p g»-22 ^e. 11. U-U*. 18-21 ^S4«_g2a g3b-B. 13a. 14-19 gl-l? (qjj
7'-' see below). It wUl be suificient to notice that in P we find the minute directions regarding the construction and size of the ark, the blessing of Noah, the laws against murder and eating blood, the covenant of the rainbow ; in J only we have the picturesque narrative of sending out the raven and the dove, and the sacrifice of Noah, which so pleased J" that He determined never again to curse the ground. In some respects the accounts of J and P contradict each other, {a) According to P one pair of every kind of animals is to be selected (6*°'*), according to J seven pairs of clean and two of unclean (7''''). But in 7^', where the actual entry is made, a reviser has, it would seem, combined the statements of J and P so as to agree with P. As it stands, the distinction between clean and unclean animals in that verse is purposeless, and indeed has the effect of emphasizing what appears like an act of disobedience on Noah's part, who took only one instead of seven pairs of clean animals as directed in V. In J this verse must have run much as follows: ' Of clean beasts, seven and seven, of unclean beasts, two and two, went unto Noah into the ark.' In P the statement was probably, ' Of the fowl after its kind, and of the cattle after its kind, and of everything that creepeth upon the ground after its kind, two of every (sort) did he bring into the ark, as God commanded Noah.' (6) According to P it was 150 days before the waters began to subside (8*), and it was 8 months and 13 days before the tops of the mountains were visible (cf. 7" and 8"), and a whole year and 10 days before the earth was perfectly dry (8"). According to J the duration of the Flood was only 40 days (7" 8'), and even before this the water had considerably abated (8-''- *»■ *"'"• "• '">). (e). Wliat is in P a covenant with Noah that the waters should ' no more become a flood to destroy aU flesh ' (9"), is in J the self -deliberation of
J' in consequence of Nojili's sweet-smelling sacrifice (8"- "). See Hexateuch.
I. Hlstoricity of the Flood. — Until compara- tively recent times the belief in a deluge covering the whole world and destroying all men and animals except those providentially preserved in the ark was practically universal among Christians. The fossil remains of marine animals, and the Flood traditions common to people in so many different parts of the world, were confidently appealed to as establishing the truth of the Bible story. Our increased knowledge of geology on the one hand and of comparative mythology on the other have now shown the little value of such evidence, and on these and other grounds this belief has been now surrendered by most biblical scholars as untenable, (a) It has been frequently pointed out that the wliole quantityof moisturecontainedin the world, whether in an aqueous or vaporous form, if all reduced to water, would not be nearly enough to cover the highest mountains, supposing that the earth's sur- face was in anything like its present condition. But there is no evidence or scientific probability that the whole surface was ever so contracted or so levelled as to admit such a possibility. (6) Again, a thorough examination and a comparison of the numerous Flood myths make it impossible to refer them all to one single event, (c). Anthropological science points in the same direction. The diversity of the human race and of language alike makes it extremely improbable that men were derived from a single pair, and this, together with what we know of the early civilization of man, makes it impossible that a universal Flood should have occurred within at least many centuries of the time assigned by biblical chronology. The early relics of primitive man found in caves, ancient graves, etc., all over the world, point to an un- broken succession of human beings, their advance in civilization developing by gradual stages, and the whole extending over many thousands of years.
(d) But, after all, the most obvious difficulties are those which lie on the surface in the narrative itself, supposing that it describes a flood extending over the whole world as we now know it. Noah is said to have collected together animals of every kind, one pair at least of each. Let us try to imagine the long journeys necessary to different parts of the world, including the Tropics and the Arctic Regions, and that in an age when the diffi- culties and dangers of travellin" must have made it almost impossible, and the difficulty of captur- ing and bringing home the animals when captured. How many years wiU it still take the Royal Zoological Society, with all the resources of modem civilization, to collect even single speci- mens of all the kno^vIl larger animals of the world, to say nothing of the hundreds of species still unknown, notliing of the myriads of insects, crustacem, etc., included in the ' creepin" things' of the Bible ! Again, the dimensions of the ark could not possibly have allowed room for the housing of all the creatures ; for, supposing that they were shut up in separate cells (' nests,' Gn 6'* RVm), almost as much space would have been required for passages to 1,'et at them as for the cells themselves. We have also to take into account the immense amount of room required for the storage of food, especially that needed for the larger animals, such as hay for the elephants, and animals of different sorts for the carnivorae, besides all the food necessary for some time after the Flood, before revived vegetation should make fresh food procurable. Even if we could suppose that the dimensions of the ark permitted all this, how would it have been possible to keep all these animals alive? The polar bear would have re-