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Genesis 7

Our retelling next to the Bible text it comes from. Each row lines up one scene with the verses it retells.

Scene 5: Into the ArkVerses 1 to 9

Scene by Scene

Then the LORD told Noah to go into the ark with his whole family. The LORD said he had found Noah righteous among the people of his time.

This time the LORD gave more detail about the animals. Noah was to take seven pairs of every kind of clean animal. He was to take one pair of every kind of unclean animal. He was to take seven pairs of every kind of bird.

The LORD said that in seven days, the rain would begin. It would fall for forty days and forty nights.

Noah did everything the LORD commanded.

The animals came to Noah. They went into the ark two by two, male and female, as God had said.

Modern

1Then the LORD said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. 2You are to take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate; a pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate; 3and seven pairs of every kind of bird of the air, male and female, to preserve their offspring on the face of all the earth. 4For seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living thing I have made.” 5And Noah did all that the LORD had commanded him. 6Now Noah was 600 years old when the floodwaters came upon the earth. 7And Noah and his wife, with his sons and their wives, entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. 8The clean and unclean animals, the birds, and everything that crawls along the ground 9came to Noah to enter the ark, two by two, male and female, as God had commanded Noah.

Scene 6: The LORD Shut Him InVerses 10 to 16

Scene by Scene

After seven days, the flood came. It was the seventeenth day of the second month of Noah's 600th year.

"All the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened" (7:11). This is picture language. Water burst up from under the earth and poured down from the sky.

Rain fell on the earth for forty days and forty nights.

That same day, Noah went into the ark. His wife went in. So did Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their three wives. That was eight people in all. Every kind of animal and bird went in with them.

Then "the LORD shut him in" (7:16). Noah did not close the door. God did.

Modern

10And after seven days the floodwaters came upon the earth. 11In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12And the rain fell upon the earth for forty days and forty nights. 13On that very day Noah entered the ark, along with his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and his wife, and the three wives of his sons— 14they and every kind of wild animal, livestock, crawling creature, bird, and winged creature. 15They came to Noah to enter the ark, two by two of every creature with the breath of life. 16And they entered, the male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD shut him in.

Scene 7: The Waters RiseVerses 17 to 24

Scene by Scene

The water rose and rose. It lifted the ark high above the ground. The ark floated on top of the water.

The water covered even the high mountains. It rose about 22 feet above the mountaintops.

Everything on dry land that breathed died. Birds died. Animals died. People died.

Genesis says it plainly. "Only Noah and those with him in the ark remained" (7:23).

The water stayed high for 150 days. That is about five months.

Genesis does not describe the deaths in detail. But it does not hide them either. Christians have struggled with this passage for a long time.

Modern

17For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and the waters rose and lifted the ark high above the earth. 18So the waters continued to surge and rise greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the waters. 19Finally, the waters completely inundated the earth, so that all the high mountains under all the heavens were covered. 20The waters rose and covered the mountaintops to a depth of fifteen cubits. 21And every living thing that moved upon the earth perished—birds, livestock, animals, every creature that swarms upon the earth, and all mankind. 22Of all that was on dry land, everything that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23And every living thing on the face of the earth was destroyed—man and livestock, crawling creatures and birds of the air; they were blotted out from the earth, and only Noah and those with him in the ark remained. 24And the waters prevailed upon the earth for 150 days.

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