Genesis 8
New King James Version
Noah’s Deliverance
8 Then God (A)remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the animals that were with him in the ark. (B)And God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters subsided. 2 (C)The fountains of the deep and the windows of heaven were also (D)stopped, and (E)the rain from heaven was restrained. 3 And the waters receded continually from the earth. At the end (F)of the hundred and fifty days the waters decreased. 4 Then the ark rested in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat. 5 And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen.
6 So it came to pass, at the end of forty days, that Noah opened (G)the window of the ark which he had made. 7 Then he sent out a raven, which kept going to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth. 8 He also sent out from himself a dove, to see if the waters had receded from the face of the ground. 9 But the dove found no resting place for the sole of her foot, and she returned into the ark to him, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and took her, and drew her into the ark to himself. 10 And he waited yet another seven days, and again he sent the dove out from the ark. 11 Then the dove came to him in the evening, and behold, a freshly plucked olive leaf was in her mouth; and Noah knew that the waters had receded from the earth. 12 So he waited yet another seven days and sent out the dove, which did not return again to him anymore.
13 And it came to pass in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, that the waters were dried up from the earth; and Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked, and indeed the surface of the ground was dry. 14 And in the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dried.
15 Then God spoke to Noah, saying, 16 “Go out of the ark, (H)you and your wife, and your sons and your sons’ wives with you. 17 Bring out with you every living thing of all flesh that is with you: birds and cattle and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, so that they may abound on the earth, and (I)be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” 18 So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him. 19 Every animal, every creeping thing, every bird, and whatever creeps on the earth, according to their families, went out of the ark.
God’s Covenant with Creation
20 Then Noah built an (J)altar to the Lord, and took of (K)every clean animal and of every clean bird, and offered (L)burnt offerings on the altar. 21 And the Lord smelled (M)a soothing aroma. Then the Lord said in His heart, “I will never again (N)curse the ground for man’s sake, although the (O)imagination[a] of man’s heart is evil from his youth; (P)nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done.
22 “While the earth (Q)remains,
Seedtime and harvest,
Cold and heat,
Winter and summer,
And (R)day and night
Shall not cease.”
Footnotes
- Genesis 8:21 intent or thought
Genesis 8
Easy-to-Read Version
The Flood Ends
8 But God did not forget about Noah. God remembered him and all the animals that were with him in the boat. God made a wind blow over the earth, and all the water began to disappear.
2 Rain stopped falling from the sky, and water stopped flowing from under the earth. 3-4 The water that covered the earth began to go down. After 150 days the water was low enough that the boat touched land again. The boat stopped on one of the mountains of Ararat. This was the 17th day of the seventh month. 5 The water continued to go down, and by the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains were above the water.
6 Forty days later Noah opened the window he had made in the boat. 7 Then he sent out a raven. The raven flew from place to place until the ground was dry and the water was gone. 8 Noah also sent out a dove. He wanted it to find dry ground. He wanted to know if water still covered the earth.
9 The dove could not find a place to rest because water still covered the earth, so the dove came back to the boat. Noah reached out his hand and caught the dove and brought it back into the boat.
10 After seven days Noah again sent out the dove. 11 And that afternoon the dove came back to Noah. The dove had a fresh olive leaf in its mouth. This was a sign to show Noah that there was dry ground on the earth. 12 Seven days later Noah sent the dove out again. But this time the dove didn’t come back.
13 After that Noah opened the door[a] of the boat. He looked and saw that the ground was dry. This was the first day of the first month of the year. He was 601 years old. 14 By the 27th day of the second month, the ground was completely dry.
15 Then God said to Noah, 16 “Leave the boat. You, your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives should go out now. 17 Bring every living animal out of the boat with you—all the birds, animals, and everything that crawls on the earth. These animals will make many more animals, and they will fill the earth again.”
18 So Noah went out with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives. 19 All the animals, everything that crawls, and every bird left the boat. All the animals came out of the boat in family groups.
20 Then Noah built an altar to honor the Lord. Noah took some of all the clean birds and some of all the clean animals and burned them on the altar as a gift to God.
21 The Lord smelled these sacrifices, and it pleased him. The Lord said to himself, “I will never again curse the earth as a way to punish people. People are evil from the time they are young, but I will never again destroy every living thing on the earth as I did this time. 22 As long as the earth continues, there will always be a time for planting and a time for harvest. There will always be cold and hot, summer and winter, day and night on earth.”
Footnotes
- Genesis 8:13 opened the door Literally, “removed the covering.”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2006 by Bible League International