A World Gone Wrong

6 Then the people began to multiply on the earth, and daughters were born to them. ² The sons of God saw the beautiful women^[a] and took any they wanted as their wives. ³ Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not put up with^[b] humans for such a long time, for they are only mortal flesh. In the future, their normal lifespan will be no more than 120 years.”

⁴ In those days, and for some time after, giant Nephilites lived on the earth, for whenever the sons of God had intercourse with women, they gave birth to children who became the heroes and famous warriors of ancient times.

⁵ The Lord observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil. ⁶ So the Lord was sorry he had ever made them and put them on the earth. It broke his heart. ⁷ And the Lord said, “I will wipe this human race I have created from the face of the earth. Yes, and I will destroy every living thing—all the people, the large animals, the small animals that scurry along the ground, and even the birds of the sky. I am sorry I ever made them.” ⁸ But Noah found favor with the Lord.

The Story of Noah

⁹ This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God. ¹⁰ Noah was the father of three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

¹¹ Now God saw that the earth had become corrupt and was filled with violence. ¹² God observed all this corruption in the world, for everyone on earth was corrupt. ¹³ So God said to Noah, “I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for they have filled the earth with violence. Yes, I will wipe them all out along with the earth!

¹⁴ “Build a large boat^[c] from cypress wood^[d] and waterproof it with tar, inside and out. Then construct decks and stalls throughout its interior. ¹⁵ Make the boat 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high.^{[e] 16} Leave an 18-inch opening^[f] below the roof all the way around the boat. Put the door on the side, and build three decks inside the boat—lower, middle, and upper.

¹⁷ “Look! I am about to cover the earth with a flood that will destroy every living thing that breathes. Everything on earth will die. ¹⁸ But I will confirm my covenant with you. So enter the boat—you and your wife and your sons and their wives. ¹⁹ Bring a pair of every kind of animal—a male and a female—into the boat with you to keep them alive during the flood. ²⁰ Pairs of every kind of bird, and every kind of animal, and every kind of small animal that scurries along the ground, will come to you to be kept alive. ²¹ And be sure to take on board enough food for your family and for all the animals.”

²² So Noah did everything exactly as God had commanded him.

The Flood Covers the Earth

7 When everything was ready, the Lord said to Noah, “Go into the boat with all your family, for among all the people of the earth, I can see that you alone are righteous. ² Take with you seven pairs—male and female—of each animal I have approved for eating and for sacrifice,^[g] and take one pair of each of the others. ³ Also take seven pairs of every kind of bird. There must be a male and a female in each pair to ensure that all life will survive on the earth after the flood. ⁴ Seven days from now I will make the rains pour down on the earth. And it will rain for forty days and forty nights, until I have wiped from the earth all the living things I have created.”

⁵ So Noah did everything as the Lord commanded him.

⁶ Noah was 600 years old when the flood covered the earth. ⁷ He went on board the boat to escape the flood—he and his wife and his sons and their wives. ⁸ With them were all the various kinds of animals—those approved for eating and for sacrifice and those that were not—along with all the birds and the small animals that scurry along the ground. ⁹ They entered the boat in pairs, male and female, just as God had commanded Noah. ¹⁰ After seven days, the waters of the flood came and covered the earth.

¹¹ When Noah was 600 years old, on the seventeenth day of the second month, all the underground waters erupted from the earth, and the rain fell in mighty torrents from the sky. ¹² The rain continued to fall for forty days and forty nights.

¹³ That very day Noah had gone into the boat with his wife and his sons—Shem, Ham, and Japheth—and their wives. ¹⁴ With them in the boat were pairs of every kind of animal—domestic and wild, large and small—along with birds of every kind. ¹⁵ Two by two they came into the boat, representing every living thing that breathes. ¹⁶ A male and female of each kind entered, just as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord closed the door behind them.

¹⁷ For forty days the floodwaters grew deeper, covering the ground and lifting the boat high above the earth. ¹⁸ As the waters rose higher and higher above the ground, the boat floated safely on the surface. ¹⁹ Finally, the water covered even the highest mountains on the earth, ²⁰ rising more than twenty-two feet^[h] above the highest peaks. ²¹ All the living things on earth died—birds, domestic animals, wild animals, small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the people. ²² Everything that breathed and lived on dry land died. ²³ God wiped out every living thing on the earth—people, livestock, small animals that scurry along the ground, and the birds of the sky. All were destroyed. The only people who survived were Noah and those with him in the boat. ²⁴ And the floodwaters covered the earth for 150 days.

The Flood Recedes

8 But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and livestock with him in the boat. He sent a wind to blow across the earth, and the floodwaters began to recede. ² The underground waters stopped flowing, and the torrential rains from the sky were stopped. ³ So the floodwaters gradually receded from the earth. After 150 days, ⁴ exactly five months from the time the flood began,^[i] the boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. ⁵ Two and a half months later,^[j] as the waters continued to go down, other mountain peaks became visible.

⁶ After another forty days, Noah opened the window he had made in the boat ⁷ and released a raven. The bird flew back and forth until the floodwaters on the earth had dried up. ⁸ He also released a dove to see if the water had receded and it could find dry ground. ⁹ But the dove could find no place to land because the water still covered the ground. So it returned to the boat, and Noah held out his hand and drew the dove back inside. ¹⁰ After waiting another seven days, Noah released the dove again. ¹¹ This time 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,^[k] 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. ¹⁴ Two more months went by,^[l] 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. ¹⁹ And 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.^{[m] 21} And 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. ²² As long as the earth remains, there will be planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night.”

God Confirms His Covenant

9 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, 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^[n] 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

¹⁸ 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.

²⁴ When Noah woke up from his stupor, he learned what Ham, his youngest son, had done. ²⁵ Then he cursed Canaan, the son of Ham:

²⁶ Then Noah said,

²⁸ Noah lived another 350 years after the great flood. ²⁹ He lived 950 years, and then he died.

10 This is the account of the families of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the three sons of Noah. Many children were born to them after the great flood.

Descendants of Japheth

² The descendants of Japheth were Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras.

³ The descendants of Gomer were Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah.

⁴ The descendants of Javan were Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Rodanim.^{[p] 5} Their descendants became the seafaring peoples that spread out to various lands, each identified by its own language, clan, and national identity.

Descendants of Ham

⁶ The descendants of Ham were Cush, Mizraim, Put, and Canaan.

⁷ The descendants of Cush were Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca. The descendants of Raamah were Sheba and Dedan.

¹³ Mizraim was the ancestor of the Ludites, Anamites, Lehabites, Naphtuhites, ¹⁴ Pathrusites, Casluhites, and the Caphtorites, from whom the Philistines came.^[t]

¹⁵ Canaan’s oldest son was Sidon, the ancestor of the Sidonians. Canaan was also the ancestor of the Hittites,^{[u] 16} Jebusites, Amorites, Girgashites, ¹⁷ Hivites, Arkites, Sinites, ¹⁸ Arvadites, Zemarites, and Hamathites. The Canaanite clans eventually spread out, ¹⁹ and the territory of Canaan extended from Sidon in the north to Gerar and Gaza in the south, and east as far as Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, near Lasha.

²⁰ These were the descendants of Ham, identified by clan, language, territory, and national identity.

Descendants of Shem

²¹ Sons were also born to Shem, the older brother of Japheth.^[v] Shem was the ancestor of all the descendants of Eber.

²² The descendants of Shem were Elam, Asshur, Arphaxad, Lud, and Aram.

²³ The descendants of Aram were Uz, Hul, Gether, and Mash.

²⁴ Arphaxad was the father of Shelah,^[w] and Shelah was the father of Eber.

²⁵ Eber had two sons. The first was named Peleg (which means “division”), for during his lifetime the people of the world were divided into different language groups. His brother’s name was Joktan.

²⁶ Joktan was the ancestor of Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, ²⁷ Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, ²⁸ Obal, Abimael, Sheba, ²⁹ Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab. All these were descendants of Joktan. ³⁰ The territory they occupied extended from Mesha all the way to Sephar in the eastern mountains.

³¹ These were the descendants of Shem, identified by clan, language, territory, and national identity.

Conclusion

³² These are the clans that descended from Noah’s sons, arranged by nation according to their lines of descent. All the nations of the earth descended from these clans after the great flood.

The Tower of Babel

11 At one time all the people of the world spoke the same language and used the same words. ² As the people migrated to the east, they found a plain in the land of Babylonia^[x] and settled there.

³ They began saying to each other, “Let’s make bricks and harden them with fire.” (In this region bricks were used instead of stone, and tar was used for mortar.) ⁴ Then they said, “Come, let’s build a great city for ourselves with a tower that reaches into the sky. This will make us famous and keep us from being scattered all over the world.”

⁵ But the Lord came down to look at the city and the tower the people were building. ⁶ “Look!” he said. “The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them! ⁷ Come, let’s go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.”

⁸ In that way, the Lord scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city. ⁹ That is why the city was called Babel,^[y] because that is where the Lord confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world.

The Line of Descent from Shem to Abram

¹⁰ This is the account of Shem’s family.

Two years after the great flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he became the father of^[z] Arphaxad. ¹¹ After the birth of^[aa] Arphaxad, Shem lived another 500 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹² When Arphaxad was 35 years old, he became the father of Shelah. ¹³ After the birth of Shelah, Arphaxad lived another 403 years and had other sons and daughters.^[ab]

¹⁴ When Shelah was 30 years old, he became the father of Eber. ¹⁵ After the birth of Eber, Shelah lived another 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁶ When Eber was 34 years old, he became the father of Peleg. ¹⁷ After the birth of Peleg, Eber lived another 430 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁸ When Peleg was 30 years old, he became the father of Reu. ¹⁹ After the birth of Reu, Peleg lived another 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁰ When Reu was 32 years old, he became the father of Serug. ²¹ After the birth of Serug, Reu lived another 207 years and had other sons and daughters.

²² When Serug was 30 years old, he became the father of Nahor. ²³ After the birth of Nahor, Serug lived another 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁴ When Nahor was 29 years old, he became the father of Terah. ²⁵ After the birth of Terah, Nahor lived another 119 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁶ After Terah was 70 years old, he became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

The Family of Terah

²⁷ This is the account of Terah’s family. Terah was the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran was the father of Lot. ²⁸ But Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, the land of his birth, while his father, Terah, was still living. ²⁹ Meanwhile, Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milcah. (Milcah and her sister Iscah were daughters of Nahor’s brother Haran.) ³⁰ But Sarai was unable to become pregnant and had no children.

³¹ One day Terah took his son Abram, his daughter-in-law Sarai (his son Abram’s wife), and his grandson Lot (his son Haran’s child) and moved away from Ur of the Chaldeans. He was headed for the land of Canaan, but they stopped at Haran and settled there. ³² Terah lived for 205 years^[ac] and died while still in Haran.