I've been thinking about alot of stories in the bible lately and this morning I've had noah's story stuck in my head.
To me it's a symbolic parable or something, cause I don't see a message or lesson in it either.
The main things that get me are ..
God was flooding the planet to kill sinners but chose an alchoholic to build an ark SO big it could hold every creature on the planet, then he'd have to travel the world in a time without auto-propelled motors and bring back a male and female member of ALL animals, including highly dangerous ones like tigers and elefants, with zero zoological training and again with no way to safely them back. then he kept all the animals alive with no incident or injury for an extended amount of time.
Also I remember reading a science article stating that the water on earth came over a long period of time in crashing meteors. Which means that the amount of water on earth is somewhat fixed, even if the glaciers where to melt completely ..
2007-07-05
08:35:53
·
37 answers
·
asked by
Anonymous
in
Society & Culture
➔ Religion & Spirituality
and flood part of the earth there's in enough cubic volume in them and all the clouds in the sky to cover everest with 20 feet of water. (also scientists would've seen signs of this happen ages ago). also , if this is true where did a pool of water so large it covered the ENTIRE earth by 20 feet suddenly disappear to?
2007-07-05
08:37:53 ·
update #1
Nita5267 - Please post a link to an article mentioning the discovery of the ark..
2007-07-05
08:42:55 ·
update #2
87GN - If I didn't want to understand the bible why would I put up this question? If I simply wanted to release my wickedness, I'd go throw condoms at a church, but I'm not a child and that would be unproductive.
as for your qoute "A fool finds no pleasure in understanding
but delights in airing his own opinions" , that's exactly what american fundemental inbred chrisitnan like you have been doing since they one... think before you spew bullsh*t from your mouth like that again.
If i'm wicked for questioning things that sound outlandish, then yes I'm wicked. If I bound a story saying that god is woman we should all worship geckos, but wrote holy bible on it and told it was god word ... would you doubt it?
2007-07-05
08:58:47 ·
update #3
Noah's life, the flood, & The Ark were not symbolic or parables but fact.
You really need to read Genesis chapters 5-9.
Those chapters contain the complete story of Noah.
Not ALL of the animals, birds, and crawling creatures on the earth were in the Ark. There were ONLY two males and two females of each living creature on the Earth, seven pairs of each kind of fowl of the air that went into the Ark.
The animals may have been enormous, they may have been vicious predators on Earth, but they KNEW their Creator's voice, they heard God & obeyed God Almighty's voice and they showed up at the Ark. They were commanded by God Almighty to be meek and non-combative on the Ark and they obeyed their Creator.
The Ark did not have a rudder, nor sails. They were not needed. God Almighty protected them and steered the Ark.
Noah, his wife, his three sons and their wives were the only human beings who were spared death, because Noah walked with God, obeyed His laws, and therefore found favor with God Almighty. For that reason, God spared not only Noah, but all of his entire family from the flood that killed every other living creature & human being on the face of the Earth.
The rain from Heaven that completely flooded the entire Earth only lasted 40 days and 40 nights. If you read Genesis 8 you will see exactly how long it was after the rains ceased before God allowed the waters to subside, how it happened, and where the waters went, and how long Noah and his family had to remain in the Ark before the mountains reappeared and the Ark landed on Mount Ararat, and even how much longer before Noah and his family and the animals on the Ark were able to leave it and live on the land again permanently.
Noah was NOT an alcoholic. He got drunk ONCE off of the wine from the vineyards he had planted. And that ONE time, cured him from ever drinking again, because Noah's foolishness opened the door for his son Ham to enter his father's tent without permission or discretion and Ham looked at his father when he was in bed drunk and naked and Ham did not avert his eyes and turn away, but was amused by his father's nakedness and drunkenness & told his brothers of it and that disrespect/ridicule brought God's wrath upon Ham.
Shem and Japheth were respectful. They walked into Noah's tent backwards, with a sheet covering their back, and they averted their eyes while they covered their father, then they backed out of the tent. Shem and Japheth received a blessing for their respect and honorable actions. Ham was cursed by God & banished and Ham fled to what is now known as Africa with his wife.
ALL of the people now living on Earth are descendants of Noah's sons: Shem, Ham, & Japheth.
Shem--The Jewish race.
Ham--The Black race.
Japheth--The Gentile race.
2007-07-05 09:45:41
·
answer #1
·
answered by faith 5
·
0⤊
0⤋
There are a number of religious traditions that have a similar story. For example the Navajo, but in that case their god placed the "seeds" of life into a bag to be resown after the flood. In certain European traditions the gods killed a great giant, like a titan, and his blood washed over the earth.
It amazes me that otherwise intelligent people insist on taking the Bible literally. I can't imagine how many mental hoops a person has to jump through to make that work. Not only that, literal interpretation of the Bible robs it of its potential to communicate transcendent knowledge, rendering it instead a series of about the most unlikely stories ever told. All transcendent is communicated through symbolism.
Concerning the symbolism of the story of the ark, I have not given it much attention. However, it is possible that vast portions of the earth have been flooded at different times. Many scientists seem to think so too. Perhaps stories such as these developed from an oral tradition among the survivors of such catastrophes and became embellished with the retelling of each new generation.
The Roman historian Tacitus detailed the long campaign of the Empire against the Celts. The Roman's regarded them as fearless in battle, so much so that once the historian asked a Celtic warrior if there was anything his people DID fear. The Celt replied that the only fear they knew was that the sky might one day fall upon their heads. This sounds ridiculous when taken literally, but he may have been speaking of a racial memory of some long past devastating event like a great flood.
And if I may offer a personal thought here, that may have been how the idea of the need for salvation ended up a key feature of the faith. After all, many today who survive tragedies credit God for saving them. Perhaps it was that the survivors of this long ago cataclysm felt themselves "chosen," so to say, by God. So it began to be taught that in the future event of another such "act of God" only those who were truly "good" would be saved. Right?
2007-07-05 09:14:35
·
answer #2
·
answered by Anonymous
·
0⤊
1⤋
The Message that you can't see in Noah's Ark is that God judges wickedness and sin.
Don't forget God controls the animals. He can even make donkeys talk. No problem for God to bring 2 of each and tell them to behave themselves. Animals listen where men don't.
Let's just say some scientists say that crashing frozen meteors brought all the water to the earth, but Who brought the water to the frozen meteor? I think God controled that also. He put some water on the earth and some water on that crashing meteor. He has a storehouse of hail also that will eventually rain huge rocks of ice. That is promised in the Bible and all Bible promises come true. God doesn't theorize, assume or guess about anything.
2007-07-05 08:49:08
·
answer #3
·
answered by Jeancommunicates 7
·
3⤊
0⤋
The flood happened, just like the bible says it did.
The ark did not contain two of every species of animal, but simply two of every type... for instance there were two felines (who knows what sort) but not two of every kind of cat large and small... God is perfectly capable of repopulating the earth with various types of cats... and in fact there were SEVEN of some types of animal.
Noah didn't go seek out the animals, God sent the animals to him.
As for the water: this is God we're talking about. He can create and uncreate water as much as he wants to. There are several theroies. The bible makes reference to waters above the earth, and some believe this means a sea, if you will, once surrounded the earth above the sky. They think this is why those biblical people lived so long... they were protected from ultraviolet radiation by this skyborne sea. If it was there and God sent it down, it'd've flooded the earth. Or what if God simply released all of the water tied up in ice and people and animals and plants? That'd be a lot. But how it happened doesn't really matter. He's God and He can access all the water He needs and can dispose of it just as easily.
Noah's stewardship of the ark and the animals therein were a test for Him as the official representative of mankind chosen, with his family, to survive. God would have made it possible for all the animals to hang out together without eating one another. As for Noah being an alcoholic, the bible describes one incident in which he got drunk and passed out in his tent. One binge does not an alcoholic make.
If God says something happened, I believe Him, and no amount of scientific theorizing that "it could have happened *this* way" will change my mind or shake my faith.
2007-07-05 08:50:36
·
answer #4
·
answered by doppler 5
·
3⤊
0⤋
First of all it was not two by two. For some animals was seven pairs.Another thing he just build the ark, God did all the rest. Noah beat the wood of the ship with a hammer as a sort of calling and the animals come by themselves. Second you have some problems understanding some concepts: Concept 1: Sea animals did not go on the ark (they live in water duh!!) Concept 2: Insects did not go on the ark (insect eggs can resist lots of things from high to low temperatures, from drought to flood). Of course considering it took him a lot of years to finish, I would not see a problem for the ark. Also you must consider that Noah did not take for instance two of every type od dog. He took only two dogs.
2016-04-01 09:36:47
·
answer #5
·
answered by Kelly 4
·
0⤊
0⤋
It is NOT a literal story. To take it that way, one misses the true meaning. It is a story about destruction, redemption, and beginning anew. However, there is some factual basis behind it. The Noah's Ark story is probably a mixer of stories about a flood that really did happen on the Euphrates river about 125 miles south east of present-day Baghdad. Every Spring the Euphrates floods, but according to archaeologists, one June around 2900 BC there was a 6 day storm and the river rose another 22 feet. One of the survivors was a local Sumerian king named Ziethsudrah. He commandeered a commercial barge, loaded it with merchandise and road the flood downstream into the Persian Gulf where he finally ran aground. Thankful to be alive, he offered a sacrifice in a hilltop temple.
That's it! Big flood. Boat full of goods. Happy landing on a hilltop. And there is geological and archeological evidence to support that. It should be no surprise that at least 6 other cultures in the region had flood stories like Noah.
2007-07-05 08:54:44
·
answer #6
·
answered by Anonymous
·
1⤊
2⤋
It's true. But, where do you get the part about alcoholic? And God brought the animals, Noah did not have to go get them. God made it so that the animals would get along together, and not eat one another. God (who knows about animals) saw to it that they were cared for properly.
Who wrote this science article? A totally infallable scientist? I doubt that.
I believe what is in the Bible. But not necessarily other articles here and there that may or may not be written by someone who got his facts straight.
2007-07-05 08:47:17
·
answer #7
·
answered by kiwi 7
·
4⤊
1⤋
The story of noah's ark is distorted from the original events. It is chronicaled better in the Gilgamesh epic.
Way back, about 7000 years ago, the Black Sea was still fresh water. It was separate from the Mediterranean Sea, and much lower than it is today. Over time, salt water reached the Black Sea, and carved out the Dardenelles.
The salt water killed everything in the Black Sea, and water eventually covered several villages. Many anvcient tales talk of this flood, and how a handful of survivors escaped. Greek tales speak of climbing mountains, and the Sumerians talk of someone building a boat.
In the past few decades, scientists have traced the area of a kill zone buried in the mud of the Black Sea. Some villages and lots of aquatic life show where and when the flood occurred.
2007-07-05 08:52:22
·
answer #8
·
answered by Raf 5
·
0⤊
4⤋
It is literal. The Bible fully intends it to be taken literally. In fact, many people believe it is located in Turkey.
Thoughts:
1. Not all animals were on the ark, but twos, threes, etc. of different kinds.
2. I am not sure if every type of dog was on the ark (lab, huskie, poodle, etc).
3. Were they fully mature animals? The Bible doesn't give us a lot of details.
4. What about dinosaurs?
5. Noah was not perfect. God does not demand perfection, he wants our hearts. I wonder if Noah got depressed.
6. The meteors thing is purely theoretical, remember that. The flood could explain contenential drifting.
I dunno, there are so many thoughts. I wish we could meet for coffee and talk. There are a lot of good resources.
2007-07-05 08:43:01
·
answer #9
·
answered by Jeff- <3 God <3 people 5
·
4⤊
2⤋
It's a story which is copied from an older story about a flood concerning a man named Giglamesh. I believe this story was written is to induce fear. There was a large flood years ago, before the time of Noah.
God can destroy us if he wants to, but promises he will never do it again with a rainbow. That will keep people in line. I think the person who wrote this knew that rainbows could occur after rain. What a great way to back up a story!
2007-07-05 08:47:06
·
answer #10
·
answered by Soul Shaper 5
·
1⤊
3⤋