Genesis 7:1-24

7:1 The Lord said to Noah, “Come into the ark, you and all your household, for I consider you godly among this generation. ¹  7:2 You must take with you seven ²  of every kind of clean animal, ³  the male and its mate, ⁴  two of every kind of unclean animal, the male and its mate, 7:3 and also seven ⁵  of every kind of bird in the sky, male and female, ⁶  to preserve their offspring ⁷  on the face of the earth. 7:4 For in seven days ⁸  I will cause it to rain ⁹  on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the ground every living thing that I have made.”

7:5 And Noah did all ¹⁰  that the Lord commanded him.

7:6 Noah ¹¹  was 600 years old when the floodwaters engulfed ¹²  the earth. 7:7 Noah entered the ark along with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives because ¹³  of the floodwaters. 7:8 Pairs ¹⁴  of clean animals, of unclean animals, of birds, and of everything that creeps along the ground, 7:9 male and female, came into the ark to Noah, ¹⁵  just as God had commanded him. ¹⁶  7:10 And after seven days the floodwaters engulfed the earth. ¹⁷ 

7:11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month – on that day all the fountains of the great deep ¹⁸  burst open and the floodgates of the heavens ¹⁹  were opened. 7:12 And the rain fell ²⁰  on the earth forty days and forty nights.

7:13 On that very day Noah entered the ark, accompanied by his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, along with his wife and his sons’ three wives. ²¹  7:14 They entered, ²²  along with every living creature after its kind, every animal after its kind, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, everything with wings. ²³  7:15 Pairs ²⁴  of all creatures ²⁵  that have the breath of life came into the ark to Noah. 7:16 Those that entered were male and female, ²⁶  just as God commanded him. Then the Lord shut him in.

7:17 The flood engulfed the earth for forty days. As the waters increased, they lifted the ark and raised it above the earth. 7:18 The waters completely overwhelmed ²⁷  the earth, and the ark floated ²⁸  on the surface of the waters. 7:19 The waters completely inundated ²⁹  the earth so that even ³⁰  all the high mountains under the entire sky were covered. 7:20 The waters rose more than twenty feet ³¹  above the mountains. ³²  7:21 And all living things ³³  that moved on the earth died, including the birds, domestic animals, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all humankind. 7:22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life ³⁴  in its nostrils died. 7:23 So the Lord ³⁵  destroyed ³⁶  every living thing that was on the surface of the ground, including people, animals, creatures that creep along the ground, and birds of the sky. ³⁷  They were wiped off the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark survived. ³⁸  7:24 The waters prevailed over ³⁹  the earth for 150 days.

Genesis 6:1

God’s Grief over Humankind’s Wickedness

6:1 When humankind ⁴⁰  began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born ⁴¹  to them, ⁴² 

Proverbs 27:22

27:22 If you should pound ⁴³  the fool in the mortar

among the grain ⁴⁴  with the pestle,

his foolishness would not depart from him. ⁴⁵ 

Isaiah 9:13

9:13 The people did not return to the one who struck them,

they did not seek reconciliation ⁴⁶  with the Lord who commands armies.

Jeremiah 8:5-6

8:5 Why, then, do these people of Jerusalem ⁴⁷ 

continually turn away from me in apostasy?

They hold fast to their deception. ⁴⁸ 

They refuse to turn back to me. ⁴⁹ 

8:6 I have listened to them very carefully, ⁵⁰ 

but they do not speak honestly.

None of them regrets the evil he has done.

None of them says, “I have done wrong!” ⁵¹ 

All of them persist in their own wayward course ⁵² 

like a horse charging recklessly into battle.

Jeremiah 25:5-7

25:5 He said through them, ⁵³  ‘Each of you must turn from your wicked ways and stop doing the evil things you are doing. ⁵⁴  If you do, I will allow you to continue to live here in the land that I gave to you and your ancestors as a lasting possession. ⁵⁵  25:6 Do not pay allegiance to ⁵⁶  other gods and worship and serve them. Do not make me angry by the things that you do. ⁵⁷  Then I will not cause you any harm.’ 25:7 So, now the Lord says, ⁵⁸  ‘You have not listened to me. But ⁵⁹  you have made me angry by the things that you have done. ⁶⁰  Thus you have brought harm on yourselves.’

Jeremiah 35:15-17

35:15 I sent all my servants the prophets to warn you over and over again. They said, “Every one of you, stop doing the evil things you have been doing and do what is right. ⁶¹  Do not pay allegiance to other gods ⁶²  and worship them. Then you can continue to live in this land that I gave to you and your ancestors.” But you did not pay any attention or listen to me. 35:16 Yes, ⁶³  the descendants of Jonadab son of Rechab have carried out the orders that their ancestor gave them. But you people ⁶⁴  have not obeyed me! 35:17 So I, the Lord, the God who rules over all, the God of Israel, say: ⁶⁵  “I will soon bring on Judah and all the citizens of Jerusalem all the disaster that I threatened to bring on them. I will do this because I spoke to them but they did not listen. I called out to them but they did not answer.”’”

Amos 4:6-13

4:6 “But surely I gave ⁶⁶  you no food to eat in any of your cities;

you lacked food everywhere you live. ⁶⁷ 

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:7 “I withheld rain from you three months before the harvest. ⁶⁸ 

I gave rain to one city, but not to another.

One field ⁶⁹  would get rain, but the field that received no rain dried up.

4:8 People from ⁷⁰  two or three cities staggered into one city to get ⁷¹  water,

but remained thirsty. ⁷² 

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:9 “I destroyed your crops ⁷³  with blight and disease.

Locusts kept ⁷⁴  devouring your orchards, ⁷⁵  vineyards, fig trees, and olive trees.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:10 “I sent against you a plague like one of the Egyptian plagues. ⁷⁶ 

I killed your young men with the sword,

along with the horses you had captured.

I made the stench from the corpses ⁷⁷  rise up into your nostrils.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:11 “I overthrew some of you the way God ⁷⁸  overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. ⁷⁹ 

You were like a burning stick ⁸⁰  snatched from the flames.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

4:12 “Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel.

Because I will do this to you,

prepare to meet your God, Israel! ⁸¹ 

4:13 For here he is!

He ⁸²  formed the mountains and created the wind.

He reveals ⁸³  his plans ⁸⁴  to men.

He turns the dawn into darkness ⁸⁵ 

and marches on the heights of the earth.

The Lord, the God who commands armies, ⁸⁶  is his name!”

Zechariah 1:4

1:4 “Do not be like your ancestors, to whom the former prophets called out, saying, ‘The Lord who rules over all says, “Turn now from your evil wickedness,”’ but they would by no means obey me,” says the Lord.

[7:1]  ¹ tn Heb “for you I see [as] godly before me in this generation.” The direct object (“you”) is placed first in the clause to give it prominence. The verb “to see” here signifies God’s evaluative discernment.

[7:2]  ² tn Or “seven pairs” (cf. NRSV).

[7:2]  ³ sn For a study of the Levitical terminology of “clean” and “unclean,” see L. E. Toombs, IDB 1:643.

[7:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “a male and his female” (also a second time at the end of this verse). The terms used here for male and female animals (אִישׁ, ’ish) and אִשָּׁה, ’ishah) normally refer to humans.

[7:3]  ⁵ tn Or “seven pairs” (cf. NRSV).

[7:3]  ⁶ tn Here (and in v. 9) the Hebrew text uses the normal generic terms for “male and female” (זָכָר וּנְקֵבָה, zakhar unÿqevah).

[7:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “to keep alive offspring.”

[7:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “for seven days yet,” meaning “after [or “in”] seven days.”

[7:4]  ⁹ tn The Hiphil participle מַמְטִיר (mamtir, “cause to rain”) here expresses the certainty of the act in the imminent future.

[7:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “according to all.”

[7:6]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Now Noah was.” The disjunctive clause (conjunction + subject + predicate nominative after implied “to be” verb) provides background information. The age of Noah receives prominence.

[7:6]  ¹² tn Heb “and the flood was water upon.” The disjunctive clause (conjunction + subject + verb) is circumstantial/temporal in relation to the preceding clause. The verb הָיָה (hayah) here carries the nuance “to come” (BDB 225 s.v. הָיָה). In this context the phrase “come upon” means “to engulf.”

[7:7]  ¹³ tn The preposition מִן (min) is causal here, explaining why Noah and his family entered the ark.

[7:8]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “two two” meaning “in twos.”

[7:9]  ¹⁵ tn The Hebrew text of vv. 8-9a reads, “From the clean animal[s] and from the animal[s] which are not clean and from the bird[s] and everything that creeps on the ground, two two they came to Noah to the ark, male and female.”

[7:9]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Noah”; the pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[7:10]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “came upon.”

[7:11]  ¹⁸ tn The Hebrew term תְּהוֹם (tÿhom, “deep”) refers to the watery deep, the salty ocean – especially the primeval ocean that surrounds and underlies the earth (see Gen 1:2).

[7:11]  ¹⁹ sn On the prescientific view of the sky reflected here, see L. I. J. Stadelmann, The Hebrew Conception of the World (AnBib), 46.

[7:12]  ²⁰ tn Heb “was.”

[7:13]  ²¹ tn Heb “On that very day Noah entered, and Shem and Ham and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and the wife of Noah, and the three wives of his sons with him into the ark.”

[7:14]  ²² tn The verb “entered” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[7:14]  ²³ tn Heb “every bird, every wing.”

[7:15]  ²⁴ tn Heb “two two” meaning “in twos.”

[7:15]  ²⁵ tn Heb “flesh.”

[7:16]  ²⁶ tn Heb “Those that went in, male and female from all flesh they went in.”

[7:18]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and the waters were great and multiplied exceedingly.” The first verb in the sequence is וַיִּגְבְּרוּ (vayyigbÿru, from גָּבַר, gavar), meaning “to become great, mighty.” The waters did not merely rise; they “prevailed” over the earth, overwhelming it.

[7:18]  ²⁸ tn Heb “went.”

[7:19]  ²⁹ tn Heb “and the waters were great exceedingly, exceedingly.” The repetition emphasizes the depth of the waters.

[7:19]  ³⁰ tn Heb “and.”

[7:20]  ³¹ tn Heb “rose fifteen cubits.” Since a cubit is considered by most authorities to be about eighteen inches, this would make the depth 22.5 feet. This figure might give the modern reader a false impression of exactness, however, so in the translation the phrase “fifteen cubits” has been rendered “more than twenty feet.”

[7:20]  ³² tn Heb “the waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward and they covered the mountains.” Obviously, a flood of twenty feet did not cover the mountains; the statement must mean the flood rose about twenty feet above the highest mountain.

[7:21]  ³³ tn Heb “flesh.”

[7:22]  ³⁴ tn Heb “everything which [has] the breath of the spirit of life in its nostrils from all which is in the dry land.”

[7:23]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and he”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:23]  ³⁶ tn Heb “wiped away” (cf. NRSV “blotted out”).

[7:23]  ³⁷ tn Heb “from man to animal to creeping thing and to the bird of the sky.”

[7:23]  ³⁸ tn The Hebrew verb שָׁאָר (sha’ar) means “to be left over; to survive” in the Niphal verb stem. It is the word used in later biblical texts for the remnant that escapes judgment. See G. F. Hasel, “Semantic Values of Derivatives of the Hebrew Root só’r,” AUSS 11 (1973): 152-69.

[7:24]  ³⁹ sn The Hebrew verb translated “prevailed over” suggests that the waters were stronger than the earth. The earth and everything in it were no match for the return of the chaotic deep.

[6:1]  ⁴⁰ tn The Hebrew text has the article prefixed to the noun. Here the article indicates the generic use of the word אָדָם (’adam): “humankind.”

[6:1]  ⁴¹ tn This disjunctive clause (conjunction + subject + verb) is circumstantial to the initial temporal clause. It could be rendered, “with daughters being born to them.” For another example of such a disjunctive clause following the construction וַיְהִיכִּי (vayÿhiki, “and it came to pass when”), see 2 Sam 7:1.

[6:1]  ⁴² tn The pronominal suffix is third masculine plural, indicating that the antecedent “humankind” is collective.

[27:22]  ⁴³ tn The verb means “to pound” in a mortar with a pestle (cf. NRSV “Crush”; NLT “grind”). The imperfect is in a conditional clause, an unreal, hypothetical condition to make the point.

[27:22]  ⁴⁴ tn The Hebrew term רִיפוֹת (rifot) refers to some kind of grain spread out to dry and then pounded. It may refer to barley groats (coarsely ground barley), but others have suggested the term means “cheeses” (BDB 937 s.v.). Most English versions have “grain” without being more specific; NAB “grits.”

[27:22]  ⁴⁵ tn The LXX contains this paraphrase: “If you scourge a fool in the assembly, dishonoring him, you would not remove his folly.” This removes the imagery of mortar and pestle from the verse. Using the analogy of pounding something in a mortar, the proverb is saying even if a fool was pounded or pulverized, meaning severe physical punishment, his folly would not leave him – it is too ingrained in his nature.

[9:13]  ⁴⁶ tn This verse describes the people’s response to the judgment described in vv. 11-12. The perfects are understood as indicating simple past.

[8:5]  ⁴⁷ tc The text is quite commonly emended, changing שׁוֹבְבָה הָעָם (shovÿvah ha’am) to שׁוֹבָב הָעָם (shovav ha’am) and omitting יְרוּשָׁלַםִ (yÿrushalaim); this is due to the anomaly of a feminine singular verb with a masculine singular subject and the fact that the word “Jerusalem” is absent from one Hebrew ms and the LXX. However, it is possible that this is a case where the noun “Jerusalem” is a defining apposition to the word “these people,” an apposition which GKC 425 §131.k calls “permutation.” In this case the verb could be attracted to the appositional noun and there would be no reason to emend the text. The MT is undoubtedly the harder reading and is for that reason to be preferred.

[8:5]  ⁴⁸ tn Or “to their allegiance to false gods,” or “to their false professions of loyalty”; Heb “to deceit.” Either “to their mistaken beliefs” or “to their allegiance to false gods” would fit the preceding context. The former is more comprehensive than the latter and was chosen for that reason.

[8:5]  ⁴⁹ sn There is a continuing play on the same root word used in the preceding verse. Here the words “turn away from me,” “apostasy,” and “turn back to me” are all forms from the root that was translated “go the wrong way” and “turn around” in v. 4. The intended effect is to contrast Judah’s recalcitrant apostasy with the usual tendency to try and correct one’s mistakes.

[8:6]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “I have paid attention and I have listened.” This is another case of two concepts being joined by “and” where one expresses the main idea and the other acts as an adverbial or adjectival modifier (a figure called hendiadys).

[8:6]  ⁵¹ tn Heb “What have I done?” The addition of the word “wrong” is implicit in the context and is supplied in the translation for clarity. The rhetorical question does not function as a denial of wrongdoing, but rather as contrite shock at one’s own wrongdoing. It is translated as a declaration for the sake of clarity.

[8:6]  ⁵² tn Heb “each one of them turns aside into their own running course.”

[25:5]  ⁵³ tn Heb “saying.” The infinitive goes back to “he sent”; i.e., “he sent, saying.”

[25:5]  ⁵⁴ tn Heb “Turn [masc. pl.] each person from his wicked way and from the evil of your [masc. pl.] doings.” See the same demand in 23:22.

[25:5]  ⁵⁵ tn Heb “gave to you and your fathers with reference to from ancient times even unto forever.” See the same idiom in 7:7.

[25:6]  ⁵⁶ tn Heb “follow after.” See the translator’s note on 2:5 for this idiom.

[25:6]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “make me angry with the work of your hands.” The term “work of your own hands” is often interpreted as a reference to idolatry as is clearly the case in Isa 2:8; 37:19. However, the parallelism in 25:14 and the context in 32:30 show that it is more general and refers to what they have done. That is likely the meaning here as well.

[25:7]  ⁵⁸ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[25:7]  ⁵⁹ tn This is a rather clear case where the Hebrew particle לְמַעַן (lÿma’an) introduces a consequence and not a purpose, contrary to the dictum of BDB 775 s.v. מַעַן note 1. They have not listened to him in order to make him angry but with the result that they have made him angry by going their own way. Jeremiah appears to use this particle for result rather than purpose on several other occasions (see, e.g., 7:18, 19; 27:10, 15; 32:29).

[25:7]  ⁶⁰ tn Heb “make me angry with the work of your hands.” The term “work of your own hands” is often interpreted as a reference to idolatry as is clearly the case in Isa 2:8; 37:19. However, the parallelism in 25:14 and the context in 32:30 show that it is more general and refers to what they have done. That is likely the meaning here as well.

[35:15]  ⁶¹ tn Heb “Turn, each of you, from his [= your] wicked way and make good your deeds.” Compare 18:11 where the same idiom occurs with the added term of “make good your ways.”

[35:15]  ⁶² tn Heb “Don’t go after/follow other gods.” See the translator’s note on 2:5 for an explanation of the idiom and see 11:10; 13:10; 25:6 for the same idiom.

[35:16]  ⁶³ tn This is an attempt to represent the particle כִּי (ki) which is probably not really intensive here (cf. BDB 472 s.v. כִּי 1.e) but is one of those causal uses of כִּי that BDB discusses on 473-74 s.v. כִּי 3.c where the cause is really the failure of the people of Judah and Jerusalem to listen/obey. I.e., the causal particle is at the beginning of the sentence so as not to interrupt the contrast drawn.

[35:16]  ⁶⁴ tn Heb “this people.” However, the speech is addressed to the people of Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem, so the second person is retained in English. In addition to the stylistic difference that Hebrew exhibits in the rapid shift between persons (second to third and third to second, which have repeatedly been noted and documented from GKC 462 §144.p) there may be a subtle rhetorical reason for the shift here. The shift from direct address to indirect address which characterizes this verse and the next may reflect the Lord’s rejection of the people he is addressing. A similar shift takes place in Wisdom’s address to the simple minded, fools, and mockers in Prov 1:28-32 after the direct address of 1:22-27.

[35:17]  ⁶⁵ tn Heb “Therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of armies, the God of Israel.” For the title see 7:13 and the study note on 2:19. The first person address is again used in the translation because this whole section is a speech from the Lord (see vv. 12-13).

[4:6]  ⁶⁶ tn The Hebrew construction is emphatic (pronoun + verb). It underscores the stark contrast between the judgments that the Lord had been sending with the God of blessing Israel was celebrating in its worship (4:4-5).

[4:6]  ⁶⁷ tn Heb “But I gave to you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and lack of food in all your places.” The phrase “cleanness of teeth” is a vivid way of picturing the famine Israel experienced.

[4:7]  ⁶⁸ sn Rain…three months before the harvest refers to the rains of late March-early April.

[4:7]  ⁶⁹ tn Heb “portion”; KJV, ASV “piece”; NASB “part.” The same word occurs a second time later in this verse.

[4:8]  ⁷⁰ tn The words “people from” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[4:8]  ⁷¹ tn Heb “to drink.”

[4:8]  ⁷² tn Or “were not satisfied.”

[4:9]  ⁷³ tn Heb “you.” By metonymy the crops belonging to these people are meant. See the remainder of this verse, which describes the agricultural devastation caused by locusts.

[4:9]  ⁷⁴ tn The Hiphil infinitive construct is taken adverbially (“kept”) and connected to the activity of the locusts (NJPS). It also could be taken with the preceding sentence and related to the Lord’s interventions (“I kept destroying,” cf. NEB, NJB, NIV, NRSV), or it could be understood substantivally in construct with the following nouns (“Locusts devoured your many orchards,” cf. NASB; cf. also KJV, NKJV).

[4:9]  ⁷⁵ tn Or “gardens.”

[4:10]  ⁷⁶ tn Heb “in the manner [or “way”] of Egypt.”

[4:10]  ⁷⁷ tn Heb “of your camps [or “armies”].”

[4:11]  ⁷⁸ tn Several English versions substitute the first person pronoun (“I”) here for stylistic reasons (e.g., NIV, NCV, TEV, CEV, NLT).

[4:11]  ⁷⁹ tn Heb “like God’s overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah.” The divine name may be used in an idiomatic superlative sense here, in which case one might translate, “like the great [or “disastrous”] overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah.”

[4:11]  ⁸⁰ tn Heb “like that which is burning.”

[4:12]  ⁸¹ tn The Lord appears to announce a culminating judgment resulting from Israel’s obstinate refusal to repent. The following verse describes the Lord in his role as sovereign judge, but it does not outline the judgment per se. For this reason F. I. Andersen and D. N. Freedman (Amos [AB], 450) take the prefixed verbal forms as preterites referring to the series of judgments detailed in vv. 6-11. It is more likely that a coming judgment is in view, but that its details are omitted for rhetorical effect, creating a degree of suspense (see S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 149-50) that will find its solution in chapter 5. This line is an ironic conclusion to the section begun at 4:4. Israel thought they were meeting the Lord at the sanctuaries, yet they actually had misunderstood how he had been trying to bring them back to himself. Now Israel would truly meet the Lord – not at the sanctuaries, but face-to-face in judgment.

[4:13]  ⁸² tn Heb “For look, the one who.” This verse is considered to be the first hymnic passage in the book. The others appear at 5:8-9 and 9:5-6. Scholars debate whether these verses were originally part of a single hymn or three distinct pieces deliberately placed in each context for particular effect.

[4:13]  ⁸³ tn Or “declares” (NAB, NASB).

[4:13]  ⁸⁴ tn Or “his thoughts.” The translation assumes that the pronominal suffix refers to God and that divine self-revelation is in view (see 3:7). If the suffix refers to the following term אָדַם (’adam, “men”), then the expression refers to God’s ability to read men’s minds.

[4:13]  ⁸⁵ tn Heb “he who makes dawn, darkness.” The meaning of the statement is unclear. The present translation assumes that allusion is made to God’s approaching judgment, when the light of day will be turned to darkness (see 5:20). Other options include: (1) “He makes the dawn [and] the darkness.” A few Hebrew mss, as well as the LXX, add the conjunction (“and”) between the two nouns. (2) “He turns darkness into glimmering dawn” (NJPS). See S. M. Paul (Amos [Hermeneia], 154), who takes שָׁחַר (shakhar) as “blackness” rather than “dawn” and עֵיפָה (’efah) as “glimmering dawn” rather than “darkness.”

[4:13]  ⁸⁶ tn Traditionally, “God of hosts.”