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Genesis

About this book

The Flood

Chapter 7

1 The Lord said to Noah, “Come into the ark,⁠ you and all your household, for I consider you godly among this generation.⁠ 2 You must take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, the male and its mate, two of every kind of unclean animal, the male and its mate,⁠ 3 and also seven pairs of every kind of bird in the sky, male and female, to preserve their offspring on the face of the entire earth.⁠ 4 For in seven days I will cause it to rain on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights, and I will wipe from the face of the ground every living thing that I have made.”⁠ 5 And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him. 6 Noah was 600 years old when the floodwaters engulfed the earth. 7 Noah entered the ark along with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives because of the floodwaters. 8 Pairs of clean animals, of unclean animals, of birds, and of everything that creeps along the ground,⁠ 9 male and female, came into the ark to Noah, just as God had commanded him. 10 And after seven days the floodwaters engulfed the earth.⁠ 11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month—on⁠ that day all the fountains of the great deep burst open and the floodgates of the heavens were opened.⁠ 12 And the rain fell on the earth 40 days and 40 nights. 13 On that very day Noah entered the ark, accompanied by his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, along with his wife and his sons’ three wives.⁠ 14 They entered, along with every living creature after its kind, every animal after its kind, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, everything with wings. 15 Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life came into the ark to Noah. 16 Those that entered were male and female, just as God commanded him. Then the Lord shut him in.⁠ 17 The flood engulfed the earth for 40 days.⁠ As the waters increased, they lifted the ark and raised it above the earth. 18 The waters completely overwhelmed the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the waters.⁠ 19 The waters completely inundated the earth so that even all the high mountains under the entire sky were covered.⁠ 20 The waters rose more than 20 feet above the mountains. 21 And all living things that moved on the earth died, including the birds, domestic animals, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all humankind. 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23 So the Lord destroyed every living thing that was on the surface of the ground, including people, animals, creatures that creep along the ground, and birds of the sky. They were wiped off the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark survived.⁠ 24 The waters prevailed over the earth for 150 days.

Texts in conversation

Compare Genesis 3:1 and Genesis 7:11 and Jubilees 3:17

Hebrew Bible · Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions

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Summary

In Jubilees, the serpent tempts Eve on the seventeenth day of the second month, which is the same date when the flood begins in Genesis 7. Jubilees interprets the flood as an event directly related to the anniversary of humanity’s first disobedience.

Passages

Genesis 3:1

Hebrew Bible
1 Now the serpent was shrewder than any of the wild animals that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Is it really true that God said, ‘You must not eat from any tree of the orchard’?” 2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit from the trees of the orchard; 3 but concerning the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the orchard God said, ‘You must not eat from it, and you must not touch it, or else you will die.’”
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Genesis

Genesis 7:11

Hebrew Bible
10 And after seven days the floodwaters engulfed the earth. 11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month—on that day all the fountains of the great deep burst open and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And the rain fell on the earth 40 days and 40 nights.
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Genesis

Jubilees 3:17

Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
16 And he cultivated (the garden), and was naked and did not know it, and was not ashamed, and he protected the garden from the birds and wild animals and cattle, and gathered its fruit, and ate, and put aside the rest for himself and for his wife [and put aside that which was being kept]. 17 And after the completion of the seven years, which he had completed there, seven years exactly [8], and in the second month, on the seventeenth day (of the month), the serpent came and approached the woman, and the serpent said to the woman, 'Has God commanded you, saying, You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?' 18 And she said to it, 'Of all the fruit of the trees of the garden God has said to us, Eat; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden God has said to us, You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, so that you do not die.'
170–125 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Jubilees

References

"... The serpent approached Eve in the second month, on the seventeenth day, an ill-starred date, the same day on which the flood-waters began to fall (Genesis 7:11) ..."
James L. Kugel, A Walk through Jubilees: Studies in the Book of Jubilees and the World of Its Creation (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 40.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Genesis 3:1 and Genesis 7:11 and Jubilees 3:17

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