Question 124, from SF

The average life-span of people written about in the Old Testament was hundreds of years, yet after the flood life spans dramatically declined. I have heard somewhere that the cause of this is related to a change in the earth’s atmosphere after the flood. Where might I go to find out more on this theory?

The only time average human life-spans are recorded as notably longer is before the story of the great flood. Although there was a much lower life-expectancy in Old Testament times, for the vast majority of the Old Testament, a life-span of 70 years was considered a good age (see, for example Psalm 90, verse 10).

The theory mentioned in the question is often found in creationist literature produced by people who seek to ‘prove’ (more…)

Question from KK, USA

Did Noah’s Ark actually occur, as described in the Bible? For instance, if there were two kangaroos on the Ark, how did they hop from Mt. Ararat all the way to Australia, especially considering that after the flood the surface of the earth would be nothing more than caked mud? What did they eat along the way? Also, how did two penguins get from Mt. Ararat to Antarctica? How did insects such as the mayfly, that have adult life-spans of around 24 hours, get from Mt. Ararat to say the Mississippi River Valley? It seems far-fetched, doesn’t it?

The short answer is: ‘Yes it does.’

For some reason Noah’s Ark keeps coming up as a question on freelance theology. It seems to be the one story in the Bible that causes the most problems for people. There are of course several creationist theories relating to this exact problem, which, while interesting, tend to raise as many new questions as they answer.

A few pointers:

1) While our English translations of the Bible say the ‘whole world’ was flooded, the Hebrew word translated as ‘earth’ in Genesis chapter 6 verse 17 is usually translated as ‘land’ or ‘country’ in chapter 10 verse 10. There is archaeological evidence for wide-ranging flooding in the Mesopotamian area (modern day Iraq) that roughly fits into the possible time-frame for when Noah’s flood occurred.

2) Kangaroos and other exotic animals are not mentioned in the story at all. There is no textual evidence of migrations from polar regions, the antipodes or the Western hemisphere to Mesopotamia, and then back from Mt. Ararat, although such things are often depicted by Bible illustrators who like drawing animals.

3) Comparative accounts that closely parallel the Noah story have been found in Babylonian legends, and in other middle-eastern cultures, but without the spiritual message found in Genesis relating to God’s wrath at human sin. There are also parallels in South American legends and, of course, the drowning of Atlantis due to the anger of the gods follows a similar theme. Traversing the sea was a forbidding challenge to early societies (it’s still tricky now!) and often ‘the sea’ was used to describe evil and chaos in primitive myths. The thought of waters rising over the land would have been exceptionally frightening in these cultures.

4) As has been said on freelance theology before, there is a danger when looking at these Biblical stories that in getting wrapped up in the ‘how’, people can easily lose focus on the ‘why’. This story has been included in Genesis to tell us about God’s character and the fact that God does not tolerate human sin. The story in Genesis chapter 9 verses 18-29 about Noah’s drunkenness shows that the ‘warning’ of the flood did not restore the right relationship between humans and God. That would take covenants with Abraham and Moses, the revelation of God’s Law and, ultimately, the Incarnation. And even now, it is theologically legitimate to say that until the final return of Jesus Christ, God’s plan to sort the world out is still in progress.

Question from AW, United Kingdom

Why is Canaan cursed after Noah gets drunk in Genesis chapter 9?

The simplest answer to this question is because this story explains why the Israelites would invade the Promised Land and rule over the Canaanites. Whether Noah made an actual prophetic statement when he ‘said’: “May Canaan be the slave of Shem” (chapter 9, verse 26), or this was a later explanation for subsequent events is pretty much irrelevant. Even the Rabbinic tradition, that Moses wrote the book of Genesis while the people of Israel were on their convoluted way to the land promised them by God, implies that this statement was included to justify the pending Israelite conquest of Canaan. The Israelites were ‘descendents of Shem’ in the genealogies and they would rule over the Canaanites.

Genesis is a complex book. It has a large number of features in the early chapters that link it to other literature in the surrounding area, particularly Babylonian ideas. If, as some scholars maintain, it was a fairly late compilation of stories, or underwent an editing process, this comment can be seen as a retrospective justification for the subjugation of another people group, something that the Israelites experienced themselves as the empires of Assyria and Babylon conquered the Middle East.

Question from JT, United Kingdom

In The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren, he claims that there wasn’t any rain until the flood. So my question is: “Did Noah ever see rain before the flood?”

The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren’s popular devotional book, approaches the Bible from a certain viewpoint, namely a literalist understanding of Scripture. This approach can actually have it’s advantages, but care is needed on asserting ‘facts’ from Scripture, particularly if the Bible is less than clear on some things. Also, it assumes that for Scripture to contain absolute truth, it has to be factually correct throughout.

In the section of the book in question, Rick Warren is trying to draw an important principle from the Noah story and he points out that there are many reasons why Noah could have decided not to build the Ark. “First, Noah had never seen rain, because prior to the Flood, God irrigated the earth from the ground up. Second, Noah lived hundreds of miles from the nearest ocean… Third, there was the problem of rounding up all the animals…” (op. cit. p.71)

The subject of Noah’s flood has appeared previously on freelance theology and it seems that many people get hung up on the mechanics of the Flood without considering the point of the story. The idea that Noah had never seen rain is a case in point. Creationist accounts of the formation of the world often use Genesis chapter 2 verses 5-6 (“Yahweh had not sent rain upon the earth… but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground”) to explain why the Flood was such an unexpected catastrophe. The Flood was caused when the ‘water in the sky’ (that had been put there in Genesis chapter 1 verse 7) was released without warning. Incidentally, Creationists often credit this ‘water in the sky’ as the reason for humankind’s longevity before the Flood, as it may have filtered out harmful solar rays and the like.

The problem with this kind of scientific (and the word is used loosely) exposition of Genesis is that the bigger issues of the Creation stories, namely the marring of God’s image in humanity and the failed relationship between creator and creature, are often lost behind complicated explanations. Rick Warren’s exposition of the bigger issue – namely Noah’s faithfulness to God’s commands, despite the circumstances – is more important. “If God asked you to build a giant boat, don’t you think you might have a few questions, objections, or reservations? Noah didn’t. He obeyed God whole-heartedly. That means doing whatever God asks without reservation or hesitation.” (Warren, op. cit. p.72) Ironically, the throwaway reference to disputable theology has perhaps hindered the effectiveness of his message.

Question from JB, Australia

Creationists are well known for explaining the size of Noah’s Ark as adequate to accommodate even dinosaurs, but how can anyone explain how the ark could have accommodated the sheer number of species in the world? One biologist recently estimated that the world today contains thirty million species, 97 per cent of which are insects. The Bible says that the flood wiped out all living things, and that the ark contained all living things. Further, it would seem that sea creatures were not included in the ark, but if not, why would God treat them differently in his plan to destroy all living creatures – except for the one (unclean animal) or seven (clean animal) pairs of each that were taken into the ark?

Thanks for the question, JB. This is a theme that keeps reoccurring at the moment with regards to the early parts of Genesis. There are a number of things to note about the ark story. Firstly, it has been included in Genesis to tell us about God’s character and the fact that God does not tolerate human sin. The story in Genesis chapter 9 verses 18-29 about Noah’s drunkenness shows that the ‘warning’ of the flood did not restore the right relationship between humans and God. It is a mistake to blindly assert the ‘fact’ of the flood without drawing out the reason behind it (see below).

Secondly, there are instances where Biblical terms are literally translated as ‘the whole world’, but probably do not mean the whole world as we are aware of it now. (A good New Testament example of this is in Acts 2 v 5 “God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven” – really, where are the Welsh?) In the case of the Noah story the Hebrew word translated as ‘earth’ in chapter 6 verse 17 is usually translated as ‘land’ or ‘country’ in chapter 10 verse 10.

The limitations of ‘the whole world’ as a phrase probably refer to the known world, i.e. the region surrounding the Mediterranean and the ‘fertile crescent’. This phrase becomes more enigmatic when we realise that the Noah story is one of the oldest stories in the Bible. Comparative accounts have been found in Babylonian legend, with very close parallels to the Noah story, but without the spiritual message. The likelihood is that there was some kind of civilisation-destroying flood in South Mesopotamia a long time ago in human history (there is certainly evidence in rock formations and silt deposits for this hypothesis). Whether the destruction of ‘the whole world’ as it was known to the writer ‘only’ means Mesopotamia is one way to look at this and does not diminish the catastrophic effect of the flood.

It is very unlikely that dinosaurs were included in Noah’s manifest and many creationists posit the Great Deluge as the extinction event that caused the dinosaurs to die out and, of course, artificially age the Earth considerably. As has been said on freelance theology before, building a huge cosmology on the basis of these Biblical accounts is up to the individual. However, there is a danger that in getting wrapped up in the ‘how’, people can easily lose focus on the ‘why’.

What we see in Genesis and Exodus is a progression. God is in relationship with humans who sin. Punishment does not work. The covenant with Noah’s descendants (all of humanity) soon leads to the prideful project of Babel. With mankind scattered, the next covenant is with Abraham. However, that does not seem to have the holding power it should, so a covenant is made on Sinai with the nation of Israel (one offshoot of Abraham’s family). Even that doesn’t work, hence the Incarnation and a personal covenant made individually, either with the ‘elect’, or those who choose to know ‘Christ and him crucified’ (whatever your view on predestination may be).

Along this timeline, Noah’s story is one of a God angered by human rebellion, pride, selfishness and ingratitude and acts as a warning to wayward human beings today. Asking ‘how big was the ark?’ is not really the issue, in the opinion of this theologian.

I hope this answers your question, JB.

This is the main thrust of the community talk by Jon the freelance theologian on Sunday 16 May. It was based on the reading of Genesis chapter 6, verse 9 to chapter 8 verse 19.

Noah’s Ark is a Bible story that has wormed its way into our cultural consciousness. Go into Clintons and you’ll find a greetings card with Noah’s Ark on, go into a craft shop and you can sew, stitch or knit your own ark, go into a toy shop and if you know where to look, you can buy your kids a plastic Playmobile Ark (with lots of cool Playmobile animals). Turn on the TV and even the Tweenies and Teletubbies have retold the story of Noah’s Ark and the animals going in two by two. I only know that because in the not-so-distant past I was a shift worker and saw a lot of morning telly.

In the past fortnight Noah’s Ark has been ‘disproved’ in a documentary on TV and on the news it has been announced that a geographical expedition has been launched to investigate the strange rock formations at the top of Mount Ararat. Spy satellites have spotted the formations and there’s a bit of excitement that they could have something to do with Noah’s Ark. So, even in the grown up world the story seems to go on and on.

There are a number of Christian organisations who could lay out very convincing scientific arguments proving every bit of Genesis is true, including the account of the flood. I’ve read some of their literature in the past and it’s all very interesting, but at one level it’s a bit irrelevant.

Christians spend a lot of time and effort in making sure that people can believe certain things. But the story of Noah was not included in the Bible to test our faith or our doctrinal orthodoxy. People who make it a mark of correct doctrine whether we believe in a literal Noah and a literal flood are missing the point somewhat. It is obvious that whoever wrote the story of Noah did so because they believed it was true but that person also wrote it down because they believed it illuminated a greater truth as well.

So let’s take the story at face value. Things have gone wrong in the world and God has pronounced judgement. He picks one guy and his family to survive the coming flood and orders him to build a big boat. That done, God arranges for animals to arrive and get on board and he seals Noah’s family and the animals inside the boat. Then it begins to rain.

We can only imagine what it must have been like inside the boat. It would have been fairly dark for one thing – this was the era before electric light. Gradually you could tune out the drumming sound on the roof. The animal noises would take a little bit longer to get used to. Suddenly the floor moves – the ark has begun to float. Hopefully the animals are all tied down or firmly penned in, because otherwise with each pitch and bob, everybody and everything would be thrown from side to side. From outside you begin to hear other sounds too. People are banging on the side of the ark and screaming to be let in. If you ever get to sleep – that sound will be the one that haunts your dreams.

The rain continues for forty days flat. Inside the ark nobody knows how long this is going to last. Will the food run out? Will the rain stop? Where will the ark end up?

Eventually the rain does stop and the Ark floats around for 150 days. That doesn’t sound too long, I know, so perhaps we should say it the other way – five months! Five months floating around who-knows-where, with no direction, no idea if, let alone when, this was going to end, with the food supplies dwindling and the animals getting fractious. Let’s not talk about the smell, or the heat, but you know how at a zoo if you go into the ‘night-time animal house’ where it’s overwhelmingly hot and stinks of bat-do…

There are times when we can empathise with Noah. When we seem to be floating along in the dark, with no control over our future, wondering how much longer we can carry on with it all, we are having our own ark experience. Noah is obedient – he does what God asks of him – but then it seems as if God has abandoned him, left him to sink or swim (well, float) and forgotten all about him. Noah’s story is, as it were, the archetype for all our experiences when we no longer feel close to God, despite doing everything right.

One of the things I’ve said a few times when speaking at our gatherings is that we are not called to success, we are required to be obedient. Sometimes that means we do everything that God asks of us and yet it seems like nothing happens. We do everything right, but everything turns out wrong. There’s a reason for that – God’s measure of success is how obedient we are, how faithful we are to the call. And sometimes a situation that sucks is better than the alternative. Even when he was floating along wondering if he would ever get out of this situation, Noah must have been aware that if he had been disobedient he would have been dead already.

The most encouraging sentence in the whole story, for me, is the first verse of Genesis chapter 8. But God remembered Noah and all the animals in the boat. Now at first reading, that phrase makes it look like God had forgotten about him? We mustn’t read too much into that – it’s not as if God was thumbing through his diary and then thought ‘Yikes, Noah! I ought to do something about him. It’s been, my goodness, five months. I could have sworn it was only last week.’ It’s more a question of perspective. From where Noah was floating, it must have felt as if God had forgotten him, particularly as it was five months since the rain had stopped.

But God remembered Noah and all the animals in the boat. Perhaps a better way of putting it would be ‘God STILL remembered Noah’ or ‘God hadn’t forgotten Noah’. As the months slipped by and he was still floating around, Noah may have been wondering about whether he had slipped the Almighty’s mind, but that wasn’t the case – God still remembered him.

A wind stirs up and begins to dry up the waters. The Ark bumps down onto a mountaintop and Noah begins his experiment of sending out birds to see if it’s safe to go out yet. The next bit of the story after Noah and his family have left the ark, if you want to read on, concerns God’s further instructions to Noah and also a promise. God tells Noah that the rainbow that comes out when it rains will be a token of God’s promise to never again destroy the Earth through flooding.

In Chapter 9 God says: “I am giving you a sign as evidence of my eternal covenant with you and all living creatures. I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is the sign of my permanent promise to you and to all the earth. When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will be seen in the clouds, and I will remember my covenant with you and with everything that lives. Never again will there be a flood that will destroy all life. When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth.” ~ Verses 9-16

The idea here is that God has set up something like a giant post-it note, a reminder that another flood won’t happen. But the implication is that when we see the rainbow we’ll be reminded of God’s promise too. It’s not as if God needs a memory aid, but as human beings, we do. So it goes in our everyday walk – there will be certain things that will spark off memories. Sometimes they will be reminders of times when God blessed us; sometimes it will be a reminder of how we failed. Sometimes it will just be a reminder of God, his grace and persevering love.

In the New Testament, when Jesus is crucified, his cross is the central one of three. On either side of him are two thieves. As the crowd jeer Jesus, mocking him and telling him that if he was the Messiah he should come down from the cross, one of the thieves joins in. The other thief sticks up for Jesus, telling his fellow criminal where to get off. “We deserve what we’ve got,” he says. Then he turns to Jesus and he says “Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

It’s the ultimate cry of faith. Nothing can save that guy. He is going to hang there until he is dead, with the breath slowly being choked out of him until his strength gives in and he can no longer push himself up to breathe or until the Romans break his legs to speed up the process of asphyxiation. He knows there is no way out – and that the teacher dying next to him is the only possible source of hope. Much has been made of the thief’s penitent plea. But he doesn’t have time to ‘pray the prayer’ – and there’s nobody around to guide him through it anyway. He certainly doesn’t have time to go through an Alpha course and get baptised and attend church services. He doesn’t even have time to become a Christian – whatever that may mean. All he can do is look to Jesus and say ‘remember me’.

Jesus knows this man, what he has done, what he needs and his reply is one of hope. “Today, you’ll eat with me in Paradise.” In one sense he is telling the thief what the thief already knows – ‘You’re going to die, you’re not getting out of this one.’ In another sense he is giving the thief more than he could ever have stolen if he had been the greatest thief in the entire world. He is saying ‘Yes, I will remember you.’

Jesus tells us, his followers, to carry our cross daily, which is why sometimes our walk with Jesus feels like we are being crucified. It’s why we risk mockery, cruelty, injustice, condemnation, prejudice, persecution and hatred. “If the world hates you it’s because it hated me first,” Jesus tells his disciples. But we have that promise – that welcome to come when Jesus greets us and says ‘well done, servant.’ In a personal letter to Timothy, Paul says: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2 Timothy 4 v7) Even though Paul’s race was long and hard and he was staring death in the face as he wrote those words, he knew that a prize was waiting for him, that Jesus remembered him.

There will be times when we will feel left in the dark, when we will wonder where we are going, how long these circumstance will last. Our immediate future may seem uncertain and we may even doubt the call of God on our lives. But our future is certain. We follow a God who will not forget us. Regardless of where we find ourselves, if we ask him to remember us, he will. And in our certain future, when we finish our race, have fought our fight, sailed the stormy waters and arrived safely on dry land, on that shore we be welcomed by the master who remembers us from before all time.