Genesis 6-11

During my formative years I, like millions of other children, heard the story of Noah's Ark in church and Sunday School. It always was a kind of morbid story, as the idea of the "loving father" drowning all life on the planet was disquieting to say the least. Looking back, this being considered a children's story is beyond me.

"Floaters" from Awkward Moments Children's Bible, vol. 1 by Horus Gilgamesh & Agnes Tickheathen - 2013 CE

Death to the Semi-Divine?

As children we were told that the reason for this genocide was because the people were sinful and evil. That was it. So imagine my surprise a few years ago when I came across the idea that the real reason for the flood was the existence of the "Nephilim" - the semi-divine hybrid progeny of human women and the "sons of God".

The Nephilim were on the earth in those days - and also afterward - when the sons of God went in to the daughters of humans, who bore children to them. These were the heroes that were of old, warriors of renown. - Genesis 6:4-5

I guess in usual evangelical protestant fashion it was deemed appropriate to horrify children with the diluvian deaths of countless people and animals, but wholly inappropriate to discuss sex with gods/angels/what-have-you. Of course, the Nephilim present plenty of difficult questions which Sunday School teachers are likely unprepared to deal with, partially because the entire subject matter is but merely introduced before the narrative moves on. If you google "Nephilim" you'll find all sorts of bizarre conspiracy theories in the more crazy-town parts of the internet. A lot of this stems from the Book of Enoch (which we will get to eventually), an apocryphal work which expands on the story of the Sons of God and the Nephilim. But here in Genesis the J source has left us very little regarding these beings. My take? If I were to guess I'd simply take the description from J at face value. The text says they are the offspring of humans and some kind of divine beings (lesser gods in the Ancient Hebrew pantheon perhaps?). We have a word for such offspring in English: demigods. You know, Heracles, Achilles, Aeneas, Gilgamesh, those types. Many cultures in human history have told stories of demigods. What better way to make your main character more interesting than divine parentage? Genesis refers to them as famous, ancient heroes and warriors. Seems a fitting title for a character such as Gilgamesh. Speaking of Gilgamesh, our main topic for today, the flood narrative, shares a large number of story elements with the tale of Utnapishtim from the Epic of Gilgamesh. Many ancient cultures had their own flood traditions, which is unsurprising as most ancient agricultural civilizations occupied fertile river basins where floods were common.

Drowning Horse by Jan Verdijk - 2011 CE

So Yahweh wanted to wipe out all of life on Earth because of all of these demigods roaming around right? Well, maybe not, though it is a plausible explanation as Yahweh is notoriously insecure regarding potential rivals. I actually do believe that the childhood explanation of "evil" is actually still the best supported motivation for Yahweh's genocidal tendencies in light of all of this Nephilim stuff. Nowhere are the Nephilim condemned or referred to as evil. They are simply mentioned in passing in the J narrative before and after Yahweh sets a limit on human lifespan at 120 years (6:3). Perhaps the Nephilim are only mentioned here to explain the cultural stories of ancient heroes who lived far longer than normal humans. Still, the situating of this story here is provocative (certainly provocative enough for the author of Enoch). In any case, in both the J and P narratives of the flood Yahweh's reasoning for wiping out all life has only to do with human morality, nothing to do with whether some of the inhabitants of Earth were the progeny of divine beings:

Yahweh saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually. And Yahweh was sorry that he had made humankind on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So Yahweh said, "I will blot out from the earth the human beings I have created - people together with animals and creeping things and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them." But Noah found favor in the sight of Yahweh. - Genesis 6:5-8 (J)

Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence. And God saw that the earth was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted its ways upon the earth. And God said to Noah, "I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence because of them; now I am going to destroy them along with the earth. - Genesis 6:11-13 (P)

Self-Quiz!

Before moving on with our main topic, if you consider yourself familiar with the story, try taking this short quiz over Noah's Flood:

How old is Noah when the flood begins?
How many of each animal species does Noah bring with him on the ark?
Where does the water of the flood come from?
How long does the flood last?
What type of bird does Noah release at the end of the flood?

Answers below the painting.

Noah's Ark (The Lord Fulfilleth All His Words) by Clark Kelley Price

Six hundred years old (7:6) - wait, how is that possible? Didn't Yahweh set a cap on human lifespans at 120 years (6:3)? Well, that was in the J source, not the P source, nor the "Book of Records" which comprised Genesis Chapter 5.
2 of every clean and unclean animal - male and female... according to P (6:19-20 & 7:8-9). According to J Noah is commanded to bring 7 of every clean animal, and only 2 of every unclean animal (7:2-3). In J Noah makes a sacrifice to Yahweh at the end of the flood, and so needs extra clean animals to not cause the extinction of the species (8:20). But for the priestly writers this was anathema to their doctrine that sacrifices must be conducted by the priesthood. Since for P sacrifices did not begin until the priesthood was established later in biblical history, it was therefore unnecessary for Noah to bring any extra clean animals.
In J it rains (7:12). It's not a cosmic rain. It just rains a lot. In P however, Yahweh releases the waters of the great deep and opens the windows of the firmament, allowing water to pour into the Earthly realm (7:11).
The flood lasts only 40 days in J (7:4, 7:12, 8:6), but an entire year in P (7:11, 8:13-14). The waters rise for 150 days (7:24) and recede for 150 days (8:3).
In P Noah releases a Raven (8:7). In J he releases a dove - 3 times (8:8-12). In the Epic of Giglamesh Utnapishtim sends a raven, a dove, and a swallow. (So give yourself partial credit if you answered swallow, even though you're still wrong.)

So how did you do? Did you expect there to be multiple correct answers for most questions? These contradictions make for a pretty confusing story. So confusing that the flood story is held up as an example of quintessential evidence for multiple source theories.

The fountains of the deep erupting in the 2014 film Noah.

A Carefully Crafted Composite Correspondence

So in the text as we have it we can see the dual narratives of the flood, interwoven with each other to attempt to tell one (mostly) cohesive story. This particular section of Genesis is hugely important as it served to provide impetus for scholars to begin postulating the existence of multiple authors of the Pentateuch. The redactor(s) of the Torah carefully layered two existing narratives, but evidently did not deem it appropriate to try to reconcile the stories' differences. So as one reads Genesis 6 through 9 many contradictory events seem to be happening at the same time. In addition to these narrative contradictions a bunch of events occur twice. The deity explains his motives twice (6:7 & 6:11-13). He warns Noah twice (6:13 & 7:4). Noah and his family enter the ark twice (7:7 & 7:13). The inhabitants of the earth die twice (7:21 & 7:23). Yahweh/God promises not to kill everyone again twice (8:21-22 & 9:8-17). But there are also certain events which only take place in one story or the other. In the painting below by Domenico Morelli you can actually see how the two narratives are combined in the minds of the reader. In the P source Noah does not make a sacrifice to Yahweh. In the J source there is no mention of the rainbow as the sign of the covenant. But here they exist in the same scene at the same time.

Noah's Thanksgiving Prayer by Domenico Morelli - 1901 CE

The great thing about using such a handy resource like The Bible with Sources Revealed by Richard Elliott Friedman in this endeavor is that one can easily read each story independently to see how the narrative smoothly flows in each, even when separated. In my opinion the stories make much more sense independently than they do together. I really can't recommend this book enough.

Don't Look At Your Dad's Naughty Bits

Anyway, to wrap up the story of Noah, in the P source God blesses everyone and everyone to be fruitful and multiple, echoing Genesis 1 in a way that sort of "resets" creation (8:17, 9:1, 9:7), then in the J source we get this really weird tale of Noah getting wasted and his son Ham seeing him naked in his tent (9:18-27). For some bizarre reason this is reason enough for Noah to curse the descendants of Ham. Dude, you were the one who got so drunk you passed out naked. Maybe take some responsibility? Some have speculated that it is implied that Ham does something sexually to Noah while he's passed out, as Noah knows that his son did something to him (9:24). Really this is just an excuse for the author to slide in some polemic against the Canaanites, as he explains that Canaan was the son of Ham. In fact, Noah doesn't even curse Ham, his son who saw him naked, but his grandson Canaan. Real subtle. Sins of the father, I guess.

Chapter 10 is lists the descendents of Noah's sons - Japheth, Ham, and Shem - to provide etiologies for the various peoples and nations of the writers' world. Japheth gives rise to the peoples of Asia Minor and the Mediterranean, Ham to North Africa & Arabia, and Shem to most of the Near East, excluding of course the Canaanites. These appear to also be composites, merging the lineage traditions from the J and P sources. Importantly, P explains that each of these families/peoples/nations had their own language in their own land (10:5, 10:20, 10:31). For P the descendants of Noah simply spread out and diversified over time, developing their own languages naturally. Not so for J.

..And the Moral of this Story is...?

In the opening verses of Chapter 11 we have the story of the Tower of Babel/Babylon, where it is explained that the whole Earth had but one language (11:1). Here we have this sad sort of story where all of humanity works together in unity on a single project: A magnificent structure to be remembered by (11:3-4).

Ruins of the Ziggurat of the ancient city-state of Ur, near modern Tell el-Muqayyar, Iraq - 21st century BCE

Wouldn't it be wonderful if the entire world could work together peacefully to accomplish great things? Yahweh didn't think so.

Yahweh came down to see the city and the tower, which mortals had built. And Yahweh said, "Look, they are one people, and they have one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down, and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand one another's speech." - Genesis 11:5-7

Apparently he felt threatened by this grand endeavor so Yahweh confuses their language just to be a dick. In Sunday School this was framed as a story of humankind indulging in their own hubris to "reach heaven" and "be like God", but that isn't what happens at all. This is a public works project meant to unify all of humanity. But Yahweh somehow feels threatened (why? does Yahweh really fear that humans are a threat to the gods?) so he ruins it. There is no ethical teaching to this story, no morality involved. It's just an attempt to explain differences in language on the part of the J author. The moral of the story is that Yahweh does what he wants because screw you. Or the moral of the story could just be "screw Babylon and their ziggurats" which makes perfect sense too.

The rest of Chapter 11 is comprised of more genealogical records until we finally meet our next heroes: Abram and his infertile wife Sarai. A descendant of Shem, Abram lived with his family in Ur, but would leave Ur behind to travel to the land of Canaan. We will look at Abraham's story next time.

Psalm 14

Well whaddya know? A Psalm about how everybody is evil, just like before the flood. How timely!

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Wow that was a lot. Sorry about taking my sweet, sweet time with this one. There was a lot to discuss, and I have mostly been spending my free time focusing on the world cup. Not that that's necessarily an excuse. Also we're going to have a baby soon, so I don't know what my time is going to look like moving forward. I plan to continue this project, but just be aware that updates likely won't be super frequent. As always, feel free to leave a comment below. See you next time.

Chasing a Trail of Smoke and Reason

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