Episode Transcript
Carey Griffel: Welcome to Genesis Marks the Spot where we raid the ivory tower of biblical theology without ransacking our faith. My name is Carey Griffel and today we are back to the flood narrative, and we're going to ask some really strange questions about the animals and the Ark. I don't really have time to go through all of the particular things today, so probably this will be a multi episode , but there's a lot of weirdness involving the animals and the ark.
[00:00:40] Have you noticed that? I'm sure you've noticed that. So today we're gonna take a really broad section of the flood narrative and we're just gonna get into some of these really strange questions, like why does Genesis six say two of every kind? Why does Genesis seven say seven pairs or by sevens of clean animals? Why mention food before the Ark entry scene even fully unfolds? Why do we get the phrase, Noah did this, and then more instructions anyway? Why does Noah already know clean and unclean animals? And is the text contradicting itself? Is it preserving multiple strands of textual traditions, or is it layering information in this final form that we have it as?
[00:01:34] I know that a lot of people will pay attention to the two animals and the seven animals, but even beyond that, the passage is textually stranger than a lot of us really realize. So today our topic is really about reading very carefully, especially in this section. We're not gonna try to solve everything too quickly, but I do have quite a few scholars to draw upon and some ideas to bring in here.
[00:02:02] And I want to establish that the oddity is part of the experience of the final form of the text. And so we don't really need to flatten it, we don't need to explain it away necessarily, but we should look at it with clarity and precision and let's just get into some of the options we have.
[00:02:21] The narrative is going to repeat. It's gonna narrow things down, and it's going to re-angle our focus in what we should be looking at here. The broad preservation in Genesis six gives way to more specific and theologically loaded preservation in Genesis seven, and the strange sequencing of the text is really one of the clues that the text is doing more than giving just instructions or an inventory.
[00:02:51] I think the fact that the story circles back, adds detail, and forces us to slow down is something that is inherent to what's going on. And so I'm gonna be talking about various scholars. We'll see how many quotes I managed to cram in this episode because there's a lot of good scholarship on this. A lot of good ideas here.
[00:03:11] I'll be drawing from Word Biblical Commentary, which was written by Gordon Wenham. I will also be drawing on Victor Hamilton's work as well as John Walton's, and probably throwing in a few other things too.
[00:03:27] First of all, we don't need to worry about contradiction here because there are really solid theological explanations that are really rooted in how Hebrew works, how we see the text written in all kinds of places, really.
[00:03:42] We do get some problems every time we try to force our reading, in English, on the text. And when I'm talking about our reading in English, I'm really referring to the fact that we tend to think of this story as being chronologically in order. And when we read Genesis, it's like this thing happens and then this thing happens, and then that thing happens and it's a chronologically ordered sequence.
[00:04:10] And while that does happen, and that is part of many places in the text, the fact that in the Hebrew text we continually see circling back around and ideas represented in different forms, should really clue us into the fact that we shouldn't read things strictly chronologically.
[00:04:30] We need to read them in forms of pattern and in kind of a spiral where the circular spiral is going to bring us back to an idea, and that idea is going to be intensified and particularized for a theological reason. That's just how the Hebrew Bible works in general. So if we're jumping to things like, oh, there's a contradiction, or How do we harmonize these two things? Well that tends to be thinking in English, not thinking so much in Hebrew.
[00:05:03] Okay, so let's actually read the text here a little bit. I want you to hear the sequence, and I want you to really pull out some details here. So the key data that I want to foreground for you to really pay attention to, Is the idea of every living thing, of all flesh, two of every sort, the male and female language, the birds and the animals and the creeping things, and the purpose clause, which is to keep them alive with you.
[00:05:35] Now, that sounds really broad. It sounds complete. It sounds very straightforward in the way that we usually have this idea of the Ark and the flood in the text. It's kind of where the Sunday school summary comes from. But we do see preservation is explicit and mostly that's what we're thinking of here. In Genesis six, we don't have a clean, unclean distinction and no hint yet that some animals will be treated differently.
[00:06:06] But I also want you to notice that the passage that is going to start in Genesis six 19 comes after six 18. I know that's really gonna blow your mind to realize that, right? But my point here is that Genesis six 18 is pointing about household preservation and talks about God establishing his covenant with Noah and coming into the ark, Noah, his sons, his wife and his son's wives with him.
[00:06:37] And in fact, I'll point out here in Word Biblical Commentary, Gordon Wenham mentions a chiasm. He says, quote, "The castic ordering of the verbs come bring in verses 18 and 19 emphasizes that the animals are to board the ark at the same time as Noah and his family. Note how the list of animals, at first very general, is gradually made more specific with many echoes of the creation account. Male and female according to their types. Note, too, the same sequence, birds, land animals, creeping things. Though you shall bring into, could suggest that Noah had to round up all the animals, the phrase will come to you shows that the animals would arrive spontaneously. The twice repeated verb to stay alive, preserve life, stresses the point of Noah's heroic efforts, and looks forward to the mission of Joseph." End quote.
[00:07:44] So that's fun. He points out a connection here with the flood and the Joseph narrative at the end of Genesis. There's actually a lot of really interesting connections, but of course we're very far away from the Joseph narrative here in the flood account.
[00:07:58] But let's just take one moment here to see where these connections are. I will point you to Genesis 45 verses six and seven, where we're talking about the famine and how God sent Joseph to preserve a remnant in the land and keep alive many survivors. And in Genesis 50, verse 20, it says, quote, " As for you, you meant evil against me. But God meant it for good to bring it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today." End quote.
[00:08:34] So that's some really fun framing there of the text.
[00:08:38] But let's go ahead into our main text and read Genesis six 19 and 20, which says, quote, " And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female. Of the birds according to their kinds, and of the animals according to their kinds, of every creeping thing of the ground according to its kind. Two of every sort shall come into you to keep them alive." End quote.
[00:09:10] Okay, so. We kind of understand this is our main framework of the animals and all of the animals, because we have all three kinds that are mentioned in the creation account. They're mentioned here again. This is to preserve all animals everywhere, right? And of course there's a few different ideas of what we mean by kind, and things like that, but probably primarily we're talking about the kinds that actually are mentioned, birds, animals, and creeping things.
[00:09:40] Then we move into Genesis six, verse 21, which says, quote, "Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten and store it up. It shall serve as food for you and for them." End quote.
[00:09:55] That's kind of where it seems like we're reading this text in a very chronological way. Well, you bring in the animals, then of course, what are the animals going to eat? If they have to have food, you have to bring in the food.
[00:10:08] If you're reading this text block into chapter seven as a whole, it almost seems like a little bit of an interruption to the flow, but it does expand the task from bringing them to sustaining them. And this kind of goes along with my point that the Ark is implied to be a space of ongoing life and a mini creation. It's not just about a boat. But there's gonna be some more points that we're gonna probably bring out with the food here in a little while.
[00:10:39] Let's go on to Genesis six verse 22. This is a very short verse. It just says, quote, "Noah did this. He did all that God commanded him." End quote.
[00:10:53] So again, it sounds like chronology. It sounds like the closing of the scene of bringing the animals and bringing the food, and now he's all ready., It sounds as if the instructions are complete, but then we're gonna go into Genesis chapter seven, and here a new speech begins. Noah's told to enter the Ark, and there's a rationale here for it because of Noah's righteousness.
[00:11:19] Here we have clean animals mentioned, which is really interesting that that is after the mention of Noah's righteousness, because if we think of righteousness as being in the realm of being right with God, that kind of has something to do with things like sacred space, sacrifice, and making things right in a cultic kind of way. Well, this is why we have the clean animals mentioned in connection to what Noah is and who Noah is and what Noah does.
[00:11:54] The story is clearly reopening the command scene here at the beginning of chapter seven. There is genuinely some new information here, though. It circles back to the animal issue and it complicates it. At least we think it complicates it. So now we have some pressure points, clean and unclean. The number two versus the number seven.
[00:12:18] We have birds that are grouped with the surplus animals and we have a seven day countdown, which isn't really the point of what we're talking about today, but probably plays into this whole matrix of ideas. It seemed really done and finished and okay, we can move on to the flood now in chapter six, but here we go again with our repetition in chapter seven.
[00:12:43] I will read the first five verses of chapter seven, which says, quote, " Then the Lord said to Noah, go into the ark, you and all your household for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and his mate, and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and his mate. And seven pairs of the birds of the heavens, also, male and female, to keep their offspring alive on the face of all the earth. For in seven days, I will send rain on the Earth, 40 days and 40 nights, and every living thing that I have made, I will blot out from the face of the ground. And Noah did all that the Lord had commanded him." End quote.
[00:13:30] Okay, so we are ending on the same note that we ended in chapter six. I pointed out that in chapter six, verse 18, we have the household. The household is again mentioned here at the beginning of the chapter. There's a rationale that connects to being righteous. And we get the seven pairs of animals.
[00:13:51] And it sounds to us in English, like it's just repeating that same thing, but the phrase male and his mate is different here than male and female was back in chapter six. We could just think, oh, well the author is just trying to kind of break up the language and say it the same thing in a different way, but probably there is a reason he's putting it this way instead of the same way that it's put in Genesis six.
[00:14:20] I do want to go on to verse 10 because I think this is part of the whole matrix of ideas here. So let's read Genesis seven verses six through 10, which says, quote, " Noah was 600 years old when the flood of waters came upon the earth. And Noah and his sons and his wife and his son's wives with him went into the ark to escape the waters of the flood. Of clean animals and of animals that are not clean and of birds and of everything that creeps on the ground. Two and two, male and female went into the Ark with Noah as God had commanded Noah. And after seven days, the waters of the flood came upon the earth." End quote.
[00:15:06] Okay, so we have a third place here where Noah is seen to be obedient. Again, the language is slightly different. We are back to mentioning the household, back to mentioning all of the animals. And here a repetition of the difference between clean and unclean animals.
[00:15:25] And I also want to note that after this there will be another mention of Noah's 600th year where the fountains of the great deep burst forth and yet another mention of Noah and his family going into the ark. There is so many times that they're mentioned going into the Ark in these two chapters that it gets a bit crazy, it seems. Almost like there might be a reason it is emphasizing that. By by the way, this will parallel the way that the idea of covenant is repeated after the flood as well. All of this repetition.
[00:16:01] All right, now that we've looked at the text, let's get into our strange questions. The first one is, why does the command seem to repeat? There is clearly a literary structure here.
[00:16:14] Now, Genesis seven is not merely the next thing that happens. It's a return to material that is already been introduced, and the fact that it cycles back again and that Genesis does this repeatedly, in many, many places is, in my opinion, a reason to discount the idea that the repetitions are just chronological.
[00:16:36] That doesn't mean that they can't be chronological. For instance, Genesis one and then Genesis two being Adam as a special creation amongst the larger group of humanity, for instance. But the fact that Genesis continually repeats itself highly suggests that maybe most of the time the repetition is for another reason beyond chronological necessity.
[00:17:04] I think the repetition is probably the first thing to be noticed and to mention here, even before the weird two and seven numbers and the clean unclean distinctions, because it's just so pointed, it's so repetitive that we really have to wonder why. It seems boring to us.
[00:17:25] Genesis six already told us about animals, but we're told again and even a third time, and so it's really easy for us as readers to kind of gloss over those things. But we do have to notice the texts in Genesis six and in Genesis seven, they're not identical. It doesn't duplicate it, and so it's repetition but not duplication.
[00:17:52] If the repetition is read a certain way, then the differences between the number two and the number seven becomes something like a general rule versus a specific qualification within the rule. The food is part of the preservation logic of the scene and the repetition of Noah doing this is the closure of a speech block.
[00:18:16] But there's another way to read it, and that is the idea that the passage reflects multiple traditions or multiple manuscripts, and so the tension can be treated as evidence of different compositions.
[00:18:30] So before resolving the other questions that we have about the passage that are more specific, we need to ask what kind of repetition is going on? Is it different authors? Or is it within the same kind of conceptual world where we have the repetition for a purpose?
[00:18:49] Backing up to our options here. The first one we have is that there is a general command and a more specific command. Genesis six gives the broad preservation command. Genesis seven comes with greater specificity, so a basic rule and a really particular rule. This explanation works pretty well because it explains why the command is repeated without requiring a contradiction. How chapter seven adds distinctions and how the narrative remains coherent in the final form of the text.
[00:19:25] It also explains why sacrifice can later emerge naturally without Genesis six having spelled out everything at once. Although, of course, we're still struggling with a lot of ideas as to how did they know about sacrifice? What did they understand about it? Did God have to come down and tell them exactly how to do it, and questions like that.
[00:19:47] So this explanation is pretty easy to explain. It fits the progression of the text, and it works in general teaching of what's going on here. But it can sound a little bit too tidy and it kind of ignores the literary tension that is pretty obvious here, and it kind of resolves the questions maybe overly quickly.
[00:20:11] And again, it's not really providing us a reason or a way as to how Noah understood about clean and unclean animals, because there is literally no buildup to that yet. There's no mention of that before. We have no idea of what that even would mean to Noah because the text has no additional information.
[00:20:32] So another option we have is recapitulation plus supplementation. Let me explain what I mean by that. Recapitulation is the idea that you have one thing happen and then you have that pattern in history. So chapter seven is not just more specific, but it is a renewed command that God is giving. So it recapitulates, or repeats, earlier instructions, but then it goes on to supplement them.
[00:21:04] So this explains why chapter seven feels like a fresh, divine speech of new revelation. It explains the repetition plus the added material and how it feels familiar, but also intensified. It's kind of like the text is slowing down and angling the same scene.
[00:21:25] Now, this obviously also overlaps heavily with the idea that this is a general rule and then a specific rule. But the added addition to this explanation is that it expands the ideas and it provides a reason and a rationale for Genesis seven being a new revelation to Noah, rather than just something he already knew.
[00:21:49] And of course, our third option for this is source criticism. The idea that we have different authors who wrote similar stories, but they have different details, and those texts just got crammed together by editors later, and they were never really ultimately harmonized or things taken out to make it look like it's not contradictory.
[00:22:13] So here, the repetitions and the tension is just because we have different traditions and different authors that are woven together, it explains why we have the repetition and why the details don't seem to line up in really neat modern sequence. But then we're left wondering how do we divide the text? Who is this author and who is that author and which one is actually correct?
[00:22:40] Our fourth option for this is what I might call a final form literary layering. Whatever the prehistory of the text may be, we might have multiple sources. But the passage as we have it is arranged in a way so that readers experience the repetition as theologically meaningful. So maybe we do have different authors, but the editors and the redactors of the text are putting these things together and not changing them because there's a real reason for the differences and there's a theological intentionality for the editing. Like they weren't taking out contradictions because they aren't really contradictions, anyway.
[00:23:25] Some representatives of these different positions, Gordon Wenham s ays that the flood narrative is highly patterned. He talks about repeated instructions and obedience formulas as structural markers to the text, and that Genesis six, nine through 22 and Genesis seven, one through five are distinct but related speech units.
[00:23:51] Now, Kenneth Matthews of the New American Commentary says that the repetitions belong to the deliberate coherence of Genesis one through 11 and should be read in terms of the final form's compositional design. Even if there are previous source texts, it doesn't really matter because those are not the final form and the authorized version of the text.
[00:24:14] And then John Walton will say that repetition is a standard ancient rhetorical feature and part of the text's theological patterning rather than a modern procedural manual.
[00:24:27] A really interesting point that Umberto Cassuto brings up, I'll just go ahead and quote from him for a little bit here. He says, quote, "In the history of world literature, heroic poetry, or the epos to call it by its Greek name, preceded narrative prose. And apparently there is a reason to believe that the latter in which, for instance, the vast majority of the sections of Genesis and many other sections of the Torah are written, first came into being as a sequel to and development of epic poetry, which both in its Eastern and Western forms evinces a great love of repetition due to the very nature of the epos, which was originally intended to be heard and not read. People who are gathered to listen to epic songs by a minstrel are particularly pleased when he begins a familiar and popular stanza. They find it easier, then, to follow the singer and as it were to participate in his song. Many and varied are the circumstances that conduced to reiteration in heroic poetry, and all of them are represented in the books of the Bible." End quote.
[00:25:43] In other words, what Cassuto is saying is that even before we have literary text and things written down, we have epic poetry. And in an epic poem, there is so much repetition. And so we could see some of that within the text here. But on the other hand, he's going to contrast that with narrative prose.
[00:26:07] You have epic poetry, but then you have epic poetry that gets written down in narrative prose, and that does change it, but it doesn't necessarily remove all of the repetitions. He says, quote, " On the other hand, narrative prose is not so fond of verbal repetitions for it was meant to be read rather than heard. And the reader, unlike the listener, has no predilection for what he already knows by heart. On the contrary, reiteration may at times be burdensome to him. Consequently, prose is inclined, when reverting to a given subject, to modify the expressions or to shorten them or to change their order. This is what happens in the narrative prose of the Pentateuch. However, abridgement and variation are not possible in every instance. For example, when the topic is essentially technical, as in the sections dealing with the work and the tabernacle, it is impossible to abbreviate or to vary the text. Then verbal repetitions occur as in epic poetry. First, it is related that the Lord commands Moses to make the Tabernacle and all its apertenences and explain to him all the details of the work. And then we are told that Moses carried out the task, and the particulars are restated in full. Complete sections recur in identical form with one change. In place of verbs in the imperative. Like make, et cetera. We find verbs of implementation made, et cetera. But when the subject is not primarily technical, as in the case of the construction of the tabernacle, and hence does not require meticulous exactitude of detail, the repetitions and prose are not word for word restatements. In the section of the flood, which is mainly concerned with narration of events and in which technical matters like the particulars of the building of the Ark do not predominate, the Torah uses chiefly the method of abridgement." End quote.
[00:28:13] He says a lot of more interesting things here after this as well, but basically what he's saying is that we have epic poetry that gets written down and when it's written down, some of the repetition is removed.
[00:28:27] Now, I wonder how much he would change or adjust some of these statements if he thought about the idea of an oral written work, as I've talked about recently, where, yes, we have things written down, but mostly it's written down in order to keep it intact. But really the prime purveyor of the text is still through an oral means. And as such, you don't wanna take out all of the repetition because if you took out all of the repetition, it becomes harder to actually remember. And in the case of something like the repetition in the story with the animals, if you took out the repetition, you're removing some of that teaching part of it as well.
[00:29:11] The emphasis is on, yes, all of the animals are coming in. But there is also to be a structure where you have to concern yourself with the idea of sacrifice. You have to concern yourself with how you're gonna deal with the animals after the flood.
[00:29:29] Okay, so now let's go on to our second strange question. Why does Genesis six say two of every kind? And then Genesis seven says seven.
[00:29:40] But actually before we get to that, I want to ask, does Noah collect them or do they come by themselves? Wenham suggested that even though it seems like Noah went out to collect them at first, that they really do just come by themselves.
[00:29:57] But again, I want to give another quote by Cassuto. He says, quote, " Two of every sort shall come into you to keep them alive. On the face of it, it appears as though this is an unnecessary repetition of what is already been stated in the previous verse. But actually there is no repetition here, but an additional explanation. Above it is stated, you shall bring into the Ark. Now, Noah might have queried this instruction and said, how is it possible for me to search out all of the different kinds of creatures upon the earth and bring them with me into the ark? To this potential question, the following answer is given. Two of every sort shall come into you of their own accord as a result of an inner urge that God would arouse within them for their own preservation and the preservation of their species. There will be no need for you to take the trouble to search for them. They will come in of their own accord to you so that you may keep them alive In the light of this interpretation, the meaning of the word bring in the preceding verse is you shall permit them to come into the ark. Proof of this is to be found in what we are told later on about the dove, and brought her into the ark with him, and it is certain that the dove came by herself." End quote.
[00:31:17] Now, Cassuto does follow kind of a Jewish and rabbinic reading here, and he gives a bit of quotes in defense of those things, but this is also a very solid Christian reading. We don't get a contradiction, even though in English we might think it's a contradiction, but we have to read very carefully.
[00:31:37] This also might kind of help guide us into why the two and the seven, simply because if the seven are clean animals that are gonna be used by the people, then Noah doesn't have to have them come. He already has a bunch of flocks and a bunch of clean animals. So the two animals are all coming from around creation to come into the Ark. But Noah didn't have to do anything about the seven clean animals because he already had those right at hand.
[00:32:09] Now, of course, is he gonna have possession of all of the clean animals in the world? Obviously not. But again, we have to read within the context of the author, and they're not thinking in terms of a globe and things like that. They're not trying to anticipate all of the apologetics objections, in other words.
[00:32:30] All right, so why the two animals and then the seven animals? Again, Genesis six sounds really broad, sounds pretty simple and complete. It has that creation language of the male and female, and Genesis seven then gets all complicated with the clean and unclean animals. But note really interestingly, that the birds also come in sevens, even though not all birds are clean.
[00:32:57] So again, these are kind of details that you might not really think about unless you've really stopped and paused with the text. I'm telling you, this section is way weirder than you've ever thought that it was, I think. Many more questions than most people will think about, but of course you're here in my podcast. So you probably have thought about all of these.
[00:33:20] So let's look at the main interpretive lanes that we have here. Number one, again, Genesis six is giving the baseline rule. Genesis seven is adding either an exception or a specification.
[00:33:35] Option number two, two animals is basically the minimum preservation principle. And we have to have clean animals that get a surplus of animals because they're clean, they're going to be eaten, they're gonna be used for sacrifice and so on. That seems fairly easy to understand, right?
[00:33:56] Then our third option is the source critical option of the different authors of the text. An author that is concerned about the cultic status of the people is going to write about the clean and unclean animals, but an author that is not concerned about that is only gonna be concerned with the pairs of animals.
[00:34:18] But of course we have a lot of readers and a lot of interpreters who are just more concerned about the final form and the broad preservation and the specific post flood significance of the animals.
[00:34:30] Gordon Wenham of the Word Biblical Commentary, again is going to really give us a lot of detail about the specifics of the Hebrew narrative. He says, quote, " Genesis seven, verse one through four is a scene three, a divine monologue addressed to Noah, instructing him to enter the Ark, corresponds to that of scene eight, which he says is in Genesis eight, verses 15 to 17, telling him to leave. Like scene one, this scene contains two commands: enter and you must take, separated by an explanation. The Lord said to Noah, the use of the divine name Yahweh here and in verse five has led to the ascription of Genesis seven, one through five, to J or the Yahwist source. However, in the present context, " because you, I have seen are righteous in this generation" clearly points back to six verse nine, which is the P source, for the same words, righteous and generation and contemporaries appear." End quote.
[00:35:41] So basically Gordon Wenham is dismantling the whole idea of JEDP or the documentary hypothesis and the source idea. It just doesn't really work out once you start comparing the pieces and how they really parallel each other in the complete text.
[00:36:00] Basically, I just think it's really silly to try and find a contradiction in these two numbers when there's a really easy explanation for it. When you have a sacrificial animals, you can't possibly take only two of them, or you'll kill off the entire species.
[00:36:18] All right, let's go to strange question number three. Why is the food verse right there? And you might not think that's a strange part of the narrative here, especially if you are thinking of it in chronological form. But I think it's a very pointed part of why it's here and it's not really gonna go against or blow anybody's mind to say that it is about preservation and sustaining the animals, keeping them alive. And that's kind of important, right? Cuz if they die on the Ark 'cause they don't have food, or if they have to eat each other, that's really quite problematic.
[00:36:55] So this might not really seem that strange of a question, but it does matter because of the vegetarian question, for instance. Was everyone supposed to be a vegetarian before the flood? And you know, that is absolutely a possibility here. But if you go back into my podcast archives, you'll see that I kind of push back against that idea that, well, maybe that's really not the case, because how do you get sacrificial context in Genesis four?
[00:37:25] Because sacrifice is about eating, and even if the sacrificial animals are entirely burnt up and people aren't supposed to eat them, you've got a couple of problems here. First of all, why is God doing something that he has prohibited humans from doing? Okay, so I'm not saying he can't do that because certainly God has a lot of things that he does and that are under his provision that are not under human provision. But how is that a fellowship meal if only God is eating? And second of all, how are people domesticating animals without eating them? I submit to you that historically and scientifically, that's just simply out of the question.
[00:38:08] From an archeological standpoint, from the information we have, we just simply know that people were domesticating animals in order to eat them. Yes, animals also have other functions. They can provide wool for clothing, they can provide milk for eating and cheese. But if you're producing animals for wool and for cheese, then you're butchering them later on in life, or maybe you're not butchering them at all. So if we're seeing them being butchered, why are they being butchered? They're being butchered young because that's where the food is the best. And that's just what we have in the archeological record for animals.
[00:38:51] Now, I mean that's just from a historical standpoint, can we say that all of that history comes post flood or post Eden at least where people are now doing evil things? I mean, sure. But again, if you're presuming that there are clean animals and that Noah knows what to do with those clean animals and that he already has flocks and that Noah is righteous, he's not part of the wicked, then he's keeping animals for food and he's not doing so in an unrighteous way.
[00:39:25] So the whole idea of vegetarian food, I think it matters more for the fact that we can't have animals eating each other on the Ark. So the food of every sort, doesn't actually mention here that that food has to all be vegetarian. Like the lions on the Ark aren't eating a bunch of hay, so perhaps the food is extra animals for the predators. It's a possibility. It's just as much a possibility as the vegetarian idea. That's what I'm saying. Not trying to say you can't go the vegetarian route, but rational reason and historical evidence and a whole bunch of other things are kind of pushing against that reality. So if you're kind of going for scientific explanations, well there's your options there.
[00:40:21] Wenham in Word Biblical Commentary says, quote, "The second command given to Noah in the opening scene ... the first was build an Ark... follows the explanation for these injunctions in verses 17 through 20. The wording of the command echoes both the creation injunctions about eating, you and they will have to eat it, with Genesis 1 29 through 30 and with the Garden of Eden's story. Take some of every edible food seems to make allusion to the taking and eating of the fruit, which was not to be eaten in Genesis three verse six, terms which run as leitmotifs throughout Genesis three. Noah, like Adam was told to eat only of divinely permitted food. Genesis seven two shows that Noah is presumed to be able to distinguish clean, edible, and unclean inedible animals." End quote..
[00:41:24] So here we have kind of an emphasis on the eating of the animals between clean and unclean, which is gonna be a major point that I'll get to. I probably will not really be talking too much about that today, but it's a really important point to notice. When we're talking about clean and unclean animals, are we talking about human diet? I will just leave that for you for the moment here.
[00:41:51] Now, Victor Hamilton in the New International Commentary on the Old Testament says, quote, " The reference to Noah's bringing aboard sufficient food to feed the passengers during the storm reminds one of Joseph's advice to the native Egyptians to gather up and store up sufficient grain to help them withstand the coming seven year famine in Genesis 41 verse 35." End quote.
[00:42:20] So Gordon Wenham is bringing up the connection to creation. And Victor Hamilton is bringing up the connection to the end of Genesis with Joseph and the grain and the famine.
[00:42:33] Kenneth Matthews in the New American Commentary is also going to call upon creation in this account. He says, quote, " As the Lord brought the animals to Adam to be named, this second Adam will bring the animal kingdom with you on the vessel, having the greater responsibility of their preservation, but also they are said to come to Noah indicating that God directs their way to the Ark ." End quote.
[00:43:02] Okay, so you see, once you start making these inter Genesis connections, it becomes really interesting, really quickly. But I do think there is a strong theological payoff to looking at this small little verse within the flood narrative. We have obviously an emphasis on preservation, and that is perhaps kind of obvious, but there's also some potential to go beyond the usual, everybody was a vegetarians before the Ark question here, as well.
[00:43:35] All right. Our fourth strange question for today is why do we get "Noah did this," and then more instructions after that? Because it really sounds very conclusive in Genesis six that Noah got it all done.
[00:43:50] Well probably the core explanation here is that Genesis six, verse 22 closes one speech unit, but not the entire section of flood narrative here. The phrase is functioning as a closure formula for what was just said. It doesn't imply that we're not gonna have more new information or that it's actually been executed, but it is the closure of this speech unit in the text, and that kind of helps so that we don't feel like Genesis 6 22 is premature.
[00:44:25] And again, we get a whole bunch of repeated obedience formulas and they do function as structural markers in the text. We have Genesis 6 22, Genesis seven, verse five, and then verse nine, and then verse 16.
[00:44:42] Word Biblical Commentary says, quote, " In contrast to the Gilgamesh Epic, which gives an elaborate and colorful description of the building and loading of the Ark, Genesis gives this brief, bald statement about Noah's obedience. Similar summaries are found in seven verse five, verse 19 and verse 16, but they do not constitute a complete scene as here. Did exactly as God commanded him, so he did. The phrasing exactly as literally according to all, and the repetition did so he did make this a very emphatic declaration of Noah's total obedience. Similar formula reoccur rarely in the Pentateuch except at the erection of the tabernacle and at some other high points in the wilderness wanderings. Within the context of the primeval history, verbal allusions to the refrain of Genesis 1: 3, 9, 11, 15, 24, 30, and it was so, and to Genesis two, verse 16, three verse 11 and 17 may be detected, implying that Noah's acts were more like God's than Adam's." End quote.
[00:46:06] That's quite interesting.
[00:46:09] Alright, so I'm going to introduce the question here, but I'm not gonna flesh it out fully. Our strange question number five is, why does Noah already know clean and unclean animals? This is probably the strangest detail in the whole cluster of questions, and I think there's a lot of presumptions here that we're not entirely aware that we hold. And remember my question previously about whether or not this is actually about human diet. That's kind of what we're presuming. But that's not the only option we have, and that's going to be probably kinda the emphasis of a whole different episode.
[00:46:52] Again, if we go with the option that Genesis six is broad and generic and is really calling back to creation and things broadly, and that Genesis seven is the introduction or revelation or the narrowing, or however you wanna put it into the idea of sacrifice and oh yeah, by the way, you can't just take two clean animals, otherwise you're gonna decimate the population, then well, you know, it's striking because this detailed purity legislation is gonna come much later in the Torah and it comes in really detailed form.
[00:47:33] And I think that may be why it seems so vastly strange to us today here in this section of the flood, because why do we have it explained so concretely and in such detailed emphasis where, oh, here's the animals that are clean, here's the animals that are unclean. We're gonna explain it all in detail later on.
[00:47:56] And a lot of that is really tied directly to the people and what they're allowed to eat and what they're allowed to not eat. Because not all clean animals even are appropriate for sacrifice. So is this emphasis really on sacrificial animals or is it on the idea of diet and what people are going to be allowed to eat or not eat?
[00:48:21] The obvious question is, how does Noah know this distinction? But a secondary question is what is the distinction even about? What is the purpose of it? And I think we kind of don't even usually ask that second question, but it might be the more important question, in fact. The introduction of clean and unclean animals means the story is no longer just about animal survival in general. It's not just about preservation, although it might still be about that. Because if the clean animals, and we're thinking in terms of sacrifice is in play here, or even in food, we do have the idea that you can't not just bring two or else you're gonna have to wait for them to then have children in order to be able to eat them or sacrifice.
[00:49:11] And we know that Noah, of course, sacrificed animals after the flood. Is it possible that he had pregnant animals and that they had an offspring and that he was able to sacrifice the offspring instead of the initial animals he took on the Ark? That actually is possible in some cases when you look at the gestation of a goat, for instance, which is absolutely fascinating in connection to the chronology of the Ark.
[00:49:39] But that will be another conversation entirely when we talk about the chronology of the flood. But so we do have some options here, as far as, well, maybe he took on pregnant animals, or maybe he took on two and two animals, but that doesn't leave out the idea that they could have already had babies in tow as well. But again, you see how we're kind of inserting a lot of " what ifs," and "maybe that's" into the flood narrative in order to get where we wanna go, instead of sitting with the text and asking, what does it even mean to begin with?
[00:50:16] Now, I think quite clearly, at minimum we can say that the author or the redactors of Genesis wants us to notice the distinction. I don't think they just accidentally forgot to edit something out. The distinction is crucial to understanding what's going on. And whatever explanation that you prefer, this different category that we have here in Genesis seven is doing some real work in the story. Something more specific is being preserved than mere biological continuation.
[00:50:51] I will quote from the IVP Bible Background Commentary. The IVP Bible Background Commentary is connected to my very favorite study Bible of all time, which is the Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible. The IVP Bible Background Commentary has a little bit more information, but both of them are the same kind of information.
[00:51:14] So the IVP Bible Background Commentary says, quote, " Clean and unclean before Moses. The distinction between clean and unclean animals was not an innovation established at Sinai, but is seen as early as Noah. Evidence from Egypt and Mesopotamia offer no system equivalent to the Israelites system of classification. While there are dietary restrictions in those cultures, they tend to be more limited. That is, certain animals restricted only to certain classes of people or on certain days of the month. Even here, one cannot assume that the classification has implications for their diet. Up to this time, no permission has been granted to eat meat. When meat was granted to them as food after the flood, there were no restrictions along the lines of clean and unclean. As a result, it appears that the classification concerned sacrifice, not diet in this period." End quote.
[00:52:18] So the reason this little section here of the commentary is so interesting is because most people are presuming that the clean and unclean distinction is about human diet, but the commentary is pointing towards sacrifice as the emphasis. But there could also be something even broader and, well, I'll just tip my hand a little bit here. We have reasons to question the idea that the concept is about diet for Israelites, or even necessarily sacrifice, particularly because not all clean animals were suitable for sacrifice. But on the other hand, it's a very interesting point about the sacrificial system. Was it about killing animals or was it about eating? And is the clean and unclean distinction simply about eating, whether it's for people or whether it's for sacrifice and God or the gods?
[00:53:14] All right, so I will again be talking about this a lot more in depth later. I'm going to suggest that there is a lot more to the status thing than we realize here.
[00:53:25] But at any rate, let's go to the usual scholarly explanations and interpretations here as to how and why Noah would understand clean and unclean animals. First option we have is that sacrificial distinctions may predate Sinai. And again, if you've listened to my previous conversations about purity before Sinai, this will not surprise you as an option.
[00:53:54] Cassuto says, quote, " The verse raises a question, how is it possible to speak of animals that are clean and not clean at a time when the Torah laws distinguishing between these categories had not yet been formulated? The explanation may be that the concepts of clean and unclean animals were already in existence prior to the Torah, even among the Gentiles, particularly in relation to sacrifices. Our verse does not refer to a distinction in human food. For according to the Bible, as we have noted, the diet at the time was purely vegetarian. The Babylonians and Assyrians, as a rule brought oblations only of herds and flocks, and in rare instances of mountain goats. When they sacrificed dogs or swines, these were not offerings to the gods, but gifts to the demons. For example, the female demon, lamatsu, or served as a substitute for a sick person so that his ailment would be transferred to the animal. If by chance a dog entered one of the temples of the gods, the sanctuary required a ceremony of purification. The inclusion of wild boars among offerings of sheep and oxen in the list of sacrifices that were customary in Ur of the Chaldeans at a later period in the time of the Selucids is quite exceptional. Already in the Sumerian story of the flood, the oldest recension we have of this tradition, it is expressly stated that the hero of the deluge offered up after his deliverance an ox and a sheep." End quote.
[00:55:36] Now, honestly, I think Cassuto kind of overstates the case a little bit. I think there is much more fuzziness here, but in general, a lot of this information could be seen as being the way that the ancient world structured the idea of animals and hierarchy and sacrifice.
[00:55:55] But another explanation for why and how this part of the flood story is here is that this is in the context of the later priestly idea of reality. So the priests are presuming that Noah is in alignment with them and they're not really trying to explain how or why. But really the narrator is using Israel's later vocabulary and ideas to describe an older world, and they're just presuming that that fits within their current conceptual reality.
[00:56:30] A third option we have is kind of a mediating view where we have sacrificial suitability that existed broadly in the ancient Near East, even if the full later purity system was not yet in view. So this is kind of the most balanced idea. And honestly it tracks along with the information we have in general.
[00:56:52] But Cassuto will still say, quote, " At this point, Noah was given a new precept, apart from the two creatures of every species that would come of their own accord, he was to take from his flocks and herds, seven pairs of every kind of clean animal. For the time being, the purpose was not revealed to him. Again, we have an injunction for which no reason is given and once more, the righteous man who obeys God's commandment unquestionably, is put to the test. The reason for the precept, as many expositors have perceived, becomes apparent later when we are informed, then Noah built an altar to the Lord and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. Had not Noah taken extra pairs of clean animals and birds into the ark, he would not have been able to offer sacrifices without completely exterminating the species involved." End quote.
[00:57:50] Now my problem with this is that God still is not instructing Noah to offer those animals. It says Noah did this. So this whole section is just really interesting part of the narrative of the flood and the way we read Scripture to me, because we insert so many ideas that are just not there and that we want to see there. Or that we just don't even realize we're inserting. It's like, oh, Noah did not know what the clean animals were for. And Noah also did not eat animals. Why on earth does Noah have flocks and herds, then?
[00:58:28] The disjunction of those two thoughts is not really readily apparent because we already have these ideas in our heads, right? And so we're not challenging some of their basic conceptions of what's going on here, and they just kinda slip in without our noticing them.
[00:58:46] Now what about the birds not being separated into clean and unclean? It's like you have way more birds than anything else on the Ark becasue unlike everything else, all birds need to come in those seven pairs.
[00:59:00] Cassuto says, quote, " The fact that the Bible does not differentiate here between clean and unclean flying creatures as it did above in the case of the animals constitutes at first sight a difficulty. According to the exegetical traditions of the talmudic sages and of the medieval commentators, this verse is to be understood on the strength of the distinction drawn in the preceding sentence to refer to the clean birds only. But such an interpretation is very forced. Today, the prevailing view calls for the emendation of the text. Several expositors hold that the whole of the first part of the verse up to the word female does not belong to the original text. Others in accordance with the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Septuagint add the adjective clean to the term flying creatures. There are even some exegetes who not only supply the word clean, but following the Greek text, also insert the words, and of all the flying creatures that are not clean, a pair, male and female. But even if we suppose that it was possible for a scribe to omit this line in error by skipping from the first mention of male and female to the second, it is hard to imagine that yet another mistake was made in the verse and that without adequate reason, the word clean was likewise left out. The Septuagint and Samaritan version simply conformed to their usual tendency of giving uniformity to the text and harmonized the verses. There is no need, however, for forced interpretation or for textual emandation. The Torah has also in mind that unclean species of flying creatures, or at least some of them, to the extent that Noah was able to catch them in regard to the flying creatures, the word all is not used , as it is in connection with the clean beasts. Of these two, Noah had to take seven pairs since he would have need in the future to make use of both categories, not only of the clean birds for sacrifices, but the two kinds together for the purpose of sending some of them forth to ascertain the state of the water upon the earth. Thus, we are told later that Noah employed to this end, both a raven, an unclean bird, and a dove, a clean bird. He could not tell at the outset how many birds would be necessary for this task, nor could he be sure that an accident would not befall one of them. If there were only two and a mishap occurred to one, that entire species would be destroyed." End quote.
[01:01:37] Yeah. But that later rationale also applies to literally all of the animals. If an elephant stepped on a chipmunk, then that chipmunk species would be doomed. But anyway, again, some interesting ideas there.
[01:01:52] I would really love to get into more ancient Near Eastern comparisons of Genesis and its neighbors and those texts regarding all of this, but I think already we're kind of tracking on some distinctive differences here, and probably if I asked you to make some of those comparative points, you probably could. What will be interesting as well as we continue on into the flood narrative and comparative stories with the flood is how or if any of these small details will survive into other stories and which ones might.
[01:02:26] So at any rate, is there tension here in the text? Yes, there is, and there are a lot of distinctive differences here, but that doesn't mean that they are contradictions. It doesn't mean we necessarily have to harmonize them to make problems go away. And there's a whole bunch of different interpretive options that are quite valid in a number of these places.
[01:02:51] What I do want to get into later on is a little bit more context with the clean and the unclean animals and how can we even understand that within the broader world and within the context of, say, Leviticus, where we have clean and unclean and purification going on, and all of these ideas that we have a hard time wrapping our minds around.
[01:03:14] Are those the same as the distinctive differences between the clean and unclean animals, or are they different? I think that they are related, but I also think that they're not always related in the ways that we think that they are. And so that will be a fun little exploration that we will be going down into soon.
[01:03:35] But again, I'm gonna just wrap up for this episode because there's just way too much to talk about there, and I couldn't really fit it in with all of the other interesting questions that we have here. So, for now, I'm gonna pass the torch over to you guys and ask what other strange questions do you have regarding the animals and the Ark, because I guarantee I did not hit on nearly all of the strange aspects here.
[01:04:01] I could just talk about the animals in the ark and the animals in the ancient Near East for ages. So I will try not to do that, but I have to put a plug in for my episode on the donkeys, okay? And that is how interesting things get and how deeply into the context and intertextuality of Scripture you can get simply by following the pattern and the narrative of even one strand of the animal narrative.
[01:04:30] So let me know what you guys notice. Let me know what you guys think about. What strangeness pops up to you, and what questions do you have regarding animals in the Bible. At any rate, I will leave that for you guys, and thank you again for listening. Really appreciate all of you who listen, who share the episodes. And who think about these things. And a particular mention to all of you who support me financially through Patreon, through PayPal, through my Biblical theology community. I really deeply appreciate all of you guys, and I wish everyone listening a blessed week and we will see you later.
