Religion and me (4)
The flood story in the Bible occupied me quite intensely
In Religion and me (2) I described how Jesuit priests indoctrinated me in my school days with bible narrative, and how the stories they told collided with the lessons we got from the excellent teachers of geography and biology. I also described how I gained access to the priests’ library, where I could consult the Encyclopedia Britannica and other very comprehensive works of knowledge. Confronting the priests with what I had read was a tricky matter. This is how it went:
At one stage we were learning about Noah and the great flood, and I had questions on the justification of God destroying all life, human and animal, all across the world, for the wickedness of man; but also technical questions on building an ark for all those animals, and feeding them over forty days. I asked how the marsupials migrated from Ararat to Australia, without leaving any of their species behind in Asia. Things came to a head when I mentioned that the same flood story was told in Gilgamesh.
The story of Noah and the great flood, one of the best-known biblical accounts, is to be found in chapters 6–9 of the Book of Genesis. In it God feels that humanity had become corrupt and violent, and decides to destroy all life with a flood. In the key verse Genesis 6:17 God says: “I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.”
But God decides to spare Noah, a righteous and blameless man, who was 600 years old at the time. He instructed him to build a large vessel, the Ark, to preserve himself, his family, and members of every kind of animal, so that life could continue after the flood.
God gave Noah detailed instructions on constructing the Ark: it was to be built of gopher wood, and the rooms had to be lined with pitch. The dimensions were to be 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high, which translates to 450 feet in length, 75 feet in width, and 45 feet high. The ark was to have three decks.
In Genesis 6:19–20 Noah is told how to proceed. “You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive.” However, in Genesis 7:2–3 the instructions change. God tells him to gather “seven pairs of every kind of clean animal”, a modification that was necessary in order to allow for sacrificial worship — which could only be performed with unblemished species. Those are land animals that chew cud (ruminate), and have cloven hooves.
When the “floodgates of heaven” opened, rain fell for forty days and forty nights (forty is an auspicious number often encountered in the Bible), covering everything, even the highest mountains. All life on earth perished. This included plants, animals, and the entire human population of the earth — except for Noah and his family.
The waters remained for 150 days before receding, and the Ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. Noah sent out a raven and then a dove, which returned with a freshly plucked olive leaf, indicating that the flood waters had receded. Noah, his family, and the animals left the Ark, just over a year after the flooding had begun, and Noah built an altar and offered sacrifices. God then made a covenant, promising never again to destroy all life with a flood. Genesis 9:13 quotes God as saying: “I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.” It is the first mention of the rainbow in the bible.
Predecessor stories
From the encyclopedias in my school days I discovered that the biblical flood narrative was based on much older myths. Thousands of years before the Book of Genesis we find stories about world-ending deluges. The Sumerian Eridu Genesis is the oldest Mesopotamian tale of the Great Flood, and is picked up in later works such as the Atrahasis and Gilgamesh.
Written in the mid-17th century BC the Atrahasis Epic describes the Great Flood sent by the gods to destroy human life. Only one good man, Atrahasis, was warned of the impending deluge by the god Enki who instructed him to build an ark to save himself. Atrahasis loaded two of every kind of animal into the ark, and so preserved life on earth.
In the Epic of Gilgamesh the gods decide to wipe out humanity with a great flood. Ea, the god who created humans, secretly warns Utnapishtim, one of the kings in Mesopotamian legend, and instructs him to build a large boat, sealed with pitch, for his family, the craftsmen, and animals, to preserve life.
When the flood subsides, Utnapishtim’s boat comes to rest on Mount Nimush. After several days, he releases a dove, a swallow, and finally a raven to find dry land. The raven does not return, signaling that the waters have receded. Sound familiar?
It became clear to me, as a school-boy and later during my studies of philosophy, that the biblical flood myth was simply a retelling of Atrahasis and Gilgamesh. All the flood stories share the narrative of a boat-building hero, and of animals rescued from extinction. One common point is the sending out of birds, after the flood, to check for dry land.
But the Hebrews did not simply repeat the ancient flood stories. They added a motivation for god’s flooding. In Genesis it became punishment for humanity’s sins, while in the Mesopotamian myths and other flood legends, no particular reason is given. There they appear to be just capricious vendettas of the gods.
