“The Histories of the Sons of Noah” - The Flood (Genesis 6:9 b - Genesis 10:1 a) - TABLET IV
It has been common practise among a large number of scholars to seek to split the flood narrative into different so-called ‘documents'. This has partly resulted from not comparing them closely enough with ancient writings as a whole and partly from over-enthusiasm for a theory. There is little real justification for it. Repetitiveness was endemic among ancient writings, and is therefore not a hint of combined narratives, and the intermixture of statistical material, such as dating, with story type is known elsewhere. The interchanging of the divine names Yahweh and Elohim has already been noted as occurring for good reasons (Genesis 4:25-26; Genesis 5:29).
The whole account is a clear unity, and is formulated on a 7 day - 40 day - 150 day - 150 day - 40 day - 7 day pattern (the numbers partly inclusive), taking us from when God commanded Noah to enter the ark to the return of the dove with the olive leaf which showed the Flood was over. The causes of, and purposes for, the Flood are consistent throughout, as are its final aims. There is certainly expansion in thought, but there is no contradiction. (Alternately we may see it as a 7 - 40 - 150 - 40 - 7 pattern depending on how we read Genesis 8:3).
The Flood
The word for flood is ‘mabbul' which only occurs outside Genesis 6-11 in Psalms 29:10, where its meaning is disputed. In Psalms 29 its use follows the description of an extremely devastating storm ‘caused' by Yahweh which strips the trees bare, and ‘Yahweh sits enthroned over the flood' may well therefore mean that He causes, and takes responsibility for, even the subsequent cataclysmic flood. But it may alternatively mean that ‘Yahweh sits enthroned over the cataclysm', the storm we have just read about. (The writer sees all natural phenomena as under God's control and is using a massive storm and cataclysm as a picture of Jahweh's great power. If the word does mean flood he may well have had Noah's flood in mind). In the New Testament and in the Septuagint mabbul is ‘translated' as kataklysmos (Matthew 24:38-39; Luke 17:27; 2 Peter 2:5). It therefore can be taken with some confidence as meaning in this context a ‘cataclysmic flood' with the emphasis on the cataclysm.
The basis of the account consistently throughout is that man will be destroyed because of his extreme sinfulness (Genesis 6:5-7; Genesis 6:11-13; Genesis 7:4; Genesis 7:21-23; Genesis 8:21). This contrasts strongly with Mesopotamian flood myths where the innocent admittedly die with the guilty, and the flood is the consequence of the anger of gods over some particular thing which annoys them.
How Extensive Was the Flood?
The question must again be raised as to what the writer is describing. There is no question but that it is a huge flood of a type never known before or since, but how far did it in fact reach?
In Hebrew the word translated ‘earth' (eretz) even more often means ‘land'. This latter fact derived from the fact that ‘the earth' (our world) as compared with the heavens (Genesis 1:1), became ‘the earth' (dry land) as opposed to the sea (Genesis 1:10), became ‘the earth' (their land) on which men lived (Genesis 12:1). It is thus quite in accordance with the Hebrew that what is described in this passage occurred in just one part of what we would call the earth, occurring in ‘Noah's earth' where Noah was living with his family.
This is not just a matter of choosing between two alternative translations. The reason eretz could be so used was because of how the ancients saw things and applied language to them. To them there was their known ‘earth', their land, and then their land with the surrounding peoples, and then the rather hazy world on the fringes and then beyond that who knew what? Thus to them ‘the earth' could mean different things in different contexts.
Even in its wider meaning it meant what was indeed a reasonably large area, and yet from our point of view would be seen as a fairly localised area, and ‘the whole earth' to them was what to us would still be limited horizons. We can compare Genesis 41:57 where ‘the whole earth' come to Egypt to buy food and 1 Kings 10:24 where ‘the whole earth' come to hear the wisdom of Solomon. Compare also how the Roman world and its fringes were ‘the world' in the New Testament (Luke 2:1; Acts 24:5; Romans 1:8; Colossians 1:6).
Thus there are three possible answers to the question as to how far the flood stretched, looking at it from the writer's point of view.
1). That all mankind was involved and that the Flood was global. However, it could not strictly mean this to the writer, or to Noah, for both were unaware of such a concept. All they could think of was ‘the world' according to their conception of it. What the writer could have meant was ‘all that there is'. But was he not rather concerned with the world of man?
2). That all mankind was involved, but that they were still living within a certain limited area and were therefore all destroyed in a huge flood, which was not, however, global, as it would not need to involve lands which were uninhabited.
The fact of the worldwide prevalence of Flood myths might be seen as supporting one of these two views. So also might the argument that had the area been too limited Noah could have been instructed to move with his family outside the area, however large. Against this latter, however, it could be argued that God was seen as having a lesson to teach to future generations, and that He had in view the preservation of animal life as part of Noah's environment.
3). That it was only mankind in the large area affected by the demonic activity (Noah's ‘earth' or ‘world') that were to be destroyed, and that the Flood was therefore vast, but not necessarily destroying those of mankind unaffected by the situation described.
What cannot be avoided is the idea that the Flood was huge beyond anything known since. It was remembered in Mesopotamia, an area which had known great floods, as ‘the Flood'which divided all that came before it from all that followed (see, for example, the Sumerian king lists). They too had a memory of how their king Zius-udra survived the Flood by entering a boat and living through it, although in his case others, apart from his family, were seen as surviving with him in the boat. Alternative suggestions offered have been the consequences of the ice age ceasing, raising water levels and causing huge floods, or the falling of a huge asteroid into the sea.