We are thus compelled to adopt the opinion that the flood of Noah was (lll^^ other deluges of which we read) a local event confined to one part of the earth's surface, and that it was ** universal" only inasmuch as it effected the destruction of the whole human race, the family of Noah alone excepted. Against this opin- ion no objections of any weight can be urged. It is borne out by the evidence to be derived fh)m a study of the phenomena of nature ; and it is not at variance with any statement in holy Scripture. The univer- sality of the language in which Moses describes the extent of the Deluge— ** all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were covered" — has indeed been regarded as a testimony to the universality of the catastrophe. But such g^ieral expressions are of fre- quent occurrence in the sacred writings to denote a tract of country which, tiiough large relatively to its inhabitants, yet formed only a very smaU portion of the earth's sur&ce. No audientic traces of the action of the flood have yet been detected in the East, where the area of submersion was probably situated, nor indeed is it likely that any such traces will ever be found. They might confirm our fiiith, but they are by no means necessary, for the fact of the former de- struction of the human race is made known to us in, the sacred volume, and has been handed down by tra- dition in almost every nation of the earth, even the most barbarous and the farthest removed from the early cradle of the human race. It is natural to sup- pose that the writer, when he speaks of **all flesh," *^ all in whose nostrils was the breath of life," refers only to Ms own locality. This sort of language is common enoucrh in the Bible when only a small part of the globe is intended. Thus, for instance, it is said that '* (Ul cowUries came into Egypt to Joseph to buy com;" and that **a decree went out from C»sar Au- gustus that ali the vsorid should be taxed." In these and many similar passages the expressions of the writer are obviously not to be taken in an exactly literal sense. Even the apparently very distinct phrase ^^aU the high hills that were toicfer the tokok
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heaven were coyered" may be matched by another pre- cisely similar, where it is said that God woold pat the fear and the dread of Israel upon every nation under heetven. It requires no effort to see Ihat such language is framed with a kind of poetic breadth. The real dif- ficulty lies in the connecting of this statement with the district in which Noah is supposed to have lived, and the assertion that the waters prevailed fifteen cu- bits upward. If the Ararat on which the ark rested be the present mountain of the same name, the highest peak of which is more than 17,000 feet above the sea, it would have been quite impossible for this to have been covered, the water reaching fifteen cubits, i. e. twenty-six feet above it, unless tibe whole earth were submerged. The author of the Genetis of the Earthy etc. has endeavored to escape this difficulty by shift- ing the scene of the catastrophe to the low country on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates (a miraculous overflow of these rivers being sufficient to account for the Deluge), and supposing that the ** fifteen cubits upward" are to be reckoned, not from the top of the mountains, but fh>m the surface of the plain. By " the high hills" he thinks may be meant only slight elevations, called '*high" because they were the high- est parts overflowed. But fifteen cubits is only a little more than twenty-six feet, and it seems absurd to sup- pose that such triffing elevations are described as *' idl the hi^^h hills under the whole heaven." At this rate the ark itself must have been twice the height of the highest mountain. The plain meaning of Uie narra- tive is that, far as the eye could sweep, not a solitary mountain reared its head above the waste of waters. On the other hand, there is no necessity for assuming that the ark stranded on the high peaks of the mount- ain now called Ararat, or even that that mountain was visible. A lower mountain range, such as the Za- gros range for instance, may be intended. In the ab- sence of all geographical certainty in the matter, it is better to adopt some such explanation of the difficulty. Indeed, it is out of the question to imagine that the ark rested on the top of a mountain wbidi is covered for 4000 feet fh>m the summit with perpetual snow, and the descent from which would have been a very seri- ous matter both to men and other animals. The local tradition, according to which the fragments of the ark are still believed to remain on the summit, can weigh nothing when balanced against so extreme an improb- ability. Assuming, then, that the Ararat here men- tioned is not the mountain of that name in Armenia, we may also assume the inundation to have been par- tial, and may suppose it to have extended over the whole valley of the Euphrates, and eastward as fur as the range of mountains running down to the Persian Gulf, or further. As the inundation is said to have been caused by the breaking up of the fountains of the great deep, as well as by the rain, some great and sud- den subsidence of the land pnay have taken place, ac- companied by an inrush of the waters of the Persian Gulf, similar to what occurred in the Runn of Cutch, on the eastern arm of the Indus, in 1819, when the sea flowed in, and in a few hours converted a tract of land 2000 square miles in area into an inland sea, or lagoon (see the account of this subsidence of the Delta of the Indus in Lyell's Principles of Geclog^^ p. 460-68). — Kitto, s. V. ; Smith, s. v. Noah. Compare Flood.