EXPOSITION
And God—Elohim, not because belonging to the Elohistic document (Block, Tuch, Colcnso); but rather because throughout this section the Deity is exhibited in his relations to his creatures—blessed—a repetition of the primal blessing rendered necessary by the devastation of the Flood (cf. Genesis 1:28)—Noah and his sons,—as the new heads of the race,—and said unto them,—audibly, in contrast to Genesis 8:21, Genesis 8:22, which was not addressed to the patriarch, but spoken by God to himself in his heart, as if internally resolving on his subsequent course of action,—Be fruitful, and multiply. A favorite expression of the Elohist (cf. Genesis 1:28; Genesis 8:17; Genesis 9:1, Genesis 9:7; Genesis 17:20; Genesis 28:3; Genesis 35:11; Genesis 47:27; Genesis 48:14), (Tuch); but
(1) the apparently great number of passages melts away when we observe the verbally exact reference of Genesis 8:17; Genesis 9:1, Genesis 9:7 to Genesis 1:28; and of Genesis 48:4 to Genesis 35:11;
(2) the Elohist does not always employ his "favorite expression" where he might have done so, as, e.g; not in Genesis 1:22; Genesis 17:6; Genesis 28:14;
(3) the Jehovist does not avoid it where the course of thought necessarily calls for it (vide Le Genesis 26:9), (Keil).
And replenish the earth. The words, "and subdue it, which had a place in the Adamic blessing, and which the LXX. insert here in the Noachic (καιÌ κατακυριευìσατε αὐτῆς), are omitted for the obvious reason that the world dominion originally assigned to man in Adam had been forfeited by sin, and could only be restored through the ideal Man, the woman's seed, to whom it had been transferred at the fail Hence says Paul, speaking of Christ: "καιÌ παìντα ὑπεìταξεν ὑποÌ τουÌς ποìδας αὐτοῦ (Ephesians 1:22); and the writer to the Hebrews: νῦν δεÌ οὐìπω ὀρῶμεν αὐτῷ (i.e. man) ταÌ παìντα ὑποτεταγμεìνα, τοÌν δεÌ βραχυìτι παρ ἀγγεìλους ἠλαττομεìνον βλεìπομεν Ἰησοῦν διαÌ τοÌ παìθημα τοῦ θαναìτου δοìξη καιÌ τιμῆ ἐστεφανωμεìνον (i.e. the world dominion which David, Psalms 8:6, recognized as belonging to God's ideal man) ὁìπως χαìριτι θεοῦ ὑπεÌρ παντοÌς γευìσηται θαναìτου (Genesis 2:8, Genesis 2:9). The original relationship which God had established between man and the lower creatures having been disturbed by sin, the inferior animals, as it were, gradually broke loose from their condition of subjection. As corruption deepened in the human race it was only natural to anticipate that man's lordship over the animal creation would become feebler and feebler. Nor, perhaps, is it an altogether violent hypothesis that, had the Deluge not intervened, in the course of time the beast would have become the master and man the slave. To prevent any such apprehensions in the future, as there was to be no second deluge, the relations of man and the lower creatures were to be placed on a new footing. Ultimately, in the palingenesia, they would be completely restored (cf. Isaiah 11:6); in the mean time, till that glorious consummation should arrive, the otherwise inevitable encroachments of the creatures upon the human family in its sin-created weakness should be restrained by a principle of fear. That was the first important modification made upon the original Adamic blessing.
And the fear of you and the dread of you. Not simply of Noah and his sons, but of man in general. Shall be. Not for the first time, as it could not fail to be evoked by the sin of man during the previous generations, but, having already been developed, it was henceforth to be turned back upon the creature rather than directed against man. Upon. The verb to be is first construed with עַל, and afterwards with בְּ. The LXX. render both by ἐπιÌ, though perhaps the latter should be taken as equivalent to ἐìν, in which case the three clauses of the verse will express a gradation. The dread of man shall first overhang the beasts, then it shall enter into and take possession of them, and finally under its influence they shall fall into man's hand. Every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon (literally, in; vide supra. Murphy translates with) all that moveth upon the earth, and upon (literally, in) all the fishes of the sea. This does not imply that the animals may not sometimes rise against man and destroy him (cf. Exodus 8:6, Exodus 8:17, Exodus 8:24; Le Exodus 26:22; 1Ki 13:24, 1 Kings 13:25; 1 Kings 20:36; 2 Kings 2:24; Ezekiel 14:15; Acts 12:23, for instances in which the creatures were made ministers of Divine justice), but simply that the normal condition of the lower creatures will be one of instinctive dread of man, causing them rather to avoid than to seek his presence—a Statement sufficiently confirmed by the facts that wherever human civilization penetrates, there the dominion of the beasts retires; that even ferocious animals, such as lions, tigers, and other beasts of prey, unless provoked, usually flee from man rather than assail him. Into your hand are they delivered. Attested by
(1) man's actual dominion over such of the creatures as are either immediately needful for or helpful to him, such as the horse, the ox, the sheep, &c.; and
(2) by man's capability of taming and so reducing to subjection every kind of wild beast—lions, tigers, &c.
Every—obviously admitting of "exceptions to be gathered both from the nature of the case and from the distinction of clean and unclean beasts mentioned before and afterwards" (Poole)—moving thing that liveth—clearly excluding such as had died of themselves or been slain by other beasts (cf. Exodus 22:31; Le Exodus 22:8)—shall be meat for you. Literally, to you it shall be for meat. Though the distinction between unclean and clean animals as to food, afterwards laid clown in the Mosaic code (Le Genesis 11:1), is not mentioned here, it does not follow that it was either unknown to the writer or unpracticed by the men before the Flood. Even as the green herb have I given you all things. An allusion to Genesis 1:29 (Rosenmüller, Bush); but vide infra. The relation of this verse to the former has been understood as signifying—
1. That animal food was expressly prohibited before the Flood, and now for the first time permitted (Mercerus, Rosenmüller, Candlish, Clarke, Murphy, Jamieson, Wordsworth, Kalisch)—the ground being that such appears the obvious import of the sacred writer's language.
2. That, though permitted from the first, it was not used till postdiluvian times, when men were explicitly directed to partake of it by God (Theodoret, Chrysostom, Aquinas, Luther, Pererius)—the reason being that prior to the Flood the fruits of the earth were more nutritious and better adapted for the sustenance of man's physical frame, propter excellentem terrae bonitatem praestantemque vim alimenti quod fructus terrae suppeditabant homini, while after it such a change passed upon the vegetable productions of the ground as to render them less capable of supporting the growing feebleness of the body, invalidam ad bene alendum hominem (Petetins).
3. That whether permitted or not prior to the Flood, it was used, and is here for the first time formally allowed (Keil, Alford, 'Speaker's Commentary'); in support of which opinion it may be urged that the general tendency of subsequent Divine legislation, until the fullness of the times, was ever in the direction of concession to the infirmities or necessities of human nature (cf. Matthew 19:8). The opinion, however, which appears to be the best supported is—
4. That animal food was permitted before the fall, and that the grant is h ere expressly renewed. The grounds for this opinion are—
(1) That the language of Genesis 1:29 does not explicitly forbid the use of animal food.
(2) That science demonstrates the existence of carnivorous animals prior to the appearance of man, and yet vegetable products alone were assigned for their food.'
(3) That shortly after the fall animals were slain by Divine direction for sacrifice, and probably also for food—at least this latter supposition is by no means an unwarrantable inference from Genesis 4:4 (q.v.).
(4) That the words, "as the green herb," even if they implied the existence of a previous restriction, do not refer to Genesis 1:29, but to Genesis 1:30, the green herb in the latter verse being contrasted with the food of man in Genesis 1:29. Solomon Glass thus correctly indicates the connection and the sense: "ut viridem herbam (illis), sic illa omnia dedi vobis" ('Sacr. Phil,' lib. 3. tr. 2, c. Genesis 22:2).
(5) That a sufficient reason for mentioning the grant of animal food in this connection may be found in the subjoined restriction, without assuming the existence of any previous limitation.
But—אַךְ, an adverb of limitation or exception, as in Le Genesis 11:4, introducing a restriction on the foregoing precept—flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof. Literally, with its soul, its blood; the blood being regarded as the seat of the soul, or life principle (Le Genesis 17:11), and even as the soul itself (Le Genesis 17:14). The idea of the unity of the soul and the blood, on which the prohibition of blood is based, comes to light everywhere in Scripture. In the blood of one mortally wounded his soul flows forth (Lamentations 2:12), and he who voluntarily sacrifices himself pours out his soul unto death (Isaiah 53:12). The murderer of the innocent slays the soul of the blood of the innocent (ψυχηÌν αἱìματος ἀθωìου, Deuteronomy 27:25), which also cleaves to his (the murderer's) skirts (Jeremiah 2:34; cf. Proverbs 28:17, blood of a soul; cf. Genesis 4:10 with Hebrews 12:24; Job 24:12 with Revelation 6:9; vide also Psalms 94:21; Matthew 23:35). Nor can it be said to be exclusively peculiar to Holy Scripture. In ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics the hawk, which feeds on bloods, represents the soul. Virgil says of a dying person, "purpuream vomit ille animam" ('AEneid,' 9.349). The Greek philosophers taught that the blood was either the soul (Critias), or the soul's food (Pythagoras), or the soul's seat (Empedocles), or the soul's producing cause (the Stoics); but only Scripture reveals the true relation between them both when it declares the blood to be not the soul absolutely, but the means of its self-attestation (vide Delitzsch's ' Bib. Psychology,' div. 4. sec. 11.). Shall ye not eat. Not referring to, although certainly forbidding, the eating of flesh taken from a living animal (Raschi, Cajetan, Delitzsch, Luther, Poole, Jamieson)—a fiendish custom which may have been practiced among the antediluvians, as, according to travelers, it is, or was, among modern Abyssinians; rather interdicting the flesh of slaughtered animals from which the blood has not been properly drained (Calvin, Keil, Kalisch, Murphy, Wordsworth). The same prohibition was afterwards incorporated in the Mosaic legislation (cf. Le Genesis 3:17; Genesis 7:1, 27; Genesis 17:10-1; Genesis 19:26; Deuteronomy 12:16, Deuteronomy 12:23, Deuteronomy 12:24; Deuteronomy 15:23), and subsequently imposed upon the Gentile converts in the Christian Church by the authority of the Holy Ghost and the apostles (Acts 15:28, Acts 15:29). Among other reasons, doubtless, for the original promulgation of this law were these:—
1. A desire to guard against the practice of cruelty to animals (Chrysostom, Calvin, 'Speaker's Commentary').
2. A design to hedge about human life by showing the inviolability which in God's eye attached to even the lives of the lower creatures (Calvin, Willet, Poole, Kalisch, Murphy).
3. The intimate connection which even in the animal creation subsisted between the blood and the life (Kurtz, 'Sacr. Worship,' I. A.V.).
4. Its symbolic use as an atonement for sin (Poole, Delitzsch, ' Bib. Psy.' Genesis 4:11; Keil, Wordsworth, Murphy). That the restriction continues to the present day may perhaps be argued from its having been given to Noah, but cannot legitimately be inferred from having been imposed on the Gentile converts to Christianity as one τῶν ἐπαìναγκες τουìτων, from the burden of which they could not be excused (Clarke), as then, by parity of reasoning, meat offered to idols would be equally forbidden, which it is not, except when the consciences of the weak and ignorant are endangered (Calvin).
And surely. Again the conjunction אַךְ introduces a restriction. The blood of beasts might without fear be shed for necessary uses, but the blood of man was holy and inviolable. Following the LXX. (καιÌ γαÌρ), Jerome, Pererius, Mercerus, Calvin, Poole, Willet give a causal sense to the conjunction, as if it supplied the reason of' the foregoing restriction—a sense which, according to Furst ('Hebrews Lex.,' sub nom.) it sometimes, though rarely, has; as in 2 Kings 24:3; Psalms 39:12; Psalms 68:22; but in each case אַךְ is better rendered "surely." Your blood of your lives.
(1) For your souls, i.e. in requital for them—lex talionis, blood for blood, life for life (Kalisch, Wordsworth, Bush);
(2) for your souls, i.e. for their protection (Gesenins, Miehaelis, Schumann, Tuch);
(3) from your souls—a prohibition against suicide (Suma-tan);
(4) with reference to your souls,—לְ = quoad,—as if specifying the particular blood for which exaction would be made (Keil);
(5) of your souls, belonging to them, or residing in them (LXX; Syriac, Vulgate, A.V; Calvin, Rosenmüller (qui ad animas vestras perti net), Murphy, 'Speaker's Commentary') although, according to Kalisch, לְ cannot have the force of a genitive after דּמְכֶס, a substantive with a suffix; but vide Le Psalms 18:20, Psalms 18:23; cf. Ewald, 'Hebrews Syn.,' p. 113. Perhaps the force of לְ may be brought out by rendering, "your blood to the extent of your lives; ' i.e. not all blood-letting, but that which proceeds to the extent of taking life (cf. verse 15: "There shall no more be waters to the extent of a flood"). Will I require. Literally, search after, with a view to punishment; hence avenge (cf. Genesis 42:22; Ezekiel 33:6; Psalms 9:13). At (literally, from) the hand of every beast will I require it. Not "an awful warning against cruelty to the brute creation!" (Clarke), but a solemn proclamation of the sanctity of human life, since it enacted that that beast should be destroyed which slew a man—a statute afterwards incorporated in the Mosaic legislation (Exodus 21:28-2), and practiced even in Christian times; "not for any punishment to the beast, which, being under no law, is capable of neither sin nor punishment, but for caution to men" (Poole). If this practice appears absurd to some moderns, it was not so to Solon and Draco, in whose enactments there was a similar provision (Delitzsch, Lunge). And at (from) the hand of man; at (or from) the hand of every man's brother. Either
(1) two persons are here described—
(a) the individual man himself, and
(b) his brother,
i.e. the suicide and the murderer (Maimonides, Wordsworth, Murphy), or the murderer and his brother man, i.e. kinsman, or goel (Michaelis, Bohlen, Baumgarten, Kalisch, Bush), or the ordinary civil authorities (Kalisch, Candlish, Jamieson)—or
(2) one, viz; the murderer, who is first generically distinguished from the beast, and then characterized as his victim's brother; as thus—" at" or from "the hand of man," as well as beast; "from the hand of the individual man, or every man (cf. Genesis 42:25; Num 17:1-13 :17 for this distributive use of אִישׁ) his brother," supplying a new argument against homicide (Calvin, Knobel, Delitzsch, Keil, Lunge). The principal objection to discovering Goelism in the phraseology is that it requires מִיַּד to be understood in two different senses, and the circumstance, that the institution of the magistracy appears to be hinted at in the next verse, renders it unnecessary to detect it in this. Will I require the life (or soul) of man. The specific manner in which this inquisition after Blood should be carried out is indicated in the words that follow.
Whoso sheddeth. Literally, he shedding, i.e. willfully and unwarrantably; and not simply accidentally, for which kind of manslaughter the law afterwards provided (vide Numbers 35:11); or judicially, for that is commanded by the present statute. Man's blood. Literally, blood of the man, human blood. By man. Not openly and directly by God, but by man himself, acting of course as God's instrument and agent—an instruction which involved the setting up of the magisterial office, by whom the sword might be borne ("Hic igitur fens est, ex quo manat totum jus civile etjus gentium."—Luther. Cf. Numbers 35:29-4; Romans 13:4), and equally laid a basis for the law of the goel subsequently established in Israel (Deuteronomy 19:6; Joshua 20:3). The Chaldee paraphrases, "with witnesses by sentence of the judges." The LXX. substitutes for "by man" ἀντιÌ τοῦ αἱìματος αὐτοῦ—an interpretation followed by Professor Lewis, who quotes Jona ben Gannach in its support, Shall. Not merely a permission legalizing, but an imperative command enjoining, capital punishment, the reason for which follows. For in the image of God made he man. To apply this to the magistracy (Bush, Murphy, Keil), who are sometimes in Scripture styled Elohim (Psalms 82:6), and the ministers of God (Romans 13:4), and who may be said to have been made in the Divine image in the sense of being endowed with the capacity of ruling and judging, seems forced and unnatural; the clause obviously assigns the original dignity of man (cf. Genesis 1:28) as the reason why the murderer cannot be suffered to escape (Calvin, Poole, Alford, 'Speaker's Commentary,' Candlish, Lange)
And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein. Vide on Genesis 9:1.
HOMILETICS
New arrangements for a new era.
I. PROVISION FOR THE INCREASE OF THE HUMAN FAMILY.
1. The procreate instrumentality—the ordinance of marriage (Genesis 9:1, Genesis 9:7), which was -
(1) A Divine institution appointed by God in Eden (cf. Genesis 2:22, and Matthew 19:5).
(2) A sacred institution. Every ordinance of God's appointment, it may be said, is in a manner holy; but a special sanctity attaches to that of marriage. God attested the estimation in which he held it by visiting the world's corruption, which had principally come through its desecration, with the waters of a flood.
(3) A permanent institution, being the same in its nature, uses, and ends that it had been from the beginning, only modified to suit the changing circumstances of man's condition. Prior to the fall it was exempt from any of those imperfections which in human experience have clung to it ever since. Subsequent to the melancholy entrance of sin, there was superadded to the lot of woman an element of pain and sorrow from which she had been previously free; and though anterior to the Flood it had been grossly abused by man's licentiousness, after it, we cannot doubt, it was restored in all its original purity, though still with the curse of sorrow unremoved.
2. The originating cause—the Divine blessing (Genesis 9:1, Genesis 9:7), without which—
(1) The marriage bed would not be fruitful (Psalms 127:3). Cf. the case of Rachel (Genesis 30:2), of Hannah (1 Samuel 1:11), of Ruth (Ruth 4:13).
(2) The married life would not be holy. What marriage is and leads to when dissociated from the fear of God had already been significantly displayed upon the theatre of the antediluvian world, and is abundantly declared in Scripture, both by precept (Genesis 24:3; Genesis 28:1; Exodus 34:16; Deuteronomy 7:3, Deuteronomy 7:4; Joshua 23:12, Joshua 23:13; 2 Corinthians 6:14) and example; e.g; the Israelites (Judges 3:6, Judges 3:7), Samson (Judges 14:1-7), Solomon (1 Kings 3:1), Jews (Ezra 9:1-15).
(3) The marriage tie would not be sure. As ungodliness tends to violate the marriage law by sins of polygamy, so, without the fear of God, there is no absolute security that the bond may not be broken by adultery and divorce.
II. PROVISION FOR THE PROTECTION OF THE HUMAN FAMILY.
1. Against the world of animals.
(1) In Eden such protection was not required, man having been constituted lord of the inferior creation, and the beasts of the field never rising to dispute his authority, his rule being characterized by gentleness and love (Genesis if. 20).
(2) After the fall such protection was incomplete. A change having passed upon the master, there is reason to suppose that a corresponding change transpired upon the servant. The moral order of the world having been dislocated, a like instability would doubtless invade those economical arrangements that depended on man for their successful administration. As man sank deeper into the mire of corruption, his supremacy over the beasts of the field would appear to have been more frequently and fiercely disputed (Genesis 6:11). But now, the Flood having washed away the sinning race,
(3) such protection was henceforth to be rendered secure by imbuing the brute nature with an instinctive dread of man which would lead the animals to acknowledge his supremacy, and rather flee from his presence than assail his dominion. The operation of this law is proved today by the facts that man retains unquestioned his lordship over all those domesticated animals that are useful to him; that there is no creature, however wild and ferocious, that he cannot tame; and that wherever man appears with his civilizing agencies the wild beast instinctively retires.
2. Against the world of men. Ever since the fall man has required to be protected against himself. Prior to the Flood it does not appear that even crimes of murder and bloodshed were publicly avenged. Now, however, the previous laxness, if it was such, and not rather Divine clemency, was to cease, and an entirely new arrangement to come into operation.
(1) The law was henceforth to inflict CAPITAL PUNISHMENT on its murderers; not the law of man simply, but the law of God. Given to Noah, this statute was designed for the universal family of man until repealed by the Authority that imposed it. Not having been exclusively a Jewish statute, the abrogation of the Mosaic economy does not affect its stability. Christ, having come not to destroy the fundamental laws of Heaven, may be fairly presumed to have left this standing. Inferences from the spirit of Christianity have no validity as against an express Divine commandment.
(2) The reasons for the law were to be the essential dignity of man's nature (verse 6; cf. homily on the greatness of man, Genesis 1:26) and the fundamental brotherhood of the race (verse 5), a point which appears not to have received sufficient prominence in prediluvian times (cf. Acts 17:26).
(3) The execution of the law was neither to be retained in the Divine hand for miraculous administration, nor to be left in that of the private individual (the kinsman) to gratify revenge, but to be entrusted to society for enforcement by means or a properly-constituted tribunal. This was the commencement of social government among men, and the institution of the magisterial office, or the power of the sword (vide Romans 13:1-45).
III. PROVISION FOR THE SUSTENANCE OF THE HUMAN FAMILY.
1. The rule. It is not certain that animal food was interdicted in Eden; it is almost certain that it was in use between the fall and the Flood. At the commencement of the new era it was expressly sanctioned.
2. The restriction. While the flesh of animals might be used as food, they were not to be mutilated while alive, nor was the blood to be eaten with the flesh. Note the bearing of the first of these on the question of vivisection, which the Divine law appears explicitly to forbid, except it can be proved to be indispensable for the advancement of medical knowledge with a view to the healing of disease, and, in the case of extending a permission, imperatively requires to be carried on with the least possible infliction of pain upon the unresisting creature whose life is thus sacrificed for the good of man; and of the second of these, on the lawfulness of eating blood under the Christian dispensation, see Expos. on verse 4.
3. The reason.
(1) For the rule, which, though not stated, may be judged to have been
(a) a concession to the moral weakness of man's soul, and
(b) a provision for the physical infirmity of man's body.
(2) For the restriction
(a) to prevent cruelty to animals;
(b) to fence about man's life by showing the criminality of destroying that of the beast;
(c) to assert God's lordship over all life;
(d) because of its symbolic value as the sign of atoning blood.
Lessons:—
1. God's clemency towards man.
2. God's care for man.
3. God's goodness to man.
4. God's estimate of man.
HOMILIES BY R.A. REDFORD
The new life of man on the earth
under a new revelation of the Divine favor. The chief points are—
I. UNLIMITED POSSESSION OF THE EARTH, and use of its inhabitants and products, whether for food or otherwise; thus supplying—
1. The scope of life.
2. The enjoy-meat of life.
3. The development of life.
II. Absolute RESPECT FOR HUMAN LIFE, and preservation of the gentler feelings (the blood being forbidden as injurious to man in this case), promoting—
1. The supremacy of the higher nature over the lower.
2. The revelation of the ethical law.
3. The preparation of the heart for Divine communications.
III. Man living in BROTHERHOOD,
(1) revealing the image of God,
(2) observing God's law,
(3) rejoicing in his blessing, he shall multiply and fill the earth.
The earth waits for such inhabitants; already by Divine judgments prepared for them.—R.