Bruce Jones – Is Genesis 1-11 Historical and Accurate?
Written by Teddy on June 11, 2016
Part Five – “The Ark that Noah Built for His Family and Animals”
So what was it like to live on that Ark for so many days tending to the animals and waiting for the waters to subside? Well the food lines must have been long unless God made it so that many of them were made to hibernate.To better understand this we do get some insight from proven science. A recent authentic science project conducted said currently there are over one million species in the world but a vast majority of them being acquatic would have been able to survive outside the ark. Other technical experts say the “created kinds” in Genesis are not the exact equivalent of modern day species though I am not qualified to draw all the distinctions. Some who know better say the ark could accommodate 16000 animal types. And more recently scientists at a University proved that “Noah’s Ark could have floated with 70,000 animals if built by dimensions in the Bible” which if they went two by two would actually allow 35,000 species, double the first report. Now a question for those who want to twist the text into a local flood? So why would God need all these animals on an ark if He was only going to send a local flood and both land animals and birds could have migrated or originally lived outside the region? Simple, He wanted representatives of all the ‘kinds” He originally created in the beginning because the rest of the animal kingdom were be be annihilated, not migrate to some other safe location.
The Context for the Ark- But the evidence for a universal flood doesn’t stop there for the text goes on to discuss (a) the destruction of the flood (b) the duration of the flood (c) the depth of the flood and then (d) the drying up of the flood.
(a) The Destruction of the Flood Genesis 7:17-24 says “For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.” Notice again the continued commentary that “Everything (not just some locally) that moved on land perished” and “ALL mankind perished so that only Noah and those with him in the ark” were survivors. Again we see the damage or destruction of the whole human race, except Noah and his family who found grace in the eyes of The Lord. Only a universal flood could do that.
(b) The Duration of the flood- The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days” In my lifetime I have seen hurricanes like Katrina cause enormous floods. I have seen Tsunamis come crashing over the shoreline to drown many who die. And I have experienced days of rain. But when ir says God caused “the fountains of the great deep to burst open and the floodgates of the sky were opened” (which retained the waters above the expanse referred to Genesis 1 verse 6-7) who can measure the amount of water that might have let loose except maybe to work back from the other facts given in the text as to the height of the waters multiplied by the circumference of the earth which would make for no ordinary local flood And it was certainly no ordinary flood in the first place as the rain poured down for forty days. It was no ordinary local flood either as it took one hundred and fifty days (five months) for the waters to all recede to our current topography.
(c) The Depth of the Flood- the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth more than fifteen cubits. The text later says that when it was over “the ark rested on Mount Ararat” which is 17000 feet above sea level, which is over three miles high (5280 ft. per mile x 3 plus) Now we know today that Mount Everest is the “highest mountain above sea level” at about 29,000 feet and if we are willing to accept the biblical account at face value as we should, then see that to say that the ark settled on Mount Ararat in that region is not to say that the waters only went that high. Mt Everest is over six miles high. Some of us may know the New York Trade Tower which is 1776 feet high. But few may know that the Shanghai Tower in China is 2,073 feet and then higher still is a tall building in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates is actually 2717 feet high. Amazing as that is, the highest building of man is only less than ten percent as high as the highest mountain.
Would we dare say that one of these buildings could be submerged in water that high for any extended time much less 150 days without the water, which always seeks its own level, then quickly receding to sea level? What an amazing giant bubble that would be. That simple law of physics alone should prove that this Biblical Flood was universal believing what the Bible plainly says should be received as the narrative from God tells us rather than making pre-suppositional science a higher authority of the Word of God Would we really want to accept an idea that water that seeks its own level would stay at that level if there was any other territory for it to recede to? Really? But if all this was not in and of itself enough to get the point across the narrative doesn’t end with chapter 7 but proceeds with chapters 8-9 which for clarity reemphasizes the same points I have made. Later I will simply try and summarize the main points there to demonstrate that God has gone to great lengths here to make Himself very clear so we should not, and could not, and dare not, distrust and distort His account, He being the only witness, and having orchestrated it. First let me summarize a few major points of these passages; (1) Expressions reflecting a universal flood occur more than 30 times. (2) The word for flood used here is not the ordinary word for a flood as the usual words for a local flood are not used here at all. (3) The descriptions of the flood are far more than relative to an ordinary flood and Job 12:15 says these waters “overturned the earth.” The terms used to describe the extent of the flood are repeatedly reflective of all flesh dying as a result, leaving no survivors except Noah and his family found grace in the eyes of the Lord. And he made a covenant only with him in 6:18 that he and his family alone would survive. But there as seen repeatedly in these chapters more to the narrative that again underscores the universality of the flood.
(d) The Drying up of the Flood-Chapter 8 starts off with an announcement that God being faithful to His promise the time came God stopped the flooding. Here’s a point to ponder. We read that there came a time when “Noah opened a window and sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark…He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth. He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him. So as I close this message today just imagine being tossed to and fro on the churching waters if a universal flood waiting for when it would be over and they can set foot on land once again? And now there is hope.
