But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee.
But with thee will I establish my covenant, х bªriytiy (H1285)]. A covenant or league has commonly a reference to the severed pieces of a sacrifice, between which the contracting parties were accustomed to pass. Here it denotes a solemn promise, guaranteeing a preservation and security on the part of God, with the implied condition of faith and obedience on the part of Noah (Hebrews 11:7). Although there seems to have been no sacrifice, because the communication was made unexpectedly and wholly by the Divine Being, the promise is called a covenant, in order to convince Noah of the perfect confidence to be reposed in its fulfillment; and as it was a promise relating not to the kingdom of God on earth, but to the whole human race, with the inferior animals, it was made not by "the Lord" (Yahweh), but by God (Genesis 6:13). The substance and the terms of this covenant are related between Genesis 6:19 and Genesis 6:21; and since the accomplishment of the things covenanted implied the agency of God as well as of Noah, hence, the propriety of the divine pledge being represented in the light of a compact.
Thy wife. On an obelisk, in the valley of Faioum, of the son of Anamenes, belonging to the eleventh dynasty, are found inscribed the hieroglyphic names of Nu and his goddess, which by learned Egyptologers are identified with Noah and his wife Tamar (palm-tree), the Lucina of Egypt (Osburn's 'Monthly History'). Ham's wife is traditionally said to be Naamah (see the note at Genesis 4:22). Only eight persons were to be taken into the ark (cf. 1 Peter 3:20; 2 Peter 2:5); and since Noah was to be the medium of preserving the lower animals, two of every sort (Hebrew, by two's), a male and a female, for the preservation of their respective kinds, with the food necessary for their subsistence, were to be taken into the ark and there to remain so long as the deluge lasted. Worms, insects, and the various tenants of the water were not received into the ark. Only such as paired, and of these, it is probable, only archetypal forms were admitted, passing by minute varieties of every species.