These pillars were the abode of the gods. It's very possible that what the text is talking about when it speaks of the mountains is the lesser mountains, the hills, and such, not things like Everest, Ararat, and K2.

But Genesis 8 specifically says that it was Mt. Ararat.

"4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat." - Genesis 8:4

> But still, what about the terminology of "covering the mountains"? Well, it depends what one means by covered. A few days ago I said my lawn was covered with starlings, because there were about 30 out there. It wasn't COVERED, but I used that word because of the quantity. And the people who heard me understood exactly what I was talking about. It's no different with the Bible.

But if you said your lawn was covered in starlings up to 3 feet, then people would think you are actually saying that the total amount of starlings measured 3 feet deep.

"19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.
20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered." - Genesis 7:19-20

The text says that every single mountain under the whole heavens (ie: the atmosphere, or space) were covered. Even if you want to argue that the mountains weren't entirely covered, and that covered here simply means that some water was around it, then there would still be a global flood because the water would have to get to all the mountains. Also, the Bible is specific about the the measurements about how high the water went. If you were being metaphorical, you might say "My lawn is covered in leaves!", but not "My lawn is covered in leaves up to fifteen feet deep!". If you were being metaphorical, you might say "That guy is filled to the brim with pie!", but not "That guy currently contains 4.8 pies.". Why would the text be specific about the measurements of the water if it was only being metaphorical or hyperbolic?

[jimwalton]

> But Genesis 8 specifically says that it was Mt. Ararat.

The ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat, probably down towards the base. It doesn't say it came to rest on the top of Ararat. The Ararat Mountains are a range, for one. "Ararat," along with "Minni" and "Askenaz," is found extensively in cuneiform sources. These names are the modified names of three political entities in the mountainous north of Mesopotamia that correspond to the realms of Urartu, Manna, and of the Schtyhians. "Ararat" is the Bible's transcription of the cuneiform spelling of "Urartu." When the Bible speaks of the mountains of Ararat, it refers to a region and a state, not simply to a mountain. All attempts to identify the specific mountain and the specific location have to date failed.

Secondly, he sent out birds to test the waters. Ravens and doves can't fly at the altitudes of the high mountains. The dove, in particular, is a valley bird and wouldn't survive at high altitudes. We know the ark came to rest fairly low on the slopes somewhere on the mountain range. If the dove flew down into a valley to get an olive leaf (only growing in low elevations, how did it manage to fly back up to 17,000' to the ark? Doves can't do that. Instead, we know the ark settled low on the slopes.

> Gen. 17.19-20, ... "the text says that every single mountain...were covered."

Yeah, this is a case of hyperbole, a rhetorical device to make a theological point. A local but cataclysmic flood is intentionally described as a global flood for rhetorical and theological purposes, which were (1) an act of judgment marred out by God in response to oral degradation, and (2) God uses the flood to reestablish a modicum of order to obliterate disorder (evil and violence). Though it doesn’t eliminate disorder (8.21), it resets the ordering process, and God indicates that the established order will not again be reset by a flood. He establishes order by using nonorder (the flood waters) to wipe out disorder. In this way the flood is a re-creation (mirroring Genesis 1). This is why the narrator includes the story. He is showing how God had worked to bring about order in the past (creation and flood). This serves as an introduction to YHWH’s strategy to advance order yet again through the covenant (Gn. 12). The covenant is an order-bringing strategy.

> If you were being metaphorical, you might say "My lawn is covered in leaves!", but not "My lawn is covered in leaves up to fifteen feet deep!". If you were being metaphorical, you might say "That guy is filled to the brim with pie!", but not "That guy currently contains 4.8 pies."

Seriously? You've never said, "There were a million leaves on my lawn," or "I've told you 100 times"? Numbers in the Bible are often symbolic. A lot of numerological studies have been done on biblical texts. Some people think, for instance, that the depth of Gn. 7.20 refers to the draught of the ark (the ark sank into the water to a depth of more than 20' [15 cubits]) when fully laden, so that whatever "covering" the author is talking about, the ark cleared what was below because it had a draught of 20'. Numbers are pretty tough in the Bible.

"40" usually denotes a time of judgment or trial, and doesn't necessarily mean "40". We use "100" in the same way to describe a lot. "I had 100 mosquito bites on my arm." No one counted the bites, it's the way we talk. "40" was like that for them. 40 days, 40 years, 400 years—symbolic.

You've been using the word "metaphorical." I've never said the story or the elements of the story were metaphorical. I've said rhetorical, symbolic, and hyperbolic. It's different. It's not a metaphor.