Genesis 7 explained: The Flood Comes and Covers Everything

Orders to board (vv. 1-5)

God tells Noah to bring his family into the ark, because he alone in his time is found to live rightly before God. More of the "clean" animals, the kinds later used for sacrifice and food, are to come along, and there are seven last days before forty days of rain.

Going into the ark (vv. 6-10)

Noah, now 600 years old, goes in with his wife, his three sons and their wives, and the animals come to him. Chapter 6 spoke of one pair of each animal while verse 2 asks for more of some, and many scholars think two older tellings of the story were woven together here, though others see it as added detail.

The waters break loose (vv. 11-16)

Water bursts up from below and pours down from above, as if the waters God separated at creation in Genesis 1 are rushing back together. The note that the LORD himself shut Noah in shows God guarding those inside, and it also means the door is now closed to everyone else.

Everything outside dies (vv. 17-23)

The ark floats as the waters rise over even the highest mountains, and verse 20 gives a figure of fifteen cubits (about seven metres) that translations read either as the depth above the peaks or as the total rise. The text does not soften the result: every person and land creature outside the ark dies, and only Noah and those with him are left.

The flood holds (v. 24)

The water stays at its height for 150 days, about five months, before the turn that comes in the next chapter. Christians later read the ark as a picture of rescue through Christ, and the New Testament links the flood with baptism (1 Peter 3).

Key verse: Genesis 7:23

Where Christians differ

Christians differ on whether this chapter describes a worldwide flood, a large regional flood remembered in universal terms, or a theological story about judgment and rescue that was not meant as a historical record.

Something to think about

What do you make of a story in which almost everyone dies and a single family is spared?