The Creation

1 In the beginning God created heaven and earth.

² The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep water. The Spirit of God was hovering over the water.

³ Then God said, “Let there be light!” So there was light. ⁴ God saw the light was good. So God separated the light from the darkness. ⁵ God named the light day, and the darkness he named night. There was evening, then morning—the first day.

⁶ Then God said, “Let there be a horizon in the middle of the water in order to separate the water.” ⁷ So God made the horizon and separated the water above and below the horizon. And so it was. ⁸ God named ⌞what was above⌟ the horizon sky. There was evening, then morning—a second day.

⁹ Then God said, “Let the water under the sky come together in one area, and let the dry land appear.” And so it was. ¹⁰ God named the dry land earth. The water which came together he named sea. God saw that it was good. ¹¹ Then God said, “Let the earth produce vegetation: plants bearing seeds, each according to its own type, and fruit trees bearing fruit with seeds, each according to its own type.” And so it was. ¹² The earth produced vegetation: plants bearing seeds, each according to its own type, and trees bearing fruit with seeds, each according to its own type. God saw that they were good. ¹³ There was evening, then morning—a third day.

¹⁴ Then God said, “Let there be lights in the sky to separate the day from the night. They will be signs and will mark religious festivals, days, and years. ¹⁵ They will be lights in the sky to shine on the earth.” And so it was. ¹⁶ God made the two bright lights: the larger light to rule the day and the smaller light to rule the night. He also made the stars. ¹⁷ God put them in the sky to give light to the earth, ¹⁸ to dominate the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. God saw that it was good. ¹⁹ There was evening, then morning—a fourth day.

²⁰ Then God said, “Let the water swarm with swimming creatures, and let birds fly through the sky over the earth.” ²¹ So God created the large sea creatures, every type of creature that swims around in the water and every type of flying bird. God saw that they were good. ²² God blessed them and said, “Be fertile, increase in number, fill the sea, and let there be many birds on the earth.” ²³ There was evening, then morning—a fifth day.

²⁴ Then God said, “Let the earth produce every type of living creature: every type of domestic animal, crawling animal, and wild animal.” And so it was. ²⁵ God made every type of wild animal, every type of domestic animal, and every type of creature that crawls on the ground. God saw that they were good.

²⁶ Then God said, “Let us make humans in our image, in our likeness. Let them rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the domestic animals all over the earth, and all the animals that crawl on the earth.”

²⁸ God blessed them and said, “Be fertile, increase in number, fill the earth, and be its master. Rule the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the animals that crawl on the earth.”

²⁹ God said, “I have given you every plant with seeds on the face of the earth and every tree that has fruit with seeds. This will be your food. ³⁰ I have given all green plants as food to every land animal, every bird in the sky, and every animal that crawls on the earth—every living, breathing animal.” And so it was.

³¹ And God saw everything that he had made and that it was very good. There was evening, then morning—the sixth day.

2 Heaven and earth and everything in them were finished. ² By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing. On the seventh day he stopped the work he had been doing. ³ Then God blessed the seventh day and set it apart as holy, because on that day he stopped all his work of creation.

The Creation of Man and Woman

⁴ This is the account of heaven and earth when they were created, at the time when the Lord God made earth and heaven.

⁵ Wild bushes and plants were not on the earth yet because the Lord God hadn’t sent rain on the earth. Also, there was no one to farm the land. ⁶ Instead, underground water would come up from the earth and water the entire surface of the ground.

⁷ Then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the earth ^[a] and blew the breath of life into his nostrils. The man became a living being.

⁸ The Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east. That’s where he put the man whom he had formed. ⁹ The Lord God made all the trees grow out of the ground. These trees were nice to look at, and their fruit was good to eat. The tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil grew in the middle of the garden.

¹⁰ A river flowed from Eden to water the garden. Outside the garden it divided into four rivers. ¹¹ The name of the first river is Pishon. This is the one that winds throughout Havilah, where there is gold. ¹² (The gold of that land is pure. Bdellium and onyx are also ⌞found⌟ there.) ¹³ The name of the second river is Gihon. This is the one that winds throughout Sudan. ¹⁴ The name of the third river is Tigris. This is the one that flows east of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.

¹⁵ Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to farm the land and to take care of it. ¹⁶ The Lord God commanded the man. He said, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden. ¹⁷ But you must never eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because when you eat from it, you will certainly die.”

¹⁸ Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is right for him.”

¹⁹ The Lord God had formed all the wild animals and all the birds out of the ground. Then he brought them to the man to see what he would call them. Whatever the man called each creature became its name. ²⁰ So the man named all the domestic animals, all the birds, and all the wild animals.

But the man found no helper who was right for him. ²¹ So the Lord God caused him to fall into a deep sleep. While the man was sleeping, the Lord God took out one of the man’s ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. ²² Then the Lord God formed a woman from the rib that he had taken from the man. He brought her to the man.

²³ The man said,

²⁴ That is why a man will leave his father and mother and will be united with his wife, and they will become one flesh. ²⁵ The man and his wife were both naked, but they weren’t ashamed of it.

The First Sin and the First Promise

3 The snake was more clever than all the wild animals the Lord God had made. He asked the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must never eat the fruit of any tree in the garden’?”

² The woman answered the snake, “We’re allowed to eat the fruit from any tree in the garden ³ except the tree in the middle of the garden. God said, ‘You must never eat it or touch it. If you do, you will die!’ ”

⁴ “You certainly won’t die!” the snake told the woman. ⁵ “God knows that when you eat it your eyes will be opened. You’ll be like God, knowing good and evil.”

⁶ The woman saw that the tree had fruit that was good to eat, nice to look at, and desirable for making someone wise. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.

⁷ Then their eyes were opened, and they both realized that they were naked. They sewed fig leaves together and made clothes for themselves.

⁸ In the cool of the evening, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking around in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees in the garden. ⁹ The Lord God called to the man and asked him, “Where are you?”

¹⁰ He answered, “I heard you in the garden. I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.”

¹¹ God asked, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat fruit from the tree I commanded you not to eat from?”

¹² The man answered, “That woman, the one you gave me, gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”

¹³ Then the Lord God asked the woman, “What have you done?”

“The snake deceived me, and I ate,” the woman answered.

¹⁴ So the Lord God said to the snake, “Because you have done this,

¹⁶ He said to the woman,

¹⁷ Then he said to the man, “You listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree, although I commanded you, ‘You must never eat its fruit.’

²⁰ Adam named his wife Eve [Life] because she became the mother of every living person.

²¹ The Lord God made clothes from animal skins for the man and his wife and dressed them.

²² Then the Lord God said, “The man has become like one of us, since he knows good and evil. He must not reach out and take the fruit from the tree of life and eat. Then he would live forever.” ²³ So the Lord God sent the man out of the Garden of Eden to farm the ground from which the man had been formed. ²⁴ After he sent the man out, God placed angels ^[b] and a flaming sword that turned in all directions east of the Garden of Eden. He placed them there to guard the way to the tree of life.

Cain Murders Abel

4 Adam made love to his wife Eve. She became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, “I have gotten the man that the Lord promised.” ² Then she gave birth to another child, Abel, Cain’s brother. Abel was a shepherd, and Cain was a farmer.

³ Later Cain brought some crops from the land as an offering to the Lord. ⁴ Abel also brought some choice parts of the firstborn animals from his flock. The Lord approved of Abel and his offering, ⁵ but he didn’t approve of Cain and his offering. So Cain became very angry and was disappointed. ⁶ Then the Lord asked Cain, “Why are you angry, and why do you look disappointed? ⁷ If you do well, won’t you be accepted? But if you don’t do well, sin is lying outside your door ready to attack. It wants to control you, but you must master it.”

⁸ Cain talked to his brother Abel. Later, when they were in the fields, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.

⁹ The Lord asked Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”

“I don’t know,” he answered. “Am I supposed to take care of my brother?”

¹⁰ The Lord asked, “What have you done? Your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground. ¹¹ So now you are cursed from the ground, which has received the blood of your brother whom you killed. ¹² When you farm the ground, it will no longer yield its best for you. You will be a fugitive, a wanderer on the earth.”

¹³ But Cain said to the Lord, “My punishment is more than I can stand! ¹⁴ You have forced me off this land today. I have to hide from you and become a fugitive, a wanderer on the earth. Now anyone who finds me will kill me!”

¹⁵ So the Lord said to him, “Not so! Anyone who kills Cain will suffer vengeance seven times over.” The Lord gave Cain a sign so that anyone meeting him would not kill him.

¹⁶ Then Cain left the Lord’s presence and lived in Nod [The Land of Wandering], east of Eden.

Cain’s Ten Descendants—Cain to Lamech

¹⁷ Cain made love to his wife. She became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Cain was building a city, and he named it Enoch after his son. ¹⁸ To Enoch was born Irad. Irad was the father of Mehujael. Mehujael was the father of Methushael. And Methushael was the father of Lamech.

¹⁹ Lamech married two women, one named Adah and the other Zillah. ²⁰ Adah gave birth to Jabal. He was the first person to live in tents and have livestock. ²¹ His brother’s name was Jubal. He was the first person to play the harp and the flute. ²² Zillah also had a son, Tubalcain, who made bronze and iron tools. Tubalcain’s sister was Naamah.

²³ Lamech said to his wives,

Adam’s Godly Descendants—Adam to Enosh

²⁵ Adam made love to his wife again. She gave birth to a son and named him Seth, because ⌞she said,⌟ “God has given ^[c] me another child in place of Abel, since Cain killed him.”

²⁶ A son was also born to Seth, and he named him Enosh. At that time people began to worship the Lord.

Evil Increases on the Earth

6 The number of people increased all over the earth, and daughters were born to them. ² The sons of God saw that the daughters of other humans were beautiful. So they married any woman they chose.

³ Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not struggle with humans forever, because they are flesh and blood. They will live 120 years.”

⁴ The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, as well as later, when the sons of God slept with the daughters of other humans and had children by them. These children were famous long ago.

⁵ The Lord saw how evil humans had become on the earth. All day long their deepest thoughts were nothing but evil. ⁶ The Lord was sorry that he had made humans on the earth, and he was heartbroken. ⁷ So he said, “I will wipe off the face of the earth these humans that I created. I will wipe out not only humans, but also domestic animals, crawling animals, and birds. I’m sorry that I made them.” ⁸ But the Lord was pleased with Noah.

Noah’s Family and the Ship

⁹ This is the account of Noah and his descendants.

Noah had God’s approval and was a man of integrity among the people of his time. He walked with God. ¹⁰ He had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

¹¹ The world was corrupt in God’s sight and full of violence. ¹² God saw the world and how corrupt it was because all people on earth lived evil lives.

¹³ God said to Noah, “I have decided to put an end to all people because the earth is full of their violence. Now I’m going to destroy them along with the earth. ¹⁴ Make yourself a ship of cypress wood. ^[a] Make rooms in the ship and coat it inside and out with tar. ¹⁵ This is how you should build it: the ship is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet high. ¹⁶ Make a roof for the ship, and leave an 18-inch-high opening at the top. Put a door in the side of the ship. Build the ship with lower, middle, and upper decks. ¹⁷ I’m about to send a flood on the earth to destroy all people under the sky—every living, breathing human. Everything on earth will die.

¹⁸ “But I will make my promise ^[b] to you. You, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives will go into the ship. ¹⁹ Bring two of every living creature into the ship in order to keep them alive with you. They must be male and female. ²⁰ Two of every type of bird, every type of domestic animal, and every type of creature that crawls on the ground will come to you to be kept alive. ²¹ Take every kind of food that can be eaten and store it. It will be food for you and the animals.”

²² Noah did this. He did everything that God had commanded him.

The Flood

7 The Lord said to Noah, “Go into the ship with your whole family because I have seen that you alone are righteous among the people of today. ² Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal (a male and a female of each) and one pair of every kind of unclean ^[c] animal (a male and a female). ³ Also, take seven pairs of every kind of bird (a male and a female of each) to preserve animal life all over the earth after the flood. ⁴ In seven days I will send rain to the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. I will wipe off the face of the earth every living creature that I have made.”

⁵ So Noah did everything that the Lord commanded him.

⁶ Noah was 600 years old when the flood came to the earth. ⁷ Noah, his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives went into the ship to escape the floodwaters. ⁸ Clean and unclean animals, birds, and creatures that crawl on the ground ⁹ came to Noah to go into the ship in pairs (a male and female of each) as God had commanded Noah.

¹⁰ Seven days later the flood came on the earth. ¹¹ On the seventeenth day of the second month of the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, all the deep springs burst open. The sky opened, ¹² and rain came pouring down on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights.

¹³ On that same day Noah and his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, as well as Noah’s wife and his three daughters-in-law went into the ship. ¹⁴ They had with them every type of wild animal, every type of domestic animal, every type of creature that crawls on the earth, and every type of bird (every creature with wings). ¹⁵ A pair of every living, breathing animal came to Noah to go into the ship. ¹⁶ A male and a female of every animal went in as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord closed the door behind them.

¹⁷ The flood continued for 40 days on the earth. The water increased and lifted the ship so that it rose high above the ground. ¹⁸ As the water rose and became very deep, the ship floated on top of the water. ¹⁹ The water rose very high above the earth. It covered all the high mountains everywhere under the sky. ²⁰ It rose 23 feet above the mountaintops.

²¹ Every creature that crawls on the earth died, including birds, domestic and wild animals, and everything that swarms over the earth, along with every human. ²² Everything on dry land (every living, breathing creature) died. ²³ Every living creature on the face of the earth was wiped out. Humans, domestic animals, crawling creatures, and birds were wiped off the earth. Only Noah and those with him in the ship were left.

²⁴ The floodwaters were on the earth for 150 days.

God Remembers Noah

8 God remembered Noah and all the wild and domestic animals with him in the ship. So God made a wind blow over the earth, and the water started to go down. ² The deep springs and the sky had been shut, and the rain had stopped pouring. ³ The water began to recede from the land. At the end of 150 days the water had decreased. ⁴ On the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ship came to rest in the mountains of Ararat. ⁵ The water kept decreasing until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared.

⁶ After 40 more days Noah opened the window he had made in the ship ⁷ and sent out a raven. It kept flying back and forth until the water on the land had dried up. ⁸ Next, he sent out a dove to see if the water was gone from the surface of the ground. ⁹ The dove couldn’t find a place to land because the water was still all over the earth. So it came back to Noah in the ship. He reached out and brought the dove back into the ship. ¹⁰ He waited seven more days and again sent the dove out of the ship. ¹¹ The dove came to him in the evening, and in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf. Then Noah knew that the water was gone from the earth. ¹² He waited seven more days and sent out the dove again, but it never came back to him.

¹³ By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water on the land had dried up. Noah opened the top of the ship, looked out, and saw the surface of the ground. ¹⁴ By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the land was dry.

¹⁵ Then God spoke to Noah, ¹⁶ “Come out of the ship with your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives. ¹⁷ Bring out every animal that’s with you: birds, domestic animals, and every creature that crawls on the earth. Be fertile, increase in number, and spread over the earth.”

¹⁸ So Noah came out with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives. ¹⁹ Every animal, crawling creature, and bird—everything that moves on the earth—came out of the ship, one kind after another.

²⁰ Noah built an altar to the Lord. On it he made a burnt offering of each type of clean ^[d] animal and clean bird. ²¹ The Lord smelled the soothing aroma. He said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of humans, even though from birth their hearts are set on nothing but evil. I will never again kill every living creature as I have just done.

God Blesses Noah and His Sons

9 God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fertile, increase in number, and fill the earth. ² All the wild animals and all the birds will fear you and be terrified of you. Every creature that crawls on the ground and all the fish in the sea have been put under your control. ³ Everything that lives and moves will be your food. I gave you green plants as food; I now give you everything else.

⁴ “But you are not to eat meat with blood in it. (Blood is life.) ⁵ In addition, I will demand your blood for your life. I will demand it from any animal or from any person. I will demand the life of any person ⌞who kills⌟ another person.

⁷ Be fertile, and increase in number. Spread over the earth, and increase.”

God’s Promise—the Sign of the Rainbow

⁸ God also said to Noah and his sons, ⁹ “I am going to make my promise ^[e] to you, your descendants, ¹⁰ and every living being that is with you—birds, domestic animals, and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ship—every living thing on earth. ¹¹ I am making my promise to you. Never again will all life be killed by floodwaters. Never again will there be a flood that destroys the earth.”

¹² God said, “This is the sign of the promise I am giving to you and every living being that is with you for generations to come. ¹³ I will put my rainbow in the clouds to be a sign of my promise to the earth. ¹⁴ Whenever I form clouds over the earth, a rainbow will appear in the clouds. ¹⁵ Then I will remember my promise to you and every living animal. Never again will water become a flood to destroy all life. ¹⁶ Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember my everlasting promise to every living animal on earth.”

¹⁷ So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the promise I am making to all life on earth.”

Noah Curses Canaan but Blesses Shem and Japheth

¹⁸ Noah’s sons, who came out of the ship, were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. ¹⁹ These were Noah’s three sons. From them the whole earth was populated. Ham was the father of Canaan.^[f]

²⁰ Noah, a farmer, was the first person to plant a vineyard. ²¹ He drank some wine, got drunk, and lay naked inside his tent. ²² Ham, father of Canaan, saw his father naked. So he went outside and told his two brothers.

²³ Shem and Japheth took a blanket and laid it over their shoulders. Then they walked in backwards and covered their father’s naked body. They turned their faces away so that they didn’t see their father naked.

²⁴ When Noah sobered up, he found out what his youngest son had done to him. ²⁵ So he said,

²⁸ Noah lived 350 years after the flood. ²⁹ Noah lived a total of 950 years; then he died.