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Genesis 6-9
EasyEnglish Bible
Genesis 6-9
EasyEnglish Bible
6 People began to grow in number all over the earth. They gave birth to daughters. 2 The sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful. They chose for themselves any of them that they wanted to become their wives.[a]
3 The Lord said, ‘My Spirit will not give life to humans for ever. One day they will die. I will not let them live for more than 120 years. Then they will die.’
4 The Nephilites lived on the earth at that time, and for some time after that. During that time, the sons of God were having sex with the daughters of men, who gave birth to their children. The Nephilites were famous great men and fighters.
5 The Lord saw that men and women on the earth had become very bad. They thought only of evil things all the time. 6 The Lord was sorry that he had made humans and put them on the earth. He became very upset. 7 So the Lord said, ‘I made humans, but now I will destroy them. I will completely take them off the earth. As well as human people, I will also destroy the animals, the living things that move on the ground, and the birds. I am sorry that I made them.’
8 But as for Noah, the Lord was happy about him.[b]
God saves Noah
9 This is the report about Noah and his family.
Noah was a good man. He was the only person at that time who lived in a completely right way. He stayed near to God in his life. 10 Noah became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth.
11 God saw that everything on the earth had become spoiled. Everywhere, people were attacking each other. 12 God saw how much the earth had become spoiled. Everyone was doing bad things. 13 God said to Noah, ‘I will destroy everyone. That is what I have decided to do. Everywhere on the earth, people are attacking each other. Now I will destroy the people and also the earth. 14 So make a ship for yourself. Use wood from cypress trees to make it.[c] The ship must have rooms in it. Cover the inside and the outside of the ship with tar.[d]
15 This is how you will build the ship: It must be 150 metres long, 25 metres wide and 15 metres high.
16 Make a roof for the ship. Leave a space 45 centimetres high all round under the roof. Put a door in the side of the ship. Inside the ship, make three floors above each other.
17 I will cover the earth with deep water. I will destroy all living things, wherever they live. Everything that breathes will die. 18 But I will make a covenant with you, Noah. You will go into the ship. You will take your wife with you, and also your three sons and their wives. 19 You must also take two of every different kind of animal into the ship. One will be male and the other will be female. Then they will stay alive with you. 20 Bring two of every different kind of bird, two of every different animal and two of every different living thing that moves along the ground. All these will come to you. You will take care of them so that they will stay alive. 21 You must also take every different kind of food. That will be food for you and food for the animals.’
22 Noah obeyed God. He did everything that God had told him to do.
God destroys people and animals
7 Then the Lord said to Noah, ‘Go into the ship. Take your wife and family with you. I can see that you alone do what is right, among all the people on the earth.
2 Take seven of every different kind of clean animal. Take a male and a female together. Take two of every different kind of unclean animal. Take a male and a female together. 3 Take seven of every kind of bird. Take males and females. Do this so that they will give birth to young ones. Then each different kind of animal and bird will continue to live on the earth.[e]
4 In seven days, I will cause rain to fall on the earth. It will rain for 40 days and 40 nights. In that way, I will destroy every living thing that I have made on the earth.’
5 Noah did everything that God told him to do.
6 Noah was 600 years old when the deep water covered the earth. 7 Noah and his wife went into the ship. His sons and their wives also went in. They all went into the ship to be safe from the deep water. 8 Pairs of clean animals and unclean animals came to Noah in the ship.[f] Also, pairs of birds and pairs of all the living things that move across the ground came to him. 9 Each pair was one male and one female. They all came to Noah in the ship. Everything happened as God had said to Noah. 10 After seven days had passed, God sent the deep water to cover the earth.
11 When Noah was 600 years old, on the 17th day of the second month, streams of water came up everywhere from below the earth. Also, the water in the heavens poured down on the earth. 12 Rain fell on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights.
13 On the day that the rain began to fall, Noah and his wife went into the ship. Noah's three sons (Shem, Ham and Japheth) and their three wives also went in. 14 With them was every different kind of wild animal and every different kind of farm animal. They also had with them every kind of living thing that moves along the ground. Every different kind of bird and other flying things were there too. 15 Pairs of every kind of animal that lived came to Noah and went into the ship.[g] 16 Each pair was one male and one female. This happened in the way that God had told Noah. When they were all in the ship, the Lord shut the door.
17 For 40 days, the water on the earth became deeper. The water lifted the ship high above the ground.
18 The water became even deeper and completely covered the earth. The ship went safely on top of the water. 19 More water came until it covered all the high mountains on the earth. 20 The water still became deeper so that it was more than 6 metres higher than the tops of the mountains.
21 As a result, everything that had lived on the earth now died. The birds, the farm animals and the wild animals died. Every living thing that moved across the ground died, and so did all the people. 22 Everything that lived on the dry land died. Nothing could breathe any more. 23 God destroyed everything that lived on the earth. He destroyed people, animals, living things that move across the ground, and birds. God removed them from the earth. Only Noah and his family, together with the animals that were in the ship, stayed alive.
24 The deep water covered the earth for 150 days.
The deep water goes away
8 Then God thought of Noah, and all the wild animals and the farm animals that were with him in the ship. He caused a wind to blow over the earth. As a result, the water began to go down. 2 Streams of water stopped coming up from below the earth. Rain stopped coming down from the sky. 3 The deep water continued to go down for 150 days. 4 On the 17th day of the seventh month, the ship stopped on the ground. It was sitting on the top of Ararat mountains. 5 The water continued to go down until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared above the water.
6 After 40 more days, Noah opened a window in the ship. 7 He sent a raven to fly away. The raven flew away from the ship and then it returned. It continued to do this until the earth was dry.
8 Then Noah sent out a dove. He wanted to see if the water had gone away from the top of the ground. 9 But the dove could not find anywhere to stand. Water still covered all the ground. So it returned to Noah in the ship. Noah put out his hand and took the dove back into the ship. 10 He waited for seven days. Then he sent the dove out of the ship again. 11 The dove returned to Noah in the evening. It carried a fresh leaf from an olive tree in its mouth. Then Noah knew that the water had gone down. 12 He waited for seven more days. Then he sent the dove out again. This time, it did not return to Noah.[h]
13 Noah was now 601 years old. On the first day of the first month, the water that had covered the earth was now gone. The ground had become dry. Noah made a hole in the roof of the ship and he looked around. He saw that the top of the ground was dry. 14 By the 27th day of the second month, the earth had become completely dry.
15 God said to Noah, 16 ‘Come out of the ship. Bring your wife, your sons and their wives with you. 17 Bring every different kind of living animal out of the ship. Bring out the birds, the animals, and the living things that move across the ground. Now they may give birth to young ones again. They can grow in number all over the earth.’
18 Noah went out of the ship, together with his wife, his sons and their wives. 19 All the living animals also went out of the ship. The birds and the living things that move across the ground all went out. Every different kind of animal came out of the ship, each of them in its own group.
God makes a promise to Noah
20 Then Noah built an altar to make sacrifices to the Lord. He took one from each kind of clean animal and clean bird. He offered them to the Lord as sacrifices which he burned on the altar.[i]
21 The Lord smelled the sacrifice and it made him happy. The Lord said to himself, ‘I will never curse the ground again because of the bad things that people do. From the time that they are children, they want to do bad things. But I will never again destroy everything that breathes, as I have done this time.
22 As long as the earth continues to be here,
the time for people to plant seeds will come each year.
The time for harvest will come each year.
Times of cold and heat will always come.
Summer and winter will always come.
Day and night will never stop.’[j]
God's covenant with Noah
9 God blessed Noah and his sons. He said to them, ‘Give birth to many children so that you become very many people. Your descendants will live all over the earth. 2 All the animals and all the birds will be afraid of you. You have authority over them. You also have authority over all the living things that move across the ground and all the fish in the sea. 3 You may now eat anything that lives and moves. Before, I gave you the green plants to eat. Now I give you everything to eat as your food.
4 But you must not eat meat that still has the blood of life in it.
5 If any person or animal kills a human, I will certainly punish them. Their punishment will be death.
6 God made people so that they were like himself.[k]
So if anyone kills a human,
another human must kill him.
7 But as for you, you should give birth to many children so that you become very many people. There will be many people and they will live all over the earth.’
8 God said to Noah and to his sons, 9 ‘I promise you that I will obey the covenant that I am making with you.[l] I promise this to you and to all your descendants. 10 I also promise this to all the animals and birds that came out of the ship with you. That is everything that lives on the earth. 11 This is the covenant that I promise to keep: I will never cause water to destroy all living things on the earth again. Deep water will never again come again to destroy the earth.’
12 Then God said, ‘I will show you clearly that I have made this covenant with you, and with every living animal. I will keep this promise for ever, for as long as people live on the earth. 13 I have put my rainbow among the clouds in the sky. It will show you clearly that I have made this covenant with everything on the earth. 14 When I bring clouds over the earth, a rainbow will sometimes appear. 15 Then I will remember the covenant that I have made with you and with all the different kinds of living things. Never again will the water become so deep that it destroys everything that lives. 16 When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember my covenant. It is a promise that I have made with every kind of living thing on the earth.’
17 Then God said to Noah, ‘The rainbow will show you that I will certainly keep my promise. I will keep my covenant that is between me and everything that lives on the earth.’
Noah's sons
18 The names of Noah's sons were Shem, Ham and Japheth. They all came out of the ship with Noah. Ham later became the father of a son called Canaan. 19 All the people who live on the earth are descendants of Noah's three sons.
20 Noah was a farmer. He was the first person to plant vines.
21 He used the grapes to make wine. One day, he drank some of the wine and he became drunk. He lay inside his tent and he slept. He was not wearing any clothes. 22 Canaan's father, Ham, saw that Noah was not wearing any clothes. He went out of the tent. He told his two brothers what he had seen. 23 Then Shem and Japheth took Noah's coat and they put it between their shoulders. They walked into Noah's tent with their backs to Noah. In this way they covered their father with the coat. They looked away from their father so that they did not see him. They did this because Noah was not wearing any clothes.[m]
24 Later, when he was no longer drunk with the wine, Noah woke up. He found out what his youngest son, Ham, had done. 25 He said, ‘I curse Canaan! He will become a slave that must serve his brothers.’
26 Noah also said, ‘I praise the Lord, the God of Shem! Let Canaan become Shem's slave! 27 I pray that God will make the land of Japheth and his descendants grow bigger. I pray that the descendants of Japheth will share good things with Shem. I pray that Canaan will become Japheth's slave.’[n]
28 Noah lived for 350 years after God covered the earth with deep water. 29 In his whole life, Noah lived for 950 years. Then he died.
Footnotes
- 6:2 We do not know who ‘the sons of God’ were. They may have been men on the earth who trusted God. They may have been men who belonged to God in heaven, like angels. The ‘daughters of men’ were women who lived on the earth.
- 6:8 Men and women turned against God. God felt very sad. Noah was different from the other people on the earth at that time. God was happy with him. The next verses tell us why God was happy about Noah.
- 6:14 Cypress trees are trees with hard wood.
- 6:14 Tar stops water coming into the ship.
- 7:3 Clean animals are the kinds of animal that God accepted as a sacrifice. God told Noah to take more clean animals so that Noah could offer a sacrifice to God. There would still be animals that remained to give birth to young animals.
- 7:8 God told the animals to go to Noah.
- 7:15 The fish and other beings that always live in the sea were safe in the deep water. See Genesis 1:21-25.
- 8:12 A raven is a big black bird. A dove is a white or grey bird. Olives are small round fruits that grow on an olive tree.
- 8:20 When Noah left the ship, he worshipped God. He built an altar to do this. He offered a sacrifice to God on the altar. God had kept them safe and Noah wanted to thank God. He did this before he did anything else.
- 8:22 As long as the earth is here, the days and the seasons will continue to happen. God has promised this. He made the universe and he continues to cause it to work properly.
- 9:6 See Genesis 1:26.
- 9:9 A covenant is a special agreement that God makes with people. He promises that he will help them in a certain way.
- 9:23 Vines grow a small round fruit called grapes. People use grapes to make wine. Wine is a drink containing alcohol.
- 9:27 Noah wanted God to bless Shem and Japheth, because they did the right thing. Noah asked for a curse on the descendants of Ham because he caused Noah to be ashamed.
Genesis 6-9
New International Version
Genesis 6-9
New International Version
Wickedness in the World
6 When human beings began to increase in number on the earth(A) and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God(B) saw that the daughters(C) of humans were beautiful,(D) and they married(E) any of them they chose. 3 Then the Lord said, “My Spirit(F) will not contend with[a] humans forever,(G) for they are mortal[b];(H) their days will be a hundred and twenty years.”
4 The Nephilim(I) were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans(J) and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.(K)
5 The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth,(L) and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.(M) 6 The Lord regretted(N) that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth(O) the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.(P)” 8 But Noah(Q) found favor in the eyes of the Lord.(R)
Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account(S) of Noah and his family.
Noah was a righteous man, blameless(T) among the people of his time,(U) and he walked faithfully with God.(V) 10 Noah had three sons: Shem,(W) Ham and Japheth.(X)
11 Now the earth was corrupt(Y) in God’s sight and was full of violence.(Z) 12 God saw how corrupt(AA) the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways.(AB) 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy(AC) both them and the earth.(AD) 14 So make yourself an ark of cypress[c] wood;(AE) make rooms in it and coat it with pitch(AF) inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.[d] 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit[e] high all around.[f] Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters(AG) on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.(AH) 18 But I will establish my covenant with you,(AI) and you will enter the ark(AJ)—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you.(AK) 20 Two(AL) of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind(AM) of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive.(AN) 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”
22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.(AO)
7 The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family,(AP) because I have found you righteous(AQ) in this generation. 2 Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean(AR) animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, 3 and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive(AS) throughout the earth. 4 Seven days from now I will send rain(AT) on the earth(AU) for forty days(AV) and forty nights,(AW) and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.(AX)”
5 And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.(AY)
6 Noah was six hundred years old(AZ) when the floodwaters came on the earth. 7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark(BA) to escape the waters of the flood. 8 Pairs of clean and unclean(BB) animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, 9 male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah.(BC) 10 And after the seven days(BD) the floodwaters came on the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life,(BE) on the seventeenth day of the second month(BF)—on that day all the springs of the great deep(BG) burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens(BH) were opened. 12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.(BI)
13 On that very day Noah and his sons,(BJ) Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark.(BK) 14 They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind,(BL) everything with wings. 15 Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark.(BM) 16 The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah.(BN) Then the Lord shut him in.
17 For forty days(BO) the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. 18 The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. 19 They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered.(BP) 20 The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits.[g][h] (BQ) 21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind.(BR) 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life(BS) in its nostrils died. 23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.(BT) Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.(BU)
24 The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.(BV)
8 But God remembered(BW) Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth,(BX) and the waters receded. 2 Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens(BY) had been closed, and the rain(BZ) had stopped falling from the sky. 3 The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days(CA) the water had gone down, 4 and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month(CB) the ark came to rest on the mountains(CC) of Ararat.(CD) 5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.
6 After forty days(CE) Noah opened a window he had made in the ark 7 and sent out a raven,(CF) and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth.(CG) 8 Then he sent out a dove(CH) to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. 9 But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. 10 He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. 11 When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth.(CI) 12 He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him.
13 By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year,(CJ) the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. 14 By the twenty-seventh day of the second month(CK) the earth was completely dry.
15 Then God said to Noah, 16 “Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives.(CL) 17 Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it.”(CM)
18 So Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives.(CN) 19 All the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds—everything that moves on land—came out of the ark, one kind after another.
20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord(CO) and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean(CP) birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings(CQ) on it. 21 The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma(CR) and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground(CS) because of humans, even though[i] every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood.(CT) And never again will I destroy(CU) all living creatures,(CV) as I have done.
22 “As long as the earth endures,
seedtime and harvest,(CW)
cold and heat,
summer and winter,(CX)
day and night
will never cease.”(CY)
God’s Covenant With Noah
9 Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.(CZ) 2 The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth, and on all the birds in the sky, on every creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea; they are given into your hands.(DA) 3 Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you.(DB) Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.(DC)
4 “But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it.(DD) 5 And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting.(DE) I will demand an accounting from every animal.(DF) And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.(DG)
6 “Whoever sheds human blood,
by humans shall their blood be shed;(DH)
for in the image of God(DI)
has God made mankind.
7 As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”(DJ)
8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: 9 “I now establish my covenant with you(DK) and with your descendants after you 10 and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. 11 I establish my covenant(DL) with you:(DM) Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.(DN)”
12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant(DO) I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come:(DP) 13 I have set my rainbow(DQ) in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow(DR) appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant(DS) between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life.(DT) 16 Whenever the rainbow(DU) appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant(DV) between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”
17 So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant(DW) I have established between me and all life on the earth.”
The Sons of Noah
18 The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham and Japheth.(DX) (Ham was the father of Canaan.)(DY) 19 These were the three sons of Noah,(DZ) and from them came the people who were scattered over the whole earth.(EA)
20 Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded[j] to plant a vineyard. 21 When he drank some of its wine,(EB) he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent. 22 Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked(EC) and told his two brothers outside. 23 But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father’s naked body. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father naked.
24 When Noah awoke from his wine and found out what his youngest son had done to him, 25 he said,
26 He also said,
“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Shem!(EG)
May Canaan be the slave(EH) of Shem.
27 May God extend Japheth’s[k] territory;(EI)
may Japheth live in the tents of Shem,(EJ)
and may Canaan be the slave of Japheth.”
28 After the flood Noah lived 350 years. 29 Noah lived a total of 950 years, and then he died.(EK)
Footnotes
- Genesis 6:3 Or My spirit will not remain in
- Genesis 6:3 Or corrupt
- Genesis 6:14 The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.
- Genesis 6:15 That is, about 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high or about 135 meters long, 23 meters wide and 14 meters high
- Genesis 6:16 That is, about 18 inches or about 45 centimeters
- Genesis 6:16 The meaning of the Hebrew for this clause is uncertain.
- Genesis 7:20 That is, about 23 feet or about 6.8 meters
- Genesis 7:20 Or rose more than fifteen cubits, and the mountains were covered
- Genesis 8:21 Or humans, for
- Genesis 9:20 Or soil, was the first
- Genesis 9:27 Japheth sounds like the Hebrew for extend.
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