![]() Stories about a great flood existed for hundreds of years before the Bible was written and were widely disseminated throughout the Near East. ![]() 2,3īoth scholars considered the Pentateuch to be written by a single author, and both were able to show that the Noah story borrowed heavily from Mesopotamian sources. Eventually, I became acquainted with the writings of two Biblical scholars, Umberto Cassuto and Nahum Sarma, who would lead me on a trail that was to change my entire perception of the early chapters of Genesis. Some were even perturbed that I would question the historicity of the Bible. All were wedded to a very literal understanding of the text. I have posed this question over the years to many orthodox Rabbis and none have been able to gave me a satisfactory answer. This is a return to the primeval chaos of Creation.īut if this is an imaginary tale, what is it doing in the Bible? This is a lot more than an extensive local flood. The fountains of the deep (tehom) (( תְהוֹם ) and the windows of the heavens were closed, (Genesis 8:1-2)…… The waters then receded from upon the earth, receding continuously, and the waters diminished at the end of a hundred and fifty days.” (Genesis 8:3) And God caused a spirit to pass over the earth, and the waters subsided. Moreover, just as the “spirit of God” hovered over the “tehom” on the first day of Creation guiding the creative process, so also the “spirit” of God passed over the earth during the Flood to guide its resolution: After the flooding the process reversed itself - the fountains of the “tehom” closed up and the deep waters receded back into the seas. Simultaneously, windows present in the barrier between the waters above the heavens and the heavens themselves opened up. During the Flood, however, these deep primeval waters surged up into the seas and flowed over the land. Subsequently, the land mass arose from within the deep primeval waters and seas were formed, while the “tehom” remained deep within the oceans. “In the beginning of God’s creating the heavens and earth, when the earth was bewilderment and void, with darkness over the surface of the deep (tehom) ( Ò תְהוֹם ), and the spirit of God was hovering upon the surface of the waters.” (Genesis 1:1) The “tehom” ( תְהוֹם ), usually translated as “the deep,” are the primordial waters of chaos that covered the earth at the time of creation: “In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep (tehom raba) ( תְּהוֹם רַבָּה ) burst forth and the windows of the heavens (hashomayim) ( הַשָּׁמַיִם ) were opened.” (Genesis 7:11) ![]() Moreover, the Biblical description of the onset of the Flood returns us to the first chapter of Genesis and the disorder accompanying the very beginnings of the earth: And He wiped out all existence that was on the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the bird of the heaven and they were destroyed from the earth and Noah only remained alive, and those who were with him in the ark.” (Genesis 7:21-23). “And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of bird, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth, and every man All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died. The words “all” and “every” are keywords in this passage from the Flood story: This is a story about global destruction. Perhaps this is a story about a local flood of unusual intensity and extent rather than a global catastrophe? At least one Midrashic source was prepared to consider this possibility when it suggests that the Land of Israel was excluded from Noah’s flood. There is no archeological evidence that a flood, or any other global catastrophe for that matter, disrupted human civilization, and the notion that all animals in the globe could be rescued in an ark seems naïve in the extreme. The Biblical story of Noah and his ark stretches belief. But before you do this, do watch this short video by clicking on these words in yellow. The History of Jewish, Christian and Islamic Messianism" of extreme interest. Noah and the Flood: an Epic Poem of Mythological Proportionsĭo you enjoy these essays? Then your are sure to find my latest book "The Struggle for Utopia.
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