The Flood Ends

8 But God did not forget about Noah. God remembered Noah and all the animals that were with him in the boat. God made a wind blow over the earth. And all the water began to disappear. ²Rain stopped falling from the sky. And water stopped flowing from under the earth. ^3–4The water that covered the earth began to go down and down. After 150 days, the water was low enough that the boat touched land again. The boat stopped on one of the mountains of Ararat.* This was the 17th day of the seventh month. ⁵The water continued to go down, and by the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains were above the water. ⁶Forty days later, Noah opened the window he had made in the boat. ⁷Then Noah sent out a raven.* The raven flew from place to place until the ground was dry and the water was gone. ⁸Noah also sent out a dove. Noah wanted the dove to find dry ground. He wanted to know if water still covered the earth. ⁹The dove could not find a place to rest because water still covered the earth, so the dove came back to the boat. Noah reached out his hand and caught the dove and brought it back into the boat. ¹⁰After seven days, Noah again sent out the dove. ¹¹And that afternoon the dove came back to Noah. The dove had a fresh olive leaf in its mouth. This was a sign to show Noah that there was dry ground on the earth. ¹²Seven days later, Noah sent the dove out again. But this time the dove never came back. ¹³After that, Noah opened the door* of the boat. Noah looked and saw that the ground was dry. This was the first day of the first month of the year. Noah was 601 years old.

¹⁴By the 27th day of the second month the ground was completely dry. ¹⁵Then God said to Noah, ¹⁶“Leave the boat. You, your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives should go out now. ¹⁷Bring every living animal out of the boat with you—all the birds, animals, and everything that crawls on the earth. Those animals will make many more animals, and they will fill the earth again.” ¹⁸So Noah went out with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives. ¹⁹All the animals, everything that crawls, and every bird left the boat. All the animals came out of the boat in family groups. ²⁰Then Noah built an altar* to the Lord. Noah took some of all the clean birds and some of all the clean animals,* and Noah burned them on the altar as a gift to God. ²¹The Lord smelled these sacrifices, and it pleased him. The Lord said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground as a way to punish people. People are evil from the time that they are young. So I will never again destroy every living thing on the earth like I have just done. ²²As long as the earth continues, there will always be a time for planting and a time for harvest. There will always be cold and hot, summer and winter, day and night on earth.”

Ararat Or, “Urartu,” an area in Eastern Turkey. raven A kind of bird. opened the door Literally, “removed the covering.” altar(s) A stone table used for burning sacrifices that were offered as gifts to God. clean birds … animals Birds and animals that God said could be used for sacrifices.

The New Beginning

9 God blessed Noah and his sons. God said to him, “Have many children. Fill the earth with your people. ²Every animal on earth, every bird in the air, every animal that crawls on the ground, and every fish in the sea will be afraid of you. All of them will be under your control. ³{In the past,} I gave you the green plants to eat. Now, every animal will also be food for you. I give you everything on earth—it is yours. ⁴But I give you one command. You must not eat meat that still has its life (blood) in it. ⁵I will demand your blood for your lives. That is, I will demand the life of any animal that kills a person. And I will demand the life of any person who takes another person’s life. ⁶“God made people as a copy of himself. So any person who kills a person must be killed by a person. ⁷“Noah, you and your sons should have many children. Fill the earth with your people.” ⁸Then God said to Noah and his sons, ⁹“I now make my promise to you and to your people who will live after you. ¹⁰I make my promise to all the birds, and to all the cattle, and to all the animals that came out of the boat with you. I make my promise to every living thing on earth. ¹¹This is my promise to you: All life on the earth was destroyed by the flood. But that will never happen again. A flood will never again destroy all the life on the earth.” ¹²And God said, “And I will give you something to prove that I made this promise to you. This proof will show that I have made an agreement with you and every living thing on earth. This agreement will continue for all times to come. This is the proof: ¹³I have made a rainbow in the clouds. That rainbow is proof of the agreement between me and the earth. ¹⁴When I bring clouds over the earth, you will see the rainbow in the clouds. ¹⁵When I see this rainbow, I will remember the agreement between me and you and every living thing on the earth. That agreement says that a flood will never again destroy all life on the earth. ¹⁶When I look and see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the agreement that continues forever. I will remember the agreement between me and every living thing on the earth.” ¹⁷So the Lord said to Noah, “That rainbow is proof of the agreement that I made with all living things on earth.”

Problems Begin Again

¹⁸Noah’s sons came out of the boat with him. Their names were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.) ¹⁹Those three men were Noah’s sons. And all the people on earth came from those three sons. ²⁰Noah became a farmer. He planted a field of grapes. ²¹Noah made wine and drank it. He became drunk and lay in his tent. Noah was not wearing any clothes.

²²Ham, the father of Canaan, looked at his naked father. Ham told his brothers outside the tent. ²³Then Shem and Japheth got a coat. They carried the coat on their backs into the tent. They walked backwards into the tent. In this way, they did not see their father without clothes. ²⁴Later, Noah woke up. (He was sleeping because of the wine.) Then he learned what his young son, Ham, had done to him. ²⁵So Noah said, “May there be a curse on Canaan*! May he be a slave to his brothers.” ²⁶Noah also said, “Bless the Lord, God of Shem! May Canaan be Shem’s slave. ²⁷May God give more land to Japheth. May God live in Shem’s tents. And may Canaan be their slave.” ²⁸After the flood Noah lived 350 years. ²⁹Noah lived a total of 950 years; then he died.

Canaan Ham’s son. The people of Canaan lived along the coast of Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria. Later, God gave this land to the people of Israel.

Nations Grow and Spread

10 Noah’s sons were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. After the flood, these three men became the fathers of many more sons. Here is a list of the sons that came from Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Japheth’s Descendants

²Japheth’s sons were: Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras. ³Gomer’s sons were: Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah. ⁴Javan’s sons were: Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim.* ⁵All the people who lived in the area around the Mediterranean Sea came from these sons of Japheth. Each son had his own land. All the families grew and became different nations. Each nation had its own language.

Ham’s Descendants ⁶Ham’s sons were: Cush,* Mizraim,* Put, and Canaan. ⁷Cush’s sons were: Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabtecah. Raamah’s sons were: Sheba and Dedan. ⁸Cush also had a son named Nimrod. Nimrod became a very powerful man on earth. ⁹Nimrod was a great hunter before the Lord. That is why people compare other men to Nimrod and say, “That man is like Nimrod, a great hunter before the Lord.” ¹⁰Nimrod’s kingdom spread from Babylon to Erech, Akkad, and Calneh in the land of Shinar. ¹¹Nimrod also went into Assyria. In Assyria, Nimrod built the cities of Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, Calah, and ¹²Resen. (Resen is the city between Nineveh and Calah, the big city.) ¹³Mizraim (Egypt) was the father of the people of Lud, Anam, Lehab, Naphtuh, ¹⁴Pathrus, Casluh, and Caphtor. (The Philistine people came from Casluh.) ¹⁵Canaan was the father of Sidon. Sidon was Canaan’s first son. Canaan was also the father of {Het, the father of} the Hittite people. ¹⁶And Canaan was the father of the Jebusite people, the Amorite people, the Girgashite people, ¹⁷the Hivite people, the Arkite people, the Sinite people, ¹⁸the Arvadite people, the Zemarite people, and the people from Hamath. The families of Canaan spread to different parts of the world. ¹⁹The land of the people of Canaan was from Sidon in the north to Gerar in the south, from Gaza in the west to Sodom and Gomorrah in the east, from Admah and Zeboiim to Lasha. ²⁰All those people were descendants* of Ham. All those families had their own languages and their own lands. They became separate nations.

Shem’s Descendants

²¹Shem was Japheth’s older brother. One of Shem’s descendants was Eber, the father of all the Hebrew people.* ²²Shem’s sons were Elam, Asshur, Arphaxad, Lud, and Aram. ²³Aram’s sons were Uz, Hul, Gether, and Mash. ²⁴Arphaxad was the father of Shelah. Shelah was the father of Eber. ²⁵Eber was the father of two sons. One son was named Peleg.* He was given this name because the earth was divided during his life. The other son was named Joktan. ²⁶Joktan was the father of Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, ²⁷Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, ²⁸Obal, Abimael, Sheba, ²⁹Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab. All those people were Joktan’s sons. ³⁰Those people lived in the area between Mesha and the hill country in the East.* Mesha was toward the country of Sephar. ³¹Those are the people from the family of Shem. They are arranged by families, languages, countries, and nations. ³²That is the list of the families from Noah’s sons. They are arranged according to their nations. From those families came all the people who spread across the earth after the flood.

Dodanim Or, “Rodanim,” or “the people of Rhodes.” Cush This is also another name for Ethiopia. Mizraim This is also another name for Egypt. descendant(s) A person’s children and their future families. One … Hebrew people Literally, “To Shem was born the father of Eber’s sons.” Peleg This name means, “division.” East This usually means the area between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers as far as the Persian Gulf.