聖書注解書

Genesis 7:11. Second month—seventeenth day, &c.— The sacred historian is exact in pointing out the period of this awful event; which came to pass on the seventeenth day of the second month of that year, which was the six hundredth of Noah's life. Now, before the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, the second month was Marchesvan, which begins about the middle of our October, and ends about the middle of November: so that the seventeenth day of the second month, according to the generality of expositors, is about the beginning of our November: the sixth of November, says Mr. Locke.

The fountains of the great deep broken up— In the original account of the disposal of the water, we are told, that all which was created was either carried aloft in clouds, or gathered together in the great communicating receptacle, called sea. See ch. 1: And, agreeable to this account, we are informed, that the deluge was occasioned by the union of the water from above and below: the fountains of the great deep were broken up: and the windows, or flood-gates, of heaven were opened. Thus the waters again prevailed over the face of the earth, as at the beginning they covered the chaotic mass. The original word for the windows of heaven, or flood-gates, as the margin of our Bibles has it, is ארבת aruboth, which properly signifies openings, cracks, or fissures of any kind, as will appear by referring to 2Ki 7:19 and Malachi 3:10.

REFLECTIONS.—Two secondary causes are here assigned for the deluge; the deeps were broken up, and the windows of heaven opened. When God pleases to avenge his quarrel, all creatures above, below, around us, are ready instruments for his judgments.

(1.) The fountains of the great deep were broken up. The earth is founded upon the floods; its bowels contain enough to destroy it, if God lets loose the waters from their prisons. (2.) The windows of heaven were opened: the clouds poured down incessant torrents forty days and nights. Learn here, 1. The greatest blessings may quickly be made the heaviest judgments. 2. To look beyond second causes to the first. If floods deluge, or earthquakes swallow up, there is one who gives each element its commission, and each judgment its orders. 3. That there are in the earth, as in the heavens above, storehouses of fire, as well as water; and that this world is doomed one day to experience their fatal influence. Be it our care, then, to secure a covert from the impending storm in Him who is the only refuge; and then, When thou passest through the waters, they shall not overflow thee; and when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burnt. Isaiah 43:2.

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Genesis 7:16. And the Lord shut him in— Closed the door after Noah and all the rest had entered; closed it so fast, that the waters could not enter. How God shut the door we need not inquire; it is likely by an angelic power, which conducted the several creatures into the ark. Many writers say this was done by the Word of the Lord, the Messiah.

REFLECTIONS.—We have a repetition of the care God took of Noah and his family: and, 1. It is particularly observed, that his three sons were no polygamists; they were content with one wife; and no bachelors against the ordinance of God. It appears to be God's will (some special cases excepted, that every man should have a wife, as it is evident he should have but one.

2. That God shut them in. (1.) He brought them in; Noah by his grace, and the creatures by his power, restraining their mutual enmities for a time. Note; 1. If ever we come into the ark we must remember to whom we are indebted for it: "by grace are ye saved." 2. Not the restraints of sin for a season, but the conquest over sin in the heart, is the proof of a change of nature.

(2.) He kept them in safe amidst the surrounding floods; he shut them in as separate from the wicked world. Those who are Christ's people, though in the world, are not of the world, but chosen out of the world, and in affection and temper separated from the world.

(3.) In shutting them in, he shut all the world out. No doubt, when the ungodly began to see the lowering clouds, and the rising waters, then they were importunate enough for that admission they had slighted. But it is too late to cry, Open unto us, when the door is shut. Note; 1. This is the day of salvation. Christ is a willing Saviour, and his arms of mercy are stretched out to save the vilest sinner from the wrath of God. He that cometh to him now shall be in no wise cast out. 2. If men neglect the day of mercy, it will be too late to come when it is the day of judgment. It must be now or never.

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Genesis 7:20. Fifteen cubits upward— That is, fifteen cubits, or twenty-two feet and a half, upward, or above the highest mountains. It is plain, as words can make it, from this and the foregoing and the subsequent verses, that the deluge was universal, and not, according to the opinion of some, confined to a certain tract of country only.

One of our most celebrated philosophers observes, that the rain of forty days and forty nights will be found to be a very small part of the cause of such a deluge as Moses describes. For supposing it to rain all over the globe as much in each day, as it is now found to do in one of the most rainy counties in England in the whole year, viz. about forty inches of water a day, forty such days could cover the whole earth with but about twenty-two fathom water, which would only drown the low-lands next the sea: but the greater part would escape. Therefore, he says, we may reasonably conclude, that by the opening of the windows of heaven, is meant an extraordinary fall of waters from the heavens, not as rain, but in one great body; as if the firmament, supposed by Moses to sustain a supra-aerial sea, had been broken up, and, at the same time, the ocean did flow in upon the land to cover all with water. See Phil. Trans. abridged, vol. 6: part 2: p. 1. Perhaps ordinary continued rain for forty days and nights would be found adequate to the effect, if this philosopher took in, as he does in the conclusion, the rupture of the great deep, and the union of its waters with those from above.

The reader will find great satisfaction by consulting Saurin's eighth and ninth Dissertations.

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Genesis 8:1. God remembered Noah—and made a wind to pass, &c.— God had compassion upon Noah in his melancholy confinement: and this stupendous end of his providence being answered by the destruction of the iniquitous generation, which brought on this dissolution of the earth, he was pleased to make use of the same natural means for the separation of the waters again to their appointed places as he used at the beginning of the creation: he caused the wind or air to operate as at first in order to assuage the waters, or rather to cause them to subside, and retreat to their appointed places. See notes on Genesis 1:6, &c. In consequence of this, Gen 1:3 the waters returned from off the earth continually, or, as the margin of our Bibles has it, in going and returning. The heathen poet Ovid, (First Book of Metamorph.) says, that Jove loosed the northern wind to restore the earth to its primitive state, &c.

REFLECTIONS.—Since the work of vengeance was finished, it was time to remember mercy to Noah, now so long a prisoner in the ark, and perhaps by this time looking with some solitude for release from his confinement. It is said,

1. God remembered Noah; not that he had ever been forgotten of him. The eyes of the Lord are ever upon his children to do them good; if he tarry therefore, wait for him: none ever trusted on him, and was ashamed.
2. He remembered the cattle also. His mercies are over all his works: he careth for beasts that perish, and shall he forget or forsake his people? that be far from him.
3. We have also the evidence of his remembrance. He stayed the waters from flowing. (1.) He sent a wind to dry up the floods. He hath winds in his treasures, as well as waters, to dry up, as well as to deluge. All things serve him. (2.) He stopped the windows of heaven, and the fountains of the deep. Note; When afflictive providences have accomplished their ends, they shall be removed. (3.) He caused the waters to return from off the earth continually; part shut up within its bowels, in the vast abyss, part exhaled by sun and wind, and re-ascending into the clouds. (4.) It was a work of time, a hundred and fifty days, before they were considerably abated. Note; When our trials are long, and our deliverance slow, we had need pray: hold out, faith and patience.

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Genesis 8:4. The ark rested in the seventh month.— Of the year; that is, not of the flood, as appears from Genesis 8:13-14. as well as from Gen 8:11 of the former chapter: on the tenth month of the year the tops of the mountains were seen, Genesis 8:5.

After tossing on the billows, at last the ark rests on Ararat. Note; Though the church suffer long in this tempestuous world, it shall rest at last upon the mount of God. It was two months and upwards after they felt ground, before the mountains were seen. They looked out every day, there is no doubt, and wished for dry land; at last, with joy it appears. Life is a long voyage: in age or sickness the believer perceives he draws near the shore; and when death's shadows are stretching over him, he begins to discover the happy land of glory beyond the grave, as the morning spread upon the mountains.

Upon the mountains of Ararat— The general opinion is, that the ark rested upon one of the mountains which separated Armenia from Mesopotamia, which Ptolemy calls the Gordiaean, and Q. Curtius the Cordaean Mountains. This opinion is supported by the authority of the Chaldee paraphrase and Arabic version, which render Ararat, the Cordae Mountains; as also by Berosus, quoted in Josephus, b. i. c. 4. of his Antiquities. Bochart has been at the pains to collect several testimonies from authors in favour of this opinion. Mr. Whiston remarks here "the care and wisdom of Providence for the preservation of Noah, and all the creatures, after their coming out of the ark, by so ordering it that the ark should rest on one of the highest mountains in the world; for though the earth must have been generally uninhabitable for a considerable time after the flood, by reason of the sediment which the water left upon its surface, and which would require no small space of time to settle, consolidate, and become fit for vegetation; yet on the high mountains, which would be covered by the waters but a little time, the quantity of sediment would be so inconsiderable, that the earth would not be much altered from what it was before, nor its vegetables much hurt by this universal deluge."

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Genesis 8:5. Tops of the mountains seen— This is no contradiction to the former verse, in which it is said, that the ark rested on the mountains of Ararat; for it is very easy to conceive, that a vessel of so heavy burden as the ark was, might rest upon the earth when there were several feet of water still prevailing.

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Genesis 8:6. At the end of forty days— i.e.. Forty days after the first day of the tenth month, when the tops of the mountains began to appear, then Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made; and he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro; which going forth and returning, as the Hebrew has it, often flew from and to the ark again, finding no place of rest till the waters were dried up.

REFLECTIONS.—Noah was told when the flood should come, but not when it should abate. He begins now, therefore, to open the window after forty days; perhaps he feared to expose himself sooner to the waters: he felt himself safe where he was. It is folly to expose ourselves to needless danger.

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Genesis 8:8. Also he sent forth a dove, &c.— From Gen 8:10 it appears, that there was seven days' interval between the sending forth the raven and the dove. The dove was sent forth, probably, because it is a bird of strong wing, flies long and far, and feeds upon the seeds which are cast or fall upon the ground; and returns to its nest or home from the most remote places. The dove found no place to rest upon, and returned; but being sent out a second time, she brought with her an olive-leaf, or branch, plucked off: "Folia olivae viridis," the leaves of a green olive-tree, says Houbigant, Who reads the word in the plural, עלי ali. She brought this, it is supposed, from Assyria, which abounded with olive-trees, the property whereof is to live and be green under water. Thus it first became a pledge of restored favour and peace with God, and it hath continued an emblem of peace from that time to the present. It may just be hinted, that these little circumstances testify the truth of the scripture-account of things, and ought to have their weight. Bochart justly observes, that two things might be collected from this by Noah: the one, that not only the mountains were dried, but also the plains, or at least the lower hills, in which the olive-trees principally flourish; the other, that the earth was not so corrupted by the waters of the deluge, but that trees remained upon it, which might shortly vegetate again by the heat of the sun, and afford him food. This writer may be consulted for a full account of this great event, the heathen traditions concerning it, and other things, which our compass will not allow us to admit.

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