FAQ - FLOOD
If Noah was a just and respectable old
gentleman of some six hundred years of age, how is it that we find him getting
intoxicated--becoming drunk--as recorded in (`Gen 9:20`).
<ANSWER>--How true are the words of the poet-- "The evil that men do
live after them; The good is oft interred with their bones." But one instance of
straying from the path of rectitude and sobriety in a long life of fidelity to the
principles of righteousness will stand out with startling distinctness and will be the
subject of more consideration than all of the individual's noble acts and traits combined.
However, we shall not leave Noah defenseless, but will call attention to the fact that his
intoxication was after the flood and was wholly unintentional. The flood wrought great
changes in the atmospheric conditions of our earth; to our understanding the deluge was
produced by the precipitation to the earth of an immense quantity of water which
previously had surrounded the earth at a distance as a cloudy canopy. The dissolution of
this canopy or envelope of water not only produced the flood, but altered the conditions
of nature so that storms, rains, etc., resulted, things which had never been before.
(`Gen. 2:5,6`.) Another result, we believe, was the development of an acidulous condition
of the atmosphere tending to produce ferment, which directly affected human longevity, so
that according to the Scriptures the average of human life decreased from eight and nine
hundred years to one hundred. This ferment from the changed atmosphere, affecting the
grape, generated "mold," and hence the alcoholic condition which produces
drunkenness. According to the record, Noah's drunkenness was the result of the first
vintage of grapes after the flood, and it evidently was contrary to all of his experiences
preceding the flood. We are justified, therefore, in supposing that this one instance of
Noah's having been intoxicated was the result of ignorance respecting the changed
character of the grape product fermented.
How large was Noah's Ark, and how did it compare with modern vessels as to size
and capacity?
<ANSWER>--The Bible (`Gen. 6:15`) gives the dimensions as follows: Three
hundred cubits long, fifty cubits broad and thirty cubits high. The length of the cubit is
variously estimated. The modern cubit is 18 inches, linear measure; the sacred cubit of
the Jews is 21.88 inches. According to the latter the ark was 547.3 feet long, 91.2 feet
wide and 54 feet high. The capacity, 2,730,782 cubic feet. Tonnage, 81,042. It is
impossible however, to do more than merely to estimate the dimensions as no one can be
absolutely sure as to the length of the cubit according to which the ark was constructed.
There are some modern vessels of greater length than the ark, but the capacity of the ark
was three times as great as any vessel afloat. It provided plenty of room for Noah and his
family and pairs of all the 244 species of animals, taken in, as scheduled by the Buffon,
together with all supplies needed for the long voyage. The design has been found in actual
practice to yield the best results for safety and stowage.
Are we to accept a literal flood, or does `Gen. 6`, `7`, `8`, give an account
of a spiritual flood? (R.E.)
<ANSWER>--Scientific thought is coming more and more into harmony with the Scripture
teachings as to the occurrence of an actual flood at about the time indicated in the
Genesis account. From the latest investigations and researches, the conclusion has been
formed that this earth was, in times remote, a part of the sun, and that it was thrown
off, or detached from the central orb in the form of gas. In course of time, this whirling
mass would cool and condense, and resolve itself into solids and liquids with the central
mass as a nucleus around which several canopies or rings, similar to the rings of the
planet Saturn, were developed. These would condense and in turn would eventually be
precipitated to the earth one by one. Science and the Bible agree that there were six of
these "canopies," and these, coming to the earth in their regular order, formed
the six creative "days" or epochs as narrated in the first chapter of Genesis;
the last one, being of water, brought about the deluge, or Noah's flood.