Do you believe that it rained for 40 days and night as the Bible describes?

[Jazzy]

Do you believe that it rained for 40 days and night as the Bible describes? (Why or Why Not)

 

[Lamb]

Yes, I do. If I can believe that God came to earth in the form of man, lived the perfect life I couldn't and died in my place on the cross for the forgiveness of all my sins, I can easily believe that it rained for 40 days and 40 nights to flood the earth.

 

[tango]

GIven some of the other stories in the Bible I'm not sure it's that hard to believe that it could rain for such an extended period. If you want to point at things that sound far-fetched there are easier targets than that one.

 

[Odë:hgöd]

.
FAQ: Is it possible that the Flood was local rather than global?

REPLY: Well; the problem with that possibility is: the waters breached the highest
mountains by fifteen cubits (22½ feet). So then, if perchance Noah lived in a
geographic basin, the waters would have overflowed the mountains surrounding
him and kept on going before they ever got up to that 22½ feet of extra elevation.

But the water would start spilling past Noah's area long before it breached the tops
of the highest mountains surrounding him because mountain ranges aren't shaped
smooth, level, and planed like the rim of a domestic bath tub. No; they're very
irregular and consist of high points and low points; viz: peaks, valleys, canyons,
saddles, and passes.

Thus mountain ranges make poor bath tubs because you would lose water through
the low points before it even had a chance to fill to the peaks. In point of fact, were
the sides of your bathtub shaped like a mountain range; you could never fill it. And
in trying to; just end up with water all over the floor.
_

 

[Odë:hgöd]

.

Do you believe that it rained for 40 days and night as the Bible describes?

Yes.

Why?

Though I sincerely believe the event took place, I have to admit that my confidence
is psychological rather than reasonable. The thing is: the Flood was too brief to leave
behind any appreciable geological evidence of itself so there's really been no
empirical way found thus far to prove it ever happened.
_

 

[Stravinsk]

I think the biblical story is likely, not only in time frame (40 days 40 nights), but in method.

In Genesis 7:11 the last line reads that the "windows of heaven were opened". Genesis 8:2 repeats the same idea (windows of heaven), now being stopped, as well as there being "fountains of the deep" from which water came.

Taken literally, what does this suggest? There are waters below us (fountains of the deep), and waters above us (windows of heaven).

So people laugh at me when I say I believe (outer) space is fake and there is water above us. Psalm 148:4 echos the same idea: "Praise him, ye heavens of heavens, and ye waters that be above the heavens."

So laugh if you like. At least the cosmology I believe in is consistent.

 

[Odë:hgöd]

.
"When the waters had swelled much more upon the earth, all the highest
mountains everywhere under the sky were covered. Fifteen cubits higher did the
waters swell, as the mountains were covered." (Gen 7:19-20)

The mountains haven't always been as high as they are now.

Take for example Mount Everest. Today its tippy top is something like 29,029 feet
above sea level. The discovery of fossilized sea lilies near its summit proves that
the Himalayan land mass has not always been mountainous; but at one time was
the floor of an ancient sea bed.

This is confirmed by the "yellow band" below Everest's summit consisting of
limestone: a type of rock made from calcite sediments containing the skeletal
remains of countless trillions of organisms who lived, not on dry land, rather,
underwater in an ocean.

I'm not alleging that the Himalayans were covered by Noah's flood; only that the
mountains in his day may've been much smaller than we think.

"He set the earth on its foundations, so that it should never be moved. You covered
it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. At your
rebuke they fled; at the sound of your thunder they took to flight. The mountains
rose, the valleys sank down to the place that you appointed for them. You set a
boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth."
(Ps 104:5-9)

That passage is stunning; and clearly way ahead of its time. Mountains rising, and
valleys sinking, speaks of volcanism and tectonic plate subduction-- powerful
forces of nature that keep the Earth's surface in a perpetual state of alteration;
especially relative to low spots and mountainous formations.
_

 

[Odë:hgöd]

~
● Gen 7:11b . . the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up,
and the windows of heaven were opened.

The Hebrew word translated "deep" basically means an abyss (as a surging mass of
water) especially the deep (the main sea or the subterranean water-supply). That
word occurs very early in the Bible at Gen 1:1-2.

The difference between this deep and the deep of Gen 1:1-2 is that this deep is the
great deep. The Hebrew word for "great" means abundant (in quantity, size, age,
number, rank, quality), so that this particular deep could be thought of as
bottomless; viz: an abysmal source of water beyond human imagination whereas
the Earth's indigenous sources are limited.

** The precise location of the great deep is currently unknown.

The "windows" of heaven are translated from a Hebrew word that means a sluice;
viz: a trough and/or a channel for moving water from one place to another; in this
case for transferring water from the great deep to the Earth.

Seeing as how Gen 7:11 speaks of heaven and sluices, then I think it's safe to
assume that the water used to flood the Earth came from somewhere out in the
cosmos; which is actually a reasonable assumption.

In an article I found on the internet dated July 22, 2011; astronomers have
discovered the largest and oldest mass of water ever detected in the universe-- a
gigantic cloud harboring 140 trillion times more water than all of Earth's oceans
combined. Well; I'm pretty sure that's a sufficient quantity to inundate the Earth to
a depth required by the Flood.
_

 

[Odë:hgöd]

~
Just for fun:

Supposing the tallest mountain at the time of the Flood was about equal to
California's Mount Laguna east of San Diego; viz: 5,738 feet above sea level--
about 1.1 miles. Adding 15 cubits to that comes out to approximately 5,761 feet.

The amount of rain it would take to accumulate that much water in only forty days
would be something like six global feet of depth per hour (not taking into
consideration that the diameter of the water's surface would increase as the water
got deeper)

To put that in perspective: the lobby of the Empire State Building in New York city
is approximately 47 feet above sea level. At 6 fph, the lobby would be under water
in less than eight hours. The whole building, lightening rod and all; would be under
water in just a little over ten days. The new One World Trade Center would be gone
in about thirteen days, and Denver in less than thirty-seven.

POSIT: That amount of rainfall is preposterous. It would've crushed the ark as
easily as a child smashing a chocolate cake!

REPLY: The Flood was a miraculous event that required manipulating the laws of
nature. With God's involvement, even a house of cards would've survived the Flood
had He wished it to because the strength of natural materials isn't fixed; they can
be greatly enhanced, e.g. Samson (Judg 13:2-16:31). He was just an ordinary man
of flesh and bone; but God made Samson strong enough to do things that no one
man alone could possibly accomplish unassisted.
_

 

[Josiah]

If you look at all this from the position of SCIENCE, there are problems....

From a website called "Medium"

https://medium.com/m/signin?actionUrl=https://medium.com/plans?dimension=post_audio_button&postId=ef3145ae1945&operation=register&redirect=https://medium.com/@AndrewLSeidel/how-much-water-would-be-needed-for-noahs-flood-ef3145ae1945&source=-----ef3145ae1945---------------------post_audio_button-----------

The Noah’s Ark story raises many questions. How could he cram 17,400,000 individual animals on a boat? How could that wooden boat survive the worst storm in history? What did the animals eat? What did they do with all the feculence?

The biggest question might involve the need for such a genocide in the first place, something Ricky Gervais touches on in one of my favorite bits ever. He also poses another question: is god gay?

One question that has annoyed me for years is not as obvious: Just how much water are we talking about? Genesis 7:20 says that the waters submerged the world’s highest mountains under 15 cubits of water. That means that flood covered Mount Everest, which is 29,028 feet tall and getting a bit taller every day, with 22 feet of water.

So I decided to do that math. My math skills are not stellar, but I did a rough, back-of-the-envelope calculation anyway. I had to start out by assuming that the earth is a perfect sphere, it’s not, it’s a bit squished at the poles and bulges at the equator, but this is a fair assumption.

The volume of a sphere is easy to calculate: V = 4/3πr³

The earth has a radius of 3959 miles. Now we need to know the radius of the flood. That’s the earth radius, plus the height of Everest, plus 15 cubits (22ft). So 3959 miles + 29,028 ft +22 feet = 3959 miles + 29050 feet = 3959 miles + 5.5018939 miles = 3964.5018939 miles

If we plug those two radii in to our volume formula, we get the volumes:

259,923,241,564 miles³ for the volume of the earth.

261,008,408,332 miles³ for the volume of the earth at flood.

So, if we subtract the earth volume from the flood volume, we’ll get the volume of water required to fill that space. That’s how much it would need to rain. That turns out to be 1,085,166,768 miles³of rain.

Now, let’s cut that by 25% because land, mountains, etc. occupy some of that volume. All that space would not be filled with water. The 25% figure is generous since oceans, which by definition sit at sea level, cover 70% of the earth and the rest of the earth isn’t nearly as high as Everest. But let’s grant the creationist this small charity.

That means that there had to be 813,875,076 miles³ of rain for the biblical flood. To put that in perspective, the oceans have about 321,000,000 miles³ of water. All the water on earth only adds up to about 332,500,000 miles³.
So for the biblical flood to have happened, the water on earth had to miraculously multiply by about 250%.
Let’s try to put that in another perspective. The Atlantic Ocean is about 80,000,000 miles³.

That means, there needed to be more water than could be contained by ten Atlantic Oceans to rain as much as the bible claims.


“If I can convince you that the flood was not real, then I can convince you that Heaven and Hell are not real,” says the serpent. This sign is at Ken Ham’s Ark Encounter in Kentucky. The snake looks a bit familiar……
One more perspective. There are 5.9978178 x 10^-⁷ Olympic pools in a cubic mile. That means an Olympic pool is about 0.00000059978178 cubic miles. Divide that 813,875,076 miles³ by that decimal and you discover that, for the bible to be true, it would have to have rained the equivalent of about 1.35 QUADRILLION Olympic swimming pools.

This raises one final point, where did all that water go?

.... so, scientifically... the 40 days of rain would have included TEN TIMES the water of all the water contained in the Atlantic Ocean, or TWICE as much water as is currently on the entire planet Earth - all falling in the form of rain over 40 days and nights. The rain would have fallen so large and hard that no one could stand, any ship would have been almost instantly destroyed and sunk. And of course, we have a problem: where did all that enormous amount of water go? Especially if it is claimed this happened just 6,000 years ago or less?

But I think we have this issue with much of Genesis 1-11, the pre-Abraham stuff in the Bible. It doesn't fit with science - at least as we understand it. Of course, some try to explain it... for example, maybe it was a local flood (even a known event, the flooding of the Black Sea). It says the flood covered "the earth" but the Hebrew word there means "dirt" and isn't the name of a planet. Um. Doesn't really work, not without taking the text quite loosely.

SOME hold that the Flood (like much in these 11 chapters) is theology, not science. It's like a parable - a story told to make a point. The POINT is infallible and true but not necessarily the story told to make it, just like maybe there was no younger son who went off to a far off land and squandered his wealth but the lesson, the point, the theology of the Parable of the Prodigal Son is true. Some take that view. It seems reasonable but seems to me to be a real slippery slope and sometimes has problems with the NT and even the teachings of Jesus and Paul. Maybe.

I'm more likely to simply view that the Bible is 100% true - but the Bible is not a science textbook, not dealing with science at all. But in the final analysis, it simply is a matter that cannot be explained or understood in the perspective of science and it's best to leave science out of it.



.

 

[Albion]

Do you believe that it rained for 40 days and night as the Bible describes? (Why or Why Not)

I do, but as with much else in Scripture, it's a mistake to insist that every last expression and word is to be taken in an exactly literal way. But even that information is sifted through the thinking of today's readers.

How much rain had to fall each day of the 40 days for the story to be correct? Enough to fill the Atlantic Ocean? Well, not necessarily. Also, when it was said that the world was flooded, what did the people to whom this happened understand about the shape and size of "the world?" Or is the message about the world as it was known by them at that time? Even most of us today make assumptions about what's happening or not happening in countries halfway around the planet and which we have never visited personality. But let an ancient perceive things in a similar fashion and we're all (or some of us) instant critics.

 

[Odë:hgöd]

~
Here's another fun fact.

● Gen 8:13-14 . . In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first
of the month, the waters began to dry from the earth; and when Noah removed the
covering of the ark, he saw that the surface of the ground was drying. And in the
second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry.

Calculating the duration of the Flood is not only an interesting exercise but also an
opportunity to get the hang of prophetic time keeping.

It began to rain on the 17th day of the second month of the 600th year of Noah's
life. The Earth was dry on the 27th day of the second month of his 601st year. So,
reckoning time according to prophetic months of 30 days each, and not counting
the final day, Noah's passengers and crew were aboard the ark for a total of 370
days; which is roughly 5 days over a solar year, and 10 days over a prophetic year.

FAQ: Whence came the so-called prophetic year?

POSIT: The Flood began on the seventeenth day of the second month of Noah's life,
and it rained for forty days. Then the rain stopped so the water could begin draining
off and leave the ark aground. A period of exactly five months went by. Those five
months are recorded as exactly 150 days. If we were to try and use the months of
the Jewish calendar, the number of days would not add up to 150. Here's why.

The months of the Jewish calendar supposedly equivalent to the months of the
Flood are:

lyar . . . . . . . . 29 days
Sivan . . . . . . . 30 days
Tammuz . . . . . 29 days
Av . . . . . . . . . 30 days
Elul . . . . . . . . 29 days
Tishri . . . . . . . 30 days

Using the Jewish calendar, it would begin raining on the 17th of lyar, thus flooding
a total of 13 days during that month. Following would be 30 in Sivan, 29 in
Tammuz, 30 in Av, 29 in Elul, and lastly 16 in Tishri if we don't count the day that
the ark ran aground. The total number of days from the beginning of the Flood until
the day the ark went aground, would have been, according to the Jewish calendar,
147; which is three days short of 150.

However, we can safely ignore the Jewish calendar, and just reckon the elapsed
time relative to Noah's birthday. The 150 days then average out to five months of
30 days apiece. That doesn't really cause any problems because a dating method
like that is not intended to mark off the actual passage of natural time in a
calendar year; only the days of time elapsed during an important event such as the
Flood.

So; here in Genesis, very early in the Bible, a standard is set for specifying the
length of a special kind of year: the prophetic year. Since the months in a year of
this type are of thirty days apiece, then twelve such months add up to 360 days;
which is 5¼ days less than a calendar year.

The prophetic year is sort of like a baker's dozen. Though a baker's dozen is not a
dozen of twelve; it is nonetheless a dozen in its own right. As long as students of
the Bible are aware of the existence of such a thing as a prophetic year, they won't
be tripped up when they run across it in prophecy; for example the one below:

"And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God,
that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days." (Rev
12:6)

"And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into
the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and
half a time, from the face of the serpent." (Rev 12:14)

Those two passages speak of a 3½ year period of exactly 1,260 days. Well, 3½
natural years is 1,274+ days; which is almost fifteen days too many. But if we
reckon those 3½ years as prophetic years of 360 days each, then it comes out
perfectly to 1,260 days.
_

 

[tango]

If you look at all this from the position of SCIENCE, there are problems....

From a website called "Medium"

https://medium.com/m/signin?actionUrl=https://medium.com/plans?dimension=post_audio_button&postId=ef3145ae1945&operation=register&redirect=https://medium.com/@AndrewLSeidel/how-much-water-would-be-needed-for-noahs-flood-ef3145ae1945&source=-----ef3145ae1945---------------------post_audio_button-----------



.... so, scientifically... the 40 days of rain would have included TEN TIMES the water of all the water contained in the Atlantic Ocean, or TWICE as much water as is currently on the entire planet Earth - all falling in the form of rain over 40 days and nights. The rain would have fallen so large and hard that no one could stand, any ship would have been almost instantly destroyed and sunk. And of course, we have a problem: where did all that enormous amount of water go? Especially if it is claimed this happened just 6,000 years ago or less?

But I think we have this issue with much of Genesis 1-11, the pre-Abraham stuff in the Bible. It doesn't fit with science - at least as we understand it. Of course, some try to explain it... for example, maybe it was a local flood (even a known event, the flooding of the Black Sea). It says the flood covered "the earth" but the Hebrew word there means "dirt" and isn't the name of a planet. Um. Doesn't really work, not without taking the text quite loosely.

SOME hold that the Flood (like much in these 11 chapters) is theology, not science. It's like a parable - a story told to make a point. The POINT is infallible and true but not necessarily the story told to make it, just like maybe there was no younger son who went off to a far off land and squandered his wealth but the lesson, the point, the theology of the Parable of the Prodigal Son is true. Some take that view. It seems reasonable but seems to me to be a real slippery slope and sometimes has problems with the NT and even the teachings of Jesus and Paul. Maybe.

I'm more likely to simply view that the Bible is 100% true - but the Bible is not a science textbook, not dealing with science at all. But in the final analysis, it simply is a matter that cannot be explained or understood in the perspective of science and it's best to leave science out of it.



.

The numbers indicate an unfathomable amount of water, but doesn't the text also refer to water rising up from the earth and subsequently seeping back into the earth? That would indicate firstly that the rate of rainfall would be substantially lower and also accounts for the question of where it all went.

Admittedly it raises a new question of what filled in the gap while it was squeezed out onto the earth but it's easy to see a rock some 4000 miles in radius having space within it for a few million cubic miles of spare water.

I think part of the question has to relate to levels of detail. If the Bible says the highest mountain was covered that might be considered analogy or metaphor. If it says the highest mountain was covered to a very specific depth it doesn't work as well to argue it's a metaphor - why add a very specific detail unless that detail is, well, specific? And if it's specific then it's talking about something specific rather than about something metaphorical.

 

[Odë:hgöd]

~
● Gen 8:3b-4 . . At the end of one hundred and fifty days the waters diminished, so
that in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to
rest on the mountains of Ararat.

The Hebrew word for "Ararat" appears three more times in the Bible: one at 2Kgs
19:36-37, one at Isa 37:36-38, and one at Jer 51:27. Ararat in the Bible always
refers to a political area-- the country of Armenia --never a specific geological
feature by the same name.

The Hebrew word for "mountains" doesn't always indicate a prominent land mass
like Kilimanjaro; especially when it's plural. It can also mean a range of hills or
highlands; for example:

In California, where I lived as a kid, the local elevation 35 miles east of San Diego,
in the town of Alpine, was about 2,000 feet above sea level. There were plenty of
meadows with pasture and good soil. In fact much of it was very good ranchland
and quite a few people in that area raised horses and cows. We ourselves kept
about five hundred chickens, and a few goats and calves. We lived in the mountains
of San Diego; but we didn't live up on top of one of its peaks like Viejas, Lyon's, or
Cuyamaca.

It makes better sense to beach the ark on the soil of one of Armenia's elevated
plains rather than up on one of Turkey's ancient volcanoes seeing as how Noah took
up agriculture after the Flood. Plus, had he been forced to abandoned the ark atop
a mountain, Noah would've lost ready access to an abundant supply of hewn wood
that he could appropriate for other purposes. Noah's sons reproduced so we can be
fairly certain that Noah's posterity-- which eventually numbered quite a few people
--would want lumber from the ark for useful purposes too.
_