Every Woman's Bible Genesis sampler - Flipbook - Page 26
GEnESIS 9
the dove returned to him in the evening with a fresh
olive leaf in its beak. Then noah knew that the floodwaters were almost gone. 12 He waited another seven
days and then released the dove again. This time it
did not come back.
13 noah was now 601 years old. On the first day of
the new year, ten and a half months after the flood
began,* the floodwaters had almost dried up from the
earth. noah lifted back the covering of the boat and
saw that the surface of the ground was drying. 14Two
more months went by,* and at last the earth was dry!
15 Then God said to noah, 16 “Leave the boat, all of
you—you and your wife, and your sons and their
wives. 17 Release all the animals—the birds, the
livestock, and the small animals that scurry along
the ground—so they can be fruitful and multiply
throughout the earth.”
18 So noah, his wife, and his sons and their wives
left the boat. 19And all of the large and small animals
and birds came out of the boat, pair by pair.
20 Then noah built an altar to the Lord, and there
he sacrificed as burnt offerings the animals and
birds that had been approved for that purpose.*
21And the Lord was pleased with the aroma of the
sacrifice and said to himself, “I will never again
curse the ground because of the human race, even
though everything they think or imagine is bent toward evil from childhood. I will never again destroy
all living things. 22As long as the earth remains, there
will be planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer
and winter, day and night.”
God Confirms His Covenant
Then God blessed noah and his sons and told
them, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth.
2 All the animals of the earth, all the birds of the sky,
all the small animals that scurry along the ground,
and all the fish in the sea will look on you with fear
and terror. I have placed them in your power. 3 I have
given them to you for food, just as I have given you
grain and vegetables. 4 But you must never eat any
meat that still has the lifeblood in it.
5 “And I will require the blood of anyone who takes
another person’s life. If a wild animal kills a person,
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it must die. And anyone who murders a fellow
human must die. 6 If anyone takes a human life, that
person’s life will also be taken by human hands. For
God made human beings* in his own image. 7 now
be fruitful and multiply, and repopulate the earth.”
8 Then God told noah and his sons, 9 “I hereby confirm my covenant with you and your descendants,
10 and with all the animals that were on the boat
with you—the birds, the livestock, and all the wild
animals—every living creature on earth. 11 Yes, I am
confirming my covenant with you. never again will
floodwaters kill all living creatures; never again will
a flood destroy the earth.”
12 Then God said, “I am giving you a sign of my covenant with you and with all living creatures, for all
generations to come. 13 I have placed my rainbow in
the clouds. It is the sign of my covenant with you
and with all the earth. 14 When I send clouds over
the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds,
15 and I will remember my covenant with you and
with all living creatures. never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. 16 When I see the rainbow in
the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant
between God and every living creature on earth.”
17 Then God said to noah, “Yes, this rainbow is the
sign of the covenant I am confirming with all the
creatures on earth.”
Noah’s Sons
The sons of noah who came out of the boat with
their father were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham
is the father of Canaan.) 19 From these three sons of
noah came all the people who now populate the
earth.
20 After the flood, noah began to cultivate the
ground, and he planted a vineyard. 21 One day he
drank some wine he had made, and he became
drunk and lay naked inside his tent. 22 Ham, the father of Canaan, saw that his father was naked and
went outside and told his brothers. 23 Then Shem
and Japheth took a robe, held it over their shoulders, and backed into the tent to cover their father.
As they did this, they looked the other way so they
would not see him naked.
18
8:13 Hebrew On the first day of the first month; see 7:11. 8:14 Hebrew The twenty-seventh day of the second month arrived; see
note on 8:13. 8:20 Hebrew every clean animal and every clean bird. 9:6 Or man; Hebrew reads ha-adam.
9:1-3 The blessing first given to Adam (1:28) was reissued
to Noah, the “Adam” of the newly cleansed world in need of
repopulation and cultural expansion. God introduced two
modifications to the created order: Now animals would live in
terror of humans, and humans were allowed to eat meat along
with seed-bearing plants (see 1:29)—a change in diet related to
the animals’ terror.
9:5-6 Violence, including murder, was a major factor in bringing about God’s judgment in the form of the Flood (4:8; 6:11, 13).
At this new beginning for humans, God affirmed the sanctity of
human life and established a system of retributive justice for the
taking of human life. Being created in God’s image gives humans
a unique status and authority within creation. Since murder
destroys a person made in God’s image, a murderer incurred the
ultimate penalty.
9:20-25 The significance of Ham’s shameful behavior is not
fully clear. He may have engaged sexually with his father or with
his mother (this type of act is elsewhere referred to literally in
the original language as “uncovering the nakedness of one’s
father,” Leviticus 20:11). It is possible that he merely gazed upon
his naked father and, rather than covering him and keeping the
matter secret, dishonored him by mocking him to his brothers.
The curse likely fell on Ham’s son Canaan to emphasize the
shameful father-son dynamic of Ham’s sin.
