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Noah and his Ark - Believe it or Not?

Do you believe the story of the flood and Noah's Ark?

  • Yes, I believe the story of the flood and Noah's Ark

    Votes: 38 33.0%
  • No, I don't believe the story of the flood and Noah's Ark

    Votes: 62 53.9%
  • I'm not sure

    Votes: 7 6.1%
  • Who cares?!

    Votes: 8 7.0%

  • Total voters
    115

t3gah

Well-Known Member
Below are the actual scriptures about Noah and his Ark so you don't have to look them up. In Genesis 5:32 Noah is 500 yrs old. In Genesis 7:6 he's 600 yrs old. Through researchers, they have determined that it took Noah approximately 70 yrs to build his floatilla Ark with the help of his wife, his three sons and their wives.



Cast your votes please. Do you believe the story below from the bible or not?
Genesis 5:32 - 8:19 (World English Bible - WEB)


5:32 Noah was five hundred years old, and Noah became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

6:1 It happened, when men began to multiply on the surface of the ground, and daughters were born to them, 6:2 that God’s sons saw that men’s daughters were beautiful, and they took for themselves wives of all that they chose. 6:3 Yahweh said, "My Spirit will not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; yet will his days be one hundred twenty years." 6:4 The Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when God’s sons came in to men’s daughters. They bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.

6:5 Yahweh saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 6:6 Yahweh was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him in his heart. 6:7 Yahweh said, "I will destroy man whom I have created from the surface of the ground; man, along with animals, creeping things, and birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them." 6:8 But Noah found favor in Yahweh’s eyes.

6:9 This is the history of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time. Noah walked with God. 6:10 Noah became the father of three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. 6:11 The earth was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. 6:12 God saw the earth, and saw that it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.

6:13 God said to Noah, "The end of all flesh has come before me, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. 6:14 Make a ship of gopher wood. You shall make rooms in the ship, and shall seal it inside and outside with pitch. 6:15 This is how you shall make it. The length of the ship will be three hundred cubits, its breadth fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. 6:16 You shall make a roof in the ship, and you shall finish it to a cubit upward. You shall set the door of the ship in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third levels. 6:17 I, even I, do bring the flood of waters on this earth, to destroy all flesh having the breath of life from under the sky. Everything that is in the earth will die. 6:18 But I will establish my covenant with you. You shall come into the ship, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. 6:19 Of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ship, to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female. 6:20 Of the birds after their kind, of the livestock after their kind, of every creeping thing of the ground after its kind, two of every sort shall come to you, to keep them alive. 6:21 Take with you of all food that is eaten, and gather it to yourself; and it will be for food for you, and for them." 6:22 Thus Noah did. According to all that God commanded him, so he did.

7:1 Yahweh said to Noah, "Come with all of your household into the ship, for I have seen your righteousness before me in this generation. 7:2 You shall take seven pairs of every clean animal with you, the male and his female. Of the animals that are not clean, take two, the male and his female. 7:3 Also of the birds of the sky, seven and seven, male and female, to keep seed alive on the surface of all the earth. 7:4 In seven days, I will cause it to rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights. Every living thing that I have made, I will destroy from the surface of the ground."

7:5 Noah did everything that Yahweh commanded him.

7:6 Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters came on the earth. 7:7 Noah went into the ship with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives, because of the waters of the flood. 7:8 Clean animals, animals that are not clean, birds, and everything that creeps on the ground 7:9 went by pairs to Noah into the ship, male and female, as God commanded Noah. 7:10 It happened after the seven days, that the waters of the flood came on the earth. 7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same day all the fountains of the great deep were burst open, and the sky’s windows were opened. 7:12 The rain was on the earth forty days and forty nights.

7:13 In the same day Noah, and Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah’s wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, entered into the ship; 7:14 they, and every animal after its kind, all the livestock after their kind, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, every bird of every sort. 7:15 They went to Noah into the ship, by pairs of all flesh with the breath of life in them. 7:16 Those who went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God commanded him; and Yahweh shut him in. 7:17 The flood was forty days on the earth. The waters increased, and lifted up the ship, and it was lifted up above the earth. 7:18 The waters prevailed, and increased greatly on the earth; and the ship floated on the surface of the waters. 7:19 The waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth. All the high mountains that were under the whole sky were covered. 7:20 The waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward, and the mountains were covered. 7:21 All flesh died that moved on the earth, including birds, livestock, animals, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, and every man. 7:22 All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, of all that was on the dry land, died. 7:23 Every living thing was destroyed that was on the surface of the ground, including man, livestock, creeping things, and birds of the sky. They were destroyed from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those who were with him in the ship. 7:24 The waters prevailed on the earth one hundred fifty days.

8:1 God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock that were with him in the ship; and God made a wind to pass over the earth. The waters subsided. 8:2 The deep’s fountains and the sky’s windows were also stopped, and the rain from the sky was restrained. 8:3 The waters receded from the earth continually. After the end of one hundred fifty days the waters decreased. 8:4 The ship rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on Ararat’s mountains. 8:5 The waters receded continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen.

8:6 It happened at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ship which he had made, 8:7 and he sent forth a raven. It went back and forth, until the waters were dried up from the earth. 8:8 He sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from the surface of the ground, 8:9 but the dove found no place to rest her foot, and she returned to him into the ship; for the waters were on the surface of the whole earth. He put forth his hand, and took her, and brought her to him into the ship. 8:10 He stayed yet another seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ship. 8:11 The dove came back to him at evening, and, behold, in her mouth was an olive leaf plucked off. So Noah knew that the waters were abated from the earth. 8:12 He stayed yet another seven days, and sent forth the dove; and she didn’t return to him any more.

8:13 It happened in the six hundred first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from the earth. Noah removed the covering of the ship, and looked. He saw that the surface of the ground was dried. 8:14 In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry.

8:15 God spoke to Noah, saying, 8:16 "Go out of the ship, you, and your wife, and your sons, and your sons’ wives with you. 8:17 Bring forth with you every living thing that is with you of all flesh, including birds, livestock, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply on the earth."

8:18 Noah went forth, with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives with him. 8:19 Every animal, every creeping thing, and every bird, whatever moves on the earth, after their families, went out of the ship.
 

jewscout

Religious Zionist
I said no, however, i think that the story is similar to the countless different flood stories that exist in other cultures. Why are there so many...because many early civilzations grew up on river banks THAT FLOOD! So are we really that surprised to see such a story in the Torah??
 

robtex

Veteran Member
Couple of questlons on the Noah story.

1) where is the boat?
2) How could all the animals fit on one boat?
3) How could all the animals be moved distances to get on the boat?
4) Why could a God that created life with the touch of his hand need to flood the world instead of just uncreating what he didnt' want?
5) If it rained /stormed for 40 days wouldn't there have to been a long draught first to get all that water from the oceans into the sky? I don't remember reading about a great draught in the Torah.
 

GodofCats

New Member
I voted no. I think the passages are kind of ridciulous. Sure, 70 years is a long time, but how did he gather all those animals AND insects? Since they didn't have modern technology, then they must have had the help of god. However, even if they had the help of god, the boat is too small to fit all the animals inside of it, and also too big and oddly shaped for it to float on water. Did god shrink all the animals to fit inside it? How did 6 people provide all the upkeep for the animals? Anyways, I could go on and on. I just don't believe it. It sonds mythical to me.
 

Doodlebug02

Active Member
No, I don't believe it. Or at least I don't believe it the way it is commonly told. I seriously doubt that a worldwide flood has ever happened or ever will happen. Now I suppose it's possible that there was a localized flood and that is what is being told about. However, I really don't know what to think about the story. I just find it hard to believe that the technology would have even existed to put all the animals on the entire earth on the ark. Perhaps it's just an allegory or some kind of myth?
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
There were numerous cartastrophic floods as Earth warmed at the end of the Pleistocene and ice dams gave way. The story of Noah's flood probably resulted from the collapse of the Bosporus ice dam which allowed the Mediterranian to rush through and convert a placid lake into the Black Sea practically overnight, innundating countless villages.
 

anders

Well-Known Member
So old Noah is shooing all the animals off the ark, screaming, "Go out and multiply, Go out and multiply."
But the two snakes aren't moving.
After yelling "go out and multiply" at them for 5 minutes, he finally says "What's the matter?"
One of the snakes says "we can't multiply, we're adders."

If all of the animals walked to the ark at normal human walking speed, (~4 mph), it would have taken them (12000/4) hours, walking from the other side of the earth (maximum distance), or 125 days. To whittle this down to the seven days used to get all the animals on the ark, all the animals would have to move at at about 71 mph.

An OP at http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=53671 asks "Where, for example, while loading his ark, did Noah find penguins and polar bears in Palestine?" A more scientific view, "I was curious about the size of the Ark and how much food it could hold. So, here we go." at http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=65829. For a shipbuilder's view, there's http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=96044#post96044.

Summing it up, the ark wasn't seaworthy, it couldn't have housed the animals and their food, there is no possible explanation of from where the enormous amounts of water came and how they disappeared. And how did plants survive?
 

No*s

Captain Obvious
I don't treat it as literal historical fact. If I treated it as history that the whole world was flooded and one ark managed to keep the animals alive for all the continents, I'd have to stick my head in the sand...
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
But so many people do treat it as literal, historical fact. They shut down their reason and uncritically accept whatever is preached to them by their religious leaders.

Doesn't spurning reason insult Him who gifted man with the capacity for analytic thought?
 
anders said:
So old Noah is shooing all the animals off the ark, screaming, "Go out and multiply, Go out and multiply."
But the two snakes aren't moving.
After yelling "go out and multiply" at them for 5 minutes, he finally says "What's the matter?"
One of the snakes says "we can't multiply, we're adders."
You, sir, are going to hell.
 

retrorich

SUPER NOT-A-MOD
You shall take seven pairs of every clean animal with you, the male and his female. Of the animals that are not clean, take two, the male and his female. Also of the birds of the sky, seven and seven, male and female, to keep seed alive on the surface of all the earth.
With my luck, I would have been assigned to stall-mucking and cage-cleaning duties.Talk about Hell! :eek:
 

No*s

Captain Obvious
Seyorni said:
But so many people do treat it as literal, historical fact. They shut down their reason and uncritically accept whatever is preached to them by their religious leaders.

Doesn't spurning reason insult Him who gifted man with the capacity for analytic thought?

Yes, it is. I'm a Christian, and I believe that God is called the Logos. Logos means more than word...it means "reason" in many cases as well. The adjective applied to humans logikos is where we get logic. Yes, I think it is extremely insulting that they have to attack the natural sciences in order to protect their interpretations of the Bible. God, after all, inspired creation too...
 

Fluffy

A fool
Couple of questlons on the Noah story.

1) where is the boat?
2) How could all the animals fit on one boat?
3) How could all the animals be moved distances to get on the boat?
4) Why could a God that created life with the touch of his hand need to flood the world instead of just uncreating what he didnt' want?
5) If it rained /stormed for 40 days wouldn't there have to been a long draught first to get all that water from the oceans into the sky? I don't remember reading about a great draught in the Torah.
I have seen plenty of questions like this to challenge some of the more fanciful ideas in certain religious texts. However, I think that in their attempt to show how ludicrous such stories are, they wrap themselves into a logic mess. They either take the idea that God is all powerful and so why didn't he do x, y, z whilst the rest of them point out how impossible the idea is. Either God is capable of miracles or he isn't, you can't have it both ways.
 

Jayhawker Soule

-- untitled --
Premium Member
Fluffy said:
Either God is capable of miracles or he isn't, you can't have it both ways.
Correct: once you accept an omnipotent deity, any absurdity is possible, but that renders the story no less absurd.
 
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