for the boat, and build the vessel upward to an amah short of the roof. Put a door on the side of the boat, and build three decks on the vessel.
17 This is because I will definitely bring a catastrophic flood upon the earth, to destroy all animal and human life. Everything on earth is to be eradicated.
18 But I will fulfill My covenant with you, because you, your wife, your sons and their wives will board the boat.
19 As well, bring a pair (one male and one female) from all the animals, to the boat.
20 (Bring them) from the birds, each pair according to its species; and from the animals of the field, each pair according to its species; also from the reptiles, bring two of each species, so that they may continue to live.
21 Then take and store up food of every variety, so that you can consume it. This will be the food supply both for you (humans) and for them (the animal life).”
22 So Noah did everything that God commanded him; he did it all.
1. vv.1–2: See the very interesting analysis of the lessons of this narrative found at http://www.ericlevy.com/Writings/Writings_BneiElohim.htm. Levy summarizes the wrongdoings of the “sons of God” as: “. . . enabling their hedonistic desires. More specifically. . . [their] purpose is to dominate the daughters of man (and, de facto, man himself) for the sake of unbounded physical pleasure.”
2. vv. 4–5: These mighty warriors, the offspring of the sons of God, are identified as evil beings in the book of Hanoch: “They taught them [women] sorcery and incantations, how to cut roots and plants. And they gave birth to mighty giants 3,000 cubits high. [The giants] ate all that men could make until men could not longer sustain them. Then the great ones turned against and ate the men. And they began to sin against birds and beasts and crawly things, and to drink human blood. And Azzazael taught the children of men to make shields and armor . . . and taught them to make up their eyes and dyes, and of precious stones. . . .” (taken from www.ericlevy.com/ Writings/Writings_BneiElohim .htm). Levy then summarizes the book of Hanoch’s viewpoint on the offspring of the sons of God: “Bestiality, cannibalism, war, and seduction; these mirror the sins of the Generation of the Flood.” The book of Hanoch can be accessed at http://reluctant-messenger .com/book_of_enoch.htm and at http://www.sacred-texts.com/bib/boe/.
It is fascinating to read the Epic of Gilgamesh (see glossary) and to note the similarities between the figure of Gilgamesh and the “fallen ones” of v. 4. It is this author’s conclusion that this is a possible extra biblical epic drama of one, if not two, of these “fallen beings,” or their descendants. I refer the reader to The Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet I:29–91, in particular. The Epic of Gilgamesh can be found at http://www.ancienttexts .org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/tab1.htm.
In contrast to these ‘fallen beings’ who polluted mankind, we have Noah, who represented the line of mankind that had not been influenced by the ‘fallen beings’ or their offspring. He has no genealogical connection to them. The text infers that these are the reasons that his family was chosen to survive the flood (see 6.8–9).
3. v. 14: The identification and translation of gofer wood (Hebrew) is uncertain. It has been identified as various types of known woods: acacia and cypress are among them. However, whatever type of wood it was, it was certainly buoyant.
4. v.15: An amah is the Hebrew word for a measure of approximately twenty or twenty-one inches in length.
Chapter 7
1 Then God instructed Noah, “Take your entire family, including yourself, to the boat, because I have paid attention that you are a righteous man among your peers.
2 Take seven pairs of each ritually pure animal, one male and one female to each pair, and take one pair of each ritually impure animal, one male and one female.
3 Also take seven pairs of each type of bird, male and female, so that they may live on the earth and be able to replenish it.
4 This is because in seven more days, I will cause rain to fall on the earth for forty days and nights—I will wipe out all creatures that I have made that live on the earth!”
5 So Noah did everything that God commanded him.
6 Noah was six hundred years old when this deluge flooded all the earth.
7 Then Noah, his wife, his sons and their wives entered the boat with him just before the floodwaters came.
8 and 9 The ritually pure animals and the ritually impure animals, as well as birds and reptiles, came to Noah and to the boat. They came in pairs of males and females, just as God commanded to Noah.
10 Then the floods occurred for seven days upon earth.
11 When Noah was six hundred years old, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the water sources on earth and in heaven opened up.
12 So rain fell on earth for forty days and forty nights.
13 Actually on this day (the seventeenth day of the second month), Noah, Shem, Ham and Yafet, along with their wives, came into the boat.
14 They entered along with all different species of animal life, including reptiles of each species that crawl on the ground, and all types of winged species that fly, every type of bird and winged creature.
15 They all came with Noah aboard the boat, pair by pair, from every type of life.
16 Male and female from every type of life came aboard, as God had commanded him; God Himself closed (the entrance) for him (Noah).
17 The flooding occurred on the earth for forty days and nights, and the floodwaters mounted up, and carried the boat and lifted it up high above the ground.
18 So the floodwaters welled up greatly on earth, and the boat floated on the surface of the waters.
19 The floodwaters continued to greatly rise on the earth’s surface, so that all the high mountains were underwater.
20 The floodwaters reached a height of fifteen amah above the mountaintops, and covered them over.1
21 All known life was eradicated—reptiles that crawl, birds, wild animals, all species of insect life that swarm over the earth, and all of mankind.
22 Every type of living being was destroyed and perished.
23 All beings, including humans, animals, reptiles and birds that lived on earth, were wiped out. Only Noah and everything that was present with him survived.
24 The floodwaters were at their maximum height on the earth for 150 days.
1. v. 20: As previously noted, the Hebrew word amah, sometimes referred to as a “cubit,” is a measurement of up to twenty-one inches in height. Using this measurement, according to the text here, the water rose up to three hundred inches (approximately twenty-five feet or 8.3 yards) above the mountaintops.
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