“The... land shattered like a... pot. All day long the South Wind blew ..., blowing fast, submerging the mountain in water, overwhelming the people like an attack.”
Gilgamesh, Tablet XI
ca. 1200-900 BCE
"The waters swelled so mightily on the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered...and all flesh died that moved on the earth."
Genesis 7
ca. 587-330 BCE
"After he had bolted the door, the god roared in the clouds. The winds became savage as he arose, he severed the mooring line and set the boat adrift."
Atrakhasis, Tablet III
ca. 19th century BCE
"This is like the days of Noah to me: Just as I swore that the waters of Noah would never again go over the earth, so I have sworn that I will not be angry with you and will not rebuke you.”
Isaiah 54:9
WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING...
Tubal-Cain: "I have men at my back, and you stand alone and defy me?”
Noah: "I am not alone."
Russel Crowe answers Ray Winstone
in film "Noah" (March, 2014)
“[E]arly reports indicate that the Noah film will not be in line with the Biblical account of Noah’s ark and the flood, but instead will push a liberal, political message focused on the environmental agenda. Christians and those interested in a Biblical story thus need to be warned to use discernment and not support Hollywood as it exploits the Bible for gain and promotes a film that casts the God of the Bible in a bad light.”
beginningandend.com,
"Russel Crowe's 'Noah" Film -
A Warning for Christians"
"Even if these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in [the land], they would, by their righteousness, only deliver their own lives, declares the Lord GOD...even if these three men were in it, they could not save their own sons or daughters. They alone would be saved, but the land will become a desolation.”
Ezekiel 14:14, 16
"[On the] reason why Noria was not allowed to join Noah in the ark, though she often wanted to: The archon who made the world, they say, wanted to destroy her in the flood with all the rest. But they say that she sat down in the ark and burned it a first and a second time, and a third. And this is why the building of the ark took many years - it was burned by Noria.”
Epiphanius, Panarion I.II.26.
Speaking against Noah's wife, Noria,
a character in Greek, Gnostic, and
Islamic tradition
"The Evangelical Environmental Network, which represents more than a thousand churches, is launching a campaign to create 'Noah congregations' that would make protection of the environment and support for the Endangered Species Act key concerns. Cal DeWitt, a Christian environmentalist who helped found the network, told The New York Times that the endangered species law is the 'Noah's ark of our day' and that 'Congress and special interests are trying to sink it.'”
Aaron McCarroll Gallegos, "Sinking Noah's Ark"
Sojournors, 1996
"And Noah wrote down everything in a book as we, [the angels] instructed him concerning every kind of medicine. Thus the evil spirits would never harm the sons of Noah.”
Jubilees 10:13
"And [the angels] took wives, each taking one, and they began to go into them and defile themselves with them. And they taught them charms and enchantments and the cutting of roots and made them acquainted with plants. And the women became pregnant, and they bore great giants, whose height was three thousand ells....the giants turned against men and devoured mankind."
1 Enoch 7:1-4
"We know what caused the catastrophe in Haiti. It was the bumping and grinding of the Caribbean Plate rubbing up against the North American Plate: a force of nature, sin-free and indifferent to sin, un-premeditated, unmotivated, supremely unconcerned with human affairs or human misery.”
Richard Dawkins,
"Haiti and the hypocrisy of Christian theology"
Washington Post, January 2010
"When Noah emerged from the Ark and saw the devastation the world had endured, he was depressed and disappointed. Because he knew deep down that he had selfishly stood by and watched it all happen. So he got drunk. Noah's failure to try and influence his generation is why the Flood is called "the waters of Noah" (Isaiah 54:9). In one sense he bore responsibility for the Flood. This teaches us a crucial life lesson: Don't think that society's problems aren't affecting you. Because they are. And we are each responsible to fix them.”
Ask the Rabbi,
aish.com
"The unconscious is the greatest peril to consciousness, while also being a source for regeneration. The flood comes at a moment of crisis. To the majority it spells destruction. To the hero rebirth.”
Eleanor Bertine
"The Great Flood"
"And they said, 'If He bring from heaven the waters of the Flood upon us, behold, we are of high stature, and the waters will not reach up to our necks ; and if He bring the waters of the depths against us, behold, the soles of our feet can close up all the depths.' What did they do? They put forth the soles of their feet, and closed up all the depths." What did the Holy One, blessed be He, do? He heated the waters of the deep, and they arose and burnt their flesh, and peeled off their skin from them.”
Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer, 162
On the wicked men of Noah's day
So the Ark floated with them on the waves, and Noah called out to his son, who had separated himself (from the rest): 'O my son, embark with us, and be not with the unbelievers.' The son replied: 'I will betake myself to some mountain. It will save me from the water.' Noah said: 'This day nothing can save from the command of Allah, any but those on whom He hath mercy.' And the waves came between them, and the son was among those overwhelmed in the Flood."
Qur'an 11:42-43
"As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.’”
God at the end of the flood
Genesis 8:22
"I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence because of them; now I am going to destroy them along with the earth.”
God to Noah
Genesis 6:13
The flood story was a blockbuster of the ancient Mesopotamian and Mediterranean worlds. The Bible cast Noah as its hero, while Atrahasis, Utnapishtim, Zuisudra, and Deucalion starred in other hit versions.
With continued reception and reimaginations in multiple cultures and time periods, flood stories explore enduring themes of humans facing cataclysm.
GENESIS IS NOT THE BEGINNING...OR THE END OF THE STORY: THE FLOOD
