find the biblical account of Noah and the flood found in the Book of Genesis 5:28 – 10:1. The text below is from the NRSV translation (the same biblical text as in your Bible textbook). The text is a word.doc so that you can work with it in your word processor.
For this exercise and assignment work directly with the Biblical text provided below. You should copy the text into a separate document to work with, and to cut and paste with your word processor.
Do not go to outside sources for information for this exercise. After you have gone through the steps below, when so directed, go to our textbook Bible [the NISB] and read the assigned commentary.
Read the story of Noah and the flood below once through to get a sense of the story.
Go back and read a second time, very carefully, now making notes of questions that the text raises for you as you read. If you are familiar with the story from church or Sunday school, what do you notice that is new? [If you are familiar with this story from Church or Sunday school you may be tempted to say this is not the account that was in the Bible you grew up with. If so, go back to whatever Bible or translation you are familiar with. Note that the modern scholarly translation that we use has added nothing that was not there all along.] Be sure to note the chapter and verses that give rise to your questions. Save this list of questions.
Go back and read carefully a third time, now looking for and making notes about inconsistencies, contradictions and duplications in the story (for example: What are the sources of the waters of the flood? How long did the flood last? How many of each animal was Noah told to bring into the ark? What kind of bird did Noah send out? And so on). Also look for doublets, where the same thing is repeated in slightly different ways (for example, Noah did all that he was commanded in 6:22 and 7:5) Again, in your notes be sure to note the chapter and verses that support your examples.
Now read the story again. Give attention to where the text uses the word “God” for the divinity, and where the text uses the word “Lord” for the deity.
Now, use “cut and paste” in your word processor to divide the biblical text into two separate sections, one with the passages in which the divinity is called “God” and the other in which the divinity is “Lord”. You should have a “God account of the flood” and a “Lord account of the flood”.
Now read each individual story as a separate unit. How does the image of the deity as “God” differ from the image of the deity in the story where the deity is referred to as “Lord”?
Reflecting on the questions raised by your earlier reading, and the seeming contradictions, note how the questions and contradictions fit into one or other of the stories.
In which story does the divinity instruct Noah to bring more clean animals into the ark than unclean animals? Can you surmise from the details of this version of the story why Noah must bring more clean animals into the ark, as opposed to the other story?
Can you quote the verse in which the divinity states the reason for bringing on the flood in the first place? Can you quote the verse in which the divinity reflects upon the results of the flood upon humans?
Can you quote one verse that is the theological center of the story.
What does the flood accomplish? What changes occur? Who changes?
Now, read the “Excursus: Two Flood Narratives” in the textbook Bible [the NISB], page 17, and go over the footnotes to the Biblical account on pages 16 – 23. How does the information from this scholarly commentary help explain what you have found in your analysis of the text?
Now, gather your notes and reflections into a four page typed reflection upon how the present text of the Bible’s account of Noah and the flood, originated from separate and different stories that have been edited and merged together into the single account that we find now in our text of the Bible.
Your submitted paper is to reflect the following outline.
Title: Evidence for Sources Behind the Account of the Great Flood in the Book of Genesis.
- Introduction [Briefly tell your reader what your paper is about, and how your paper
will progress.]
b. Body
Questions raised by careful close reading of the text.
Inconsistencies
Contradictions
Doublets & Contradictions
Discovering a “God” version of the flood story and a “LORD” version.
Characteristics of the “God” version of the great flood
Characteristics of the “Lord” version of the great flood.
