Genesis 9

Chapter 9

Covenant of the Rainbow

¹And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “^aBe fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth.

²“The fear of you and the terror of you will be on every beast of the earth and on every bird of the ¹sky; with everything that creeps on the ground, and all the fish of the sea, into your hand they are given.

³“Every moving thing that is alive shall be food for you; I give all to you, ^aas I gave the green plant.

⁴“Only you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, ^aits blood.

⁵“Surely I will require ^1ayour lifeblood; ^2bfrom every beast I will require it. And from every man, from every man’s brother I will require the life of man.

⁶“^aWhoever sheds man’s blood,

By man his blood shall be shed,

For ^bin the image of God

He made man.

⁷“As for you, ^abe fruitful and multiply;

¹Populate the earth abundantly and multiply in it.”

⁸Then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying,

⁹“Now behold, ^aI Myself do establish My covenant with you, and with your ¹descendants after you;

¹⁰and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, even every beast of the earth.

¹¹“I establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall ^anever again be cut off by the water of the flood, ^bneither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth.”

¹²God said, “This is ^athe sign of the covenant which I am making between Me and you and every living creature that is with you, for ¹all successive generations;

¹³I set My ^abow in the cloud, and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between Me and the earth.

¹⁴“It shall come about, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow will be seen in the cloud,

¹⁵and ^aI will remember My covenant, which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and ^bnever again shall the water become a flood to destroy all flesh.

¹⁶“When the bow is in the cloud, then I will look upon it, to remember the ^aeverlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.”

¹⁷And God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant which I have established between Me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

¹⁸Now the sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem and Ham and Japheth; and ^aHam was the father of Canaan.

¹⁹These three were the sons of Noah, and ^afrom these the whole earth was ¹populated.

²⁰Then Noah began ¹farming and planted a vineyard.

²¹He drank of the wine and ^abecame drunk, and uncovered himself inside his tent.

²²Ham, the father of Canaan, ^asaw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brothers outside.

²³But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it upon both their shoulders and walked backward and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were ¹turned away, so that they did not see their father’s nakedness.

²⁴When Noah awoke from his wine, he knew what his youngest son had done to him.

²⁵So he said,

“^aCursed be Canaan;

^1bA servant of servants

He shall be to his brothers.”

²⁶He also said,

“^aBlessed be the Lord,

The God of Shem;

And let Canaan be ¹his servant.

²⁷“^aMay God enlarge Japheth,

And let him dwell in the tents of Shem;

And let Canaan be ¹his servant.”

²⁸Noah lived three hundred and fifty years after the flood.

²⁹So all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years, and he died.