8And God remembered Noah and all the wild animals, and all the domesticated animals that were with him in the ark. And God caused a wind to blow^a over the earth, and the waters subsided. ²And the fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens^b were closed, and the rain from the heavens^c was restrained. ³And the waters receded from the earth gradually,^d and the waters abated at the end of one hundred and fifty days. ⁴And the ark came to rest in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat. ⁵And the waters continued to recede^e to the tenth month; in the tenth month, on the first of the month, the tops of the mountains appeared. ⁶And it happened that at the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark that he had made. ⁷And he sent out a^f raven;^g it went to and fro^h until the waters were dried up from upon the earth. ⁸And he sent out aⁱ dove^j to see whether the waters had subsided from upon the face of the ground. ⁹But the dove did not find a resting place for the sole of her foot, and she returned to him into the ark, for the waters were still on the face of all the earth. And he stretched out his hand and took her, and brought her to himself into the ark. ¹⁰And he waited another seven days, and again he sent out^k the dove from the ark. ¹¹And the dove came to him in the evening,^l and behold, a freshly-picked olive tree leaf was in her mouth. And Noah knew that the waters had subsided from upon the earth. ¹²And he waited seven more days,^m and he sent out the dove. But it did not return again to him. ¹³And it happened that, in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first day of the month, the waters dried up from upon the earth. And Noah removed the covering of the ark and looked. And behold, the face of the ground was dried up. ¹⁴And in the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry. ¹⁵And God spoke to Noah, saying: ¹⁶“Go out from the ark, you and your wife, and your sons, and your sons’ wives with you. ¹⁷Bring out with you all the living things which are with you, from all the living creatures—birds, and animals, and everything that creeps on the earth, and let them swarm on the earth and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” ¹⁸Soⁿ Noah went out, with^o his sons and his wife, and the wives of his sons with him. ¹⁹Every animal, every creeping thing, and every bird, and everything that moves upon the earth, according to its families, went out from the ark. ²⁰And Noah built an altar to Yahweh, and he took from all the clean animals and from all the clean birds, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. ²¹And Yahweh smelled the soothing fragrance, and Yahweh said to himself,^p “Never again will I curse^q the ground for the sake of humankind, because the inclination of the heart of humankind is evil from his youth. Nor will I ever again destroy^r all life as I have done. ²²As long as the earth endures,^s seed and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will not cease.

God’s Covenant with Noah and Humankind

9And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. ²And fear of you and dread of you shall be upon every animal of the earth, and on every bird of heaven,^a and on everything that moves upon the ground, and on all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they shall be given. ³Every moving thing that lives shall be for you as food. As I gave the green plants to you, I now give you everything. ⁴Only you shall not eat raw flesh with blood in it.^b ⁵And^c your lifeblood^d I will require; from every animal^e I will require it. And from the hand of humankind, from the hand of each man to his brother I will require the life of humankind.

⁶“As for the one shedding the blood of humankind,

by humankind his blood shall be shed,

for God made humankind in his own image.

⁷“And you, be fruitful and multiply, swarm on the earth and multiply in it.” ⁸And God said to Noah and to his sons with him, ⁹“As for me, behold, I am establishing my covenant with you and with your seed after you, ¹⁰and with every living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and every animal of the earth with you, from all that came out of the ark to all the animals of the earth. ¹¹I am establishing my covenant with you, that never again will all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, nor will there ever be a flood that destroys the earth.” ¹²And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I am making between me and you, and between every living creature that is with you for future generations. ¹³My bow I have set in the clouds, and it shall be for a sign of the covenant between me and between the earth. ¹⁴And when I make clouds appear over the earth the bow shall be seen in the clouds. ¹⁵Then^f I will remember my covenant that is between me and you, and between every living creature, with all flesh. And the waters of a flood will never again cause the destruction^g of all flesh. ¹⁶The bow shall be in the clouds, and I will see it, so as to remember the everlasting covenant between God and between every living creature, with all flesh that is upon the earth.” ¹⁷And God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant which I am establishing between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.”

Noah’s Descendants

¹⁸Now^h the sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.) ¹⁹These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was populated.ⁱ ²⁰And Noah began to be a man of the ground, and he planted a vineyard. ²¹And he drank some of the wine and became drunk, and he exposed himself in the midst of his tent. ²²And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and he told his two brothers outside. ²³Then^j Shem and Japheth took a garment, and the two of them put it on their shoulders and, walking backward, they covered the nakedness of their father. And their faces were turned backward, so that^k they did not see the nakedness of their father. ²⁴Then^l Noah awoke from his drunkenness,^m and he knew what his youngest son had done to him. ²⁵And he said,

“Cursed be Canaan,

a slave of slaves he shall be to his brothers.”

²⁶Thenⁿ he said,

“Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Shem,

and let Canaan be a slave to them.

²⁷May God make space for Japheth,

and let him dwell in the tents of Shem,

and let Canaan be a slave for him.”

²⁸And Noah lived three hundred and fifty years after the flood. ²⁹And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years, and he died.

Read in Logos

Footnotes

aOr “go”
bOr “the sky”
cOr “the sky”
dLiterally “going and returning”
eLiterally “going and receding”
fOr “the”
gOr “crow”
hLiterally “it went out, going out and returning”
iOr “the”
jLiterally “and he sent out a dove from him”
kLiterally “he added to send”
lLiterally “at the time of the evening”
mLiterally “again another seven days”
nOr “And”
oOr “and”
pLiterally “to his heart”
qLiterally “I will not add to curse again”
rLiterally “And I will not add again to destroy”
sLiterally “While all the days of the earth”
aOr “the sky”
bLiterally “flesh with its life, its blood”
cOr “only”; the same word that occurs at the beginning of v. 4
dLiterally “your blood belonging to your life”
eLiterally “from the hand of every animal”
fOr “And”
gLiterally “be to destroy”
hOr “And”
iLiterally “all the earth branched out”
jOr “And”
kOr “and”
lOr “And”
mOr “his wine”
nOr “And”