This document provides a historical overview of perspectives on the Genesis flood account from ancient times to modern day. It discusses how early Christian thinkers like Origen emphasized both the literal and allegorical meanings of scripture. During the Renaissance, scholars began critically examining the logistics and scientific feasibility of a global flood. By the 18th-19th centuries, advances in geology, biology and archaeology made a literal global flood seem untenable, leading to debates around flood geology and creationism. The document traces this intellectual history in 3 sentences or less.

1. The Genesis Flood in Historical Perspective
God and the Natural Sciences
2017
John Wilkins

2. The Genesis Flood
And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in
the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of
his heart was only evil continually.
And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the
earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have
created from the face the earth; both man, and beast,
and creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it
repenteth me that I have made them. [Genesis 6: 5–7]

3. The Legend of Noah
• God wished to punish mankind for sinful behaviour
• Noah, his 3 sons – Shem, Japhet and Ham – and
their wives were spared.
• Noah built an Ark under God’s instructions to
survive the Flood. He was ordered to take 2 of every
animal aboard the Ark to preserve life.
• The Deluge lasted 40 days and waters prevailed
upon the earth for 150 days.
• The waters gradually receded and Noah, his family
and animals emerged from the Ark a year later and
repopulated the earth.

4. Why “Ark”?
• before 850; Middle English ark(e), erke, Old En
glish arc, earc(e) (compare Old Frisian erke,
arke, Dutch ark, Old High German, Gothic arka,
Old Norse ǫrk) < Latin arca chest, coffer,
derivative of arcēre to safeguard, cognate with
Hittite h̬ark- hold, possess [http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ark]
• The Ark was supposed to be box-shaped

5. Flood Myths
The flood myth motif is widespread among many ancient cultures.
Early Sumerian poems and later Mesopotamian The Epic of Gilgamesh
[1600 BCE]
• The bustle of humanity disturbs the gods, who decide to send a flood. Warned by
one of the gods, Ea, Utnapishtim builds a boat and takes his family and animals
inside.
• After the flood, Utnapishtim sends a dove, then a swallow, then a raven to check
whether the waters have subsided. After exiting the boat, Utnapishtim offers a
sacrifice to the gods, who repent their choice to send the flood.
Hindu Myth of The Epic of Manu
• The god Vishnu takes the form of Matsya the fish and warns Manu about a coming
flood. He tells Manu to put all the creatures of the earth into a boat.

6. “Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the
heavens, and other elements of this world, about the motions and the
orbits of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the
predictable eclipses of the sun and the moon, the cycles of the years and
the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth,
and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and
experience. Now it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to
hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture,
talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to
prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast
ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much
that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the
household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to
the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of
Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men.”
St Augustine, De genesis ad litteram, Bk I, §39, Taylor translation, page 42.

7. The rise of biblical realism and
rationalism
• Contrary to the usual view, medieval theology was
not opposed to reason
• The “One-Truth” doctrine held that truth cannot
contradict truth
• Since it was assumed the Bible was revealed truth, it
must be consistent with human reason
• Increasingly, the Bible was read in the “common
sense” manner, leading to an emphasis upon realist
interpretation
• However, this raised issues, especially about the
Flood and Ark stories

8. Renaissance Scholarship
• Humanist critical studies of
texts
• The Ark was the work of the
Divine Intellect – we should
try to understand it
• The study of nature can
help understand Christian
doctrine

9. Renaissance Study of the Genesis
Flood
• “The scientific activities of the Renaissance brought
this difficulty to the forefront again, for the men of
that age also wanted to know where the water came
from and where it went after the flood was over.
• [Many] Protestants [and Jesuits] were anxious to
prove that all of the Bible accorded with reason sat
down to work out coldly scientific solutions. They
failed, of course, to produce such a solution and with
this failure, the inspired history of Noah became
simply a Jewish myth.”
• D. C. Allen, The Legend of Noah, pp. 85–9

10. The Sensus Litteralis
But discerning the literal meaning required the interpreter to make
judgments about the subject matter and the scope of the text in
question.
Origen, in the third century wrote:
As we being to speak about the Ark which was constructed by Noah at
God's command, let us see first of all what is related about it literally, and,
proposing the questions which many are in the habit of presenting, let us
search out also their solutions from the traditions which have been handed
down to us by the forefathers. When we have laid foundations of this kind,
we can ascend from the historical account to the mystical and allegorical
understanding of the spiritual meaning and, if these contain anything
secret, we can explain it as the Lord reveals knowledge of his word to us. .
[Homilies on Genesis, 2, trans. R. E. Heine, Catholic University of America
Press, 1982, p72]

11. The Reformation and the literal sense
The Reformers challenged the “spritual meaning” and emphasized:
▫ The method of comparing one part of the text with another
▫ Clarity
▫ Sufficiency
• One must also consider the historical and literary contexts. Pay
close attention to the style and structure of the text – humanism
• Non-biblical sources used to make sense of the biblical account
• Historical scholarship
• Philology – the study of language in historical sources
• The study of the natural world

12. Realism and the Logistics of the Ark
• Raised by Origen
• Rabbinical concerns about rubbish (manure)
• Alonso Tostada (ca. 1400 –1455): God miraculously wafted
the odours away
• Rising concern among Renaissance humanists about the text
and meaning of the Bible
▫ Shift from analogical and allegory
▫ In the 12th century, the Ark was a metaphor for Christ and the
Church
▫ By the 15th, Tostada and the rabbis are concerned with the
practical issues

13. Johannes Buteo’s Geometrics
• French mathematician (1492 – d. 1564–1572)
• Was there enough space on the Ark?
▫ Buteo’s Opera geometric (1554) calculates 475,000
cubic cubits
▫ 125,000 cubic cubits for stairways, partitions,
beams, joints
▫ Food for 93 large animals?
▫ Why didn’t they fight?
• What was the arc made of?
▫ Squared timber (Greek)
▫ Smooth lumber (Vulgate)
▫ Gopher wood (Hebrew)
▫ Caked with bitumen or pitch

14. The Discovery of the New World
• Exotic new animals and plants brought to Europe
from the new world in the voyages of discovery
• Conrad Gesner included many new animals not
included in the original Greek or Hebrew texts in his
Historia Animalium (1551)
• Alligators
• Manatees
• Iguanas
• Monkeys
• Hummingbirds
• Tapirs
• Armadillos
• Sloths
• Toucans
• Guinea pigs
• Opossums
• Bird of paradise
• Gophers
• Rattlesnakes?
• Anteaters?
• Satyrs?
• Unicorns?
• Sea monsters?

15. The Animals Aboard the Ark
• In 1675 Athanasius Kircher (1602–1680) declared there were
▫ 130 kinds of four-footed animals
▫ 30 pairs of snakes
▫ 150 kinds of birds
▫ Some species emerged only after the Flood via hybridization and spontaneous
generation
• By the end of the 17thC John Ray (1628–1705) could list
▫ 500 species of birds
▫ 150 species of quadrupeds
▫ 10,000 species of fish and invertebrates
• By the middle of the 18th century Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) could list
14,000 species (5,600 animal species). Today the number of animal species
is estimated at 3–30 million!

16. Changing Perspectives
• In 1655 Isaac de la Peyrère (Jewish theologian; 1594–1679)
concluded:
▫ The flood must have been local – confined to Europe and the Middle
East
▫ No need for Ark to contain all animals
▫ The olive branch demonstrated the survival of trees outside the flooded
area
• Abraham van der Myl (Dutch Protestant; 1563–1637) argued:
▫ Animals and humans existed from the beginning in the New World
▫ Many distinct creations across the globe
• Edward Stillingfleet (English theologian; 1635–1699)
▫ Humanity inhabited a small portion of the globe at the time of Noah
▫ A local flood compatible with Bible and science

17. The Source of the Waters
• Where did the waters come
from?
▫ Rainfall? Implausible
▫ Subterranean water
▫ Atmospheric water
▫ A giant comet collided with the
earth
• But where did the water go?
▫ Could it evaporate in 150 days?
▫ Action of the sun – a miracle

18. Geographical Difficulties
• If the Ark finally came to rest on Mount Ararat (Greek/Hebrew) or
the mountains of Armenia (Vulgate), how did animals and human
populations get to the New World?
▫ José de Acosta (Spanish Jesuit missionary; 1540–1600): Some species
are only found in America
▫ Justus Lipsius (Nederlandish Catholic; 1547–1606): Animals crossed on
land via Atlantis from Africa to the New World. Others suggested land
bridges
▫ Isaac de la Peyrère (1594–1679): Living organisms could not have
migrated as a literal reading demanded
• Were the indigenous peoples of the new World descendants of
grand-children of Noah?
▫ If so, how can we account for racial differences?

19. Fossil Evidence of the Flood?
• Discoveries of bones and fossils of extinct and still
existing animals in various unlikely parts of the
world were taken as an indication of the deluge.
• Jacob Scheuchzer (Swiss doctor; 1672–1733)
▫ We should find the fossil remains of drowned human
beings
• Alexander Cattcot, Treatise on the Deluge (English
geologist and theologian; 1761)
▫ Interpreted the discontinuous stratification of the
geological record of the Mendip Hills in Somerset as
evidence of the flood

20. Below: Catcott’s model of the earth
Right: Scheuchzer’s “Homo Diluvus Testis”
[Eyewitness man of the Flood]

21. The Age of the Earth
Bishop Usher (Church of Ireland; 1581–1656)
• Heaven and earth created on the evening preceding
Sunday 23 October 4004 BCE
• The Flood occurred 1,656 years later
• Noah and his family joined the animals on the ark on
Sunday 7 December 2,349 BCE

22. The Discovery of ‘Deep Time’
• After 1770 the 6,000-year scheme was called into
question by geology
• Comte de Buffon, Époches de la Nature (1778)
▫ Calculated the earth is 74,832 years old
▫ Mankind emerged some 6,000–8,000 years ago
▫ The flood is reduced to an insignificant episode
• James Hutton, Theory of the Earth (1785)
▫ ‘[W]e find no vestige of a beginning’ in the geological record
▫ The earth undergoes continual dynamic process of erosion
and renewal

23. Histories of the Earth
• Georges Cuvier, Discourse on the Upheavals of the Surface of the
Globe (1822)
▫ Catastrophism – ‘Geological epochs’
▫ Fossil evidence of violent and sudden natural catastrophes (e.g., great
floods and rapid formation of major mountain chains)
▫ Mass extinctions, followed abruptly by the emergence of new life forms
• Charles Lyell, The Principles of Geology, 3 vols (1830–1833)
▫ Uniformitarianism – ‘the present is the key to the past’
▫ Dismissed the Genesis flood in favour of an essentially ‘static earth’
• Charles Darwin, Origin of Species (1859)
▫ Life on earth has evolved over hundreds, if not thousands, of millions of
years

24. The Impact of Darwinism
“Whatever faith may settle down into, opinions can never go back exactly to
what they were before Darwin came out” (C. Lyell, 1860)

25. Nineteenth Century Biblical Scholarship
New methods of historical-critical analysis emerged in the 19th C
• to ascertain the text’s primitive or original meaning in its original historical
context
• to reconstruct the historical situation of the authors and recipients of the text
Several biblical scholars stressed:
• Attempts to reconcile Genesis and modern science are misguided, as they fail to
grasp “the meaning behind the text” or the sensus literalis historicus
• One must distinguish between the Bible and the Word of God. Not a process of
direct communication (in Hebrew) from God to biblical authors
• Biblical writers depended on ordinary human sources, but they were ‘divinely
inspired’ drawing on ‘religious intuition’ or insights from religious life
• God reveals himself to humanity through modern science

26. The Rise of Evangelical
Fundamentalism
• A movement that arose arose in a
specifically British and American
context in the 19th and early 20th
century
▫ a rejection of modernist theology
▫ its interpretation of biblical
inerrancy and literalism
• Contested the view that modern
science provides an adequate
description of the natural world
No single denomination:
Pentecostals, Missouri
Lutherans, Seventh-Day
Adventists

27. Flood Geology
• George McCready Price (Seventh-Day
Adventist mineralogist; 1870–1963)
▫ Illogical Geology: The Weakest Point in the
Evolution Theory (1906)
▫ The New Geology (1923)
• Law of conformable stratiographic
sequences
▫ Deceptive conformities (where strata seem to
be missing) and thrust faults (where the
strata are apparently in the wrong order)
▫ No natural order to the fossil-bearing rocks!
• Noah’s flood was global and produced most
of the geological strata we see today

28. The Rise of Creationism
• “[The new science] will interpret the records of the rocks, the
lives of plants and animals, and human history, in the light of
the creation story . . . As men go deeper into the science of
creationism, the inmost secrets of the cell and the atom will
display the power of the Creator in ways that have never been
understood; and in the degeneracy and evil that biology and
sociology bring to light will be seen the activity of the counter-
power [i.e. Satan] that has been trying to mar the beautiful
creation… The time is ripe for a rebellion against the
domination of evolution, and for a return to the fundamentals
of true science, BACK TO CREATIONISM.”
 Harold W. Clark, Back to Creationism (1929)

29. Flood Theology and Creationist Revival
• John Whitcomb (a theologian) and
Henry M. Morris (an engineer), The
Genesis Flood (1961)
• “The Bible is the infallible Word of
God”
• Provided impetus for the emergence of
the young earth creationist movement
in the 1970s.
• “the facts of science can be explained
in terms of the scientific model of
creation”.

30. The Legitimacy of Flood Geology?
• “The Genesis Flood is the real crux of the conflict
between the evolutionist and creationist cosmologies. If
the system of flood geology can be established on a
sound scientific basis, and be effectively promoted and
publicized, then the entire evolutionary cosmology, at
least in its present neo-Darwinian form, will collapse.
This, in turn, would mean that every anti-Christian
system and movement (communism, racism, humanism,
libertinism, behaviorism, and all the rest) would be
deprived of their pseudo-intellectual foundation.”
 Henry Morris, Scientific Creationism (1974)

31. The Search for Noah’s Ark
• Many remain convinced that the Ark of
Noah is on top of Mount Ararat
• In Search of Noah’s Ark, Sunn Classic
Pictures (1975). Massive box-office
success
• The Incredible Discovery of Noah's
Ark, CBS (1993)
• Reflect a deep distrust of modern
science and secular authority
• Conspiracy theories and pseudo-science

32. Modern Views of the Flood
• The Genesis Flood has been the subject of a
variety of interpretations and
reinterpretations for the last 400 years.
• Considered by secular thinkers as a Jewish
mythology based on prior narratives
• For many Christians, the narrative should not
be interpreted literally, but this does not
diminish its theological and moral meaning.
• The last 30 years has witnessed the rapid
growth of organized creationism, which has
spread from the US to Australia, Korea,
Russia and now even to parts of Central
Europe and Turkey.

33. Modern Views of the Flood
• Recent suggestions:
▫ Ryan and Pitman’s Flooding of
the Black Sea
▫ Finkel’s argument the original
flood was local to Mesopotamia
 The “ark” was a large coracle

34. Reason and Revelation
• We see that the Christian, and to a lesser extent the
Jewish and Islamic, traditions take several
approaches to science [reason] versus scriptures
[revelation]
1. Both are true and we must reconcile them
2. Revelation is true, and hence conflicting reason is
false
3. Reason (science) is correct, and religion cannot
speak to matters of fact
• Which do you think is right?

35. Further reading
• Pleins, J. D. (2009). When the Great Abyss Opened: Classic
and Contemporary Readings of Noah's Flood. Oxford, Oxford
University Press.
▫ Very readable and covers the period from the middle ages to the
modern creationists
• Cohn, N. (1996). Noah's flood: the Genesis story in Western
thought. New Haven, Yale University Press.
• Allen, D. C. (1949). The Legend of Noah. Renaissance
rationalism in art, science and letters. Urbana, University of
Illinois.
▫ The classic study of the rise of the realist and rationalist
interpretation