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,^[a] the boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. ⁵ Two and a half months later,^[b] 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,^[c] 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,^[d] 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.^{[e] 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^[f] 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.^{[h] 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.^[l]

¹⁵ Canaan’s oldest son was Sidon, the ancestor of the Sidonians. Canaan was also the ancestor of the Hittites,^{[m] 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.^[n] 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,^[o] 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.