Genesis 8
8
1 God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock that were with him in the ship; and God made a wind to pass over the earth. The waters subsided. 2The deep’s fountains and the sky’s windows were also stopped, and the rain from the sky was restrained. 3The waters continually receded from the earth. After the end of one hundred fifty days the waters receded. 4The ship rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on Ararat’s mountains. 5The waters receded continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were visible.
6 At the end of forty days, Noah opened the window of the ship which he had made, 7and he sent out a raven. It went back and forth, until the waters were dried up from the earth. 8He himself sent out a dove to see if the waters were abated from the surface of the ground, 9but the dove found no place to rest her foot, and she returned into the ship to him, for the waters were on the surface of the whole earth. He put out his hand, and took her, and brought her to him into the ship. 10He waited yet another seven days; and again he sent the dove out of the ship. 11The dove came back to him at evening and, behold, in her mouth was a freshly plucked olive leaf. So Noah knew that the waters were abated from the earth. 12He waited yet another seven days, and sent out the dove; and she didn’t return to him any more.
13 In the six hundred first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from the earth. Noah removed the covering of the ship, and looked. He saw that the surface of the ground was dry. 14In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry.
15 God spoke to Noah, saying, 16“Go out of the ship, you, your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives with you. 17Bring out with you every living thing that is with you of all flesh, including birds, livestock, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful, and multiply on the earth.”
18 Noah went out, with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives with him. 19Every animal, every creeping thing, and every bird, whatever moves on the earth, after their families, went out of the ship.
20 Noah built an altar to the LORD, and took of every clean animal, and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21The LORD smelled the pleasant aroma. The LORD said in his heart, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake because the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth. I will never again strike every living thing, as I have done. 22While the earth remains, seed time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night will not cease.”
PUBLIC DOMAIN
Genesis 8
8
The Water Goes Down
1God did not forget about Noah and the animals with him in the boat. So God made a wind blow, and the water started going down. 2God stopped up the places where the water had been gushing out from under the earth. He also closed up the sky, and the rain stopped. 3For 150 days the water slowly went down. 4Then on the seventeenth day of the seventh month of the year, the boat came to rest somewhere in the Ararat mountains. 5The water kept going down, and the mountain tops could be seen on the first day of the tenth month.
6-7Forty days later Noah opened a window to send out a raven, but it kept flying around until the water had dried up. 8Noah wanted to find out if the water had gone down, so he sent out a dove. 9Deep water was still everywhere, and when the dove could not find a place to land, it flew back to the boat. Then Noah held out his hand and helped it back in.
10Seven days later Noah sent the dove out again. 11It returned in the evening, holding in its beak a green leaf from an olive tree. Noah knew the water was finally going down. 12He waited seven more days before sending the dove out again, and this time it did not return.
13Noah was now 601 years old. And by the first day of that year, almost all the water had gone away. Noah made an opening in the roof of the boat#8.13 made … boat: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text. and saw that the ground was getting dry. 14By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was completely dry.
15God said to Noah, 16“You, your wife, your sons, and your daughters-in-law may now leave the boat. 17Let out the birds, animals, and reptiles, so they can mate and live all over the earth.” 18After Noah and his family had left the boat, 19the living creatures left in groups of their own kind.
The Lord's Promise for the Earth
20Noah built an altar where he could offer sacrifices to the Lord. Then he offered on the altar one of each kind of animal and bird that could be used for a sacrifice.#8.20 animal … sacrifice: See the note at 7.2. 21The smell of the burning offering pleased the Lord, and he said:
Never again will I punish the earth for the sinful things its people do. All of them have evil thoughts from the time they are young, but I will never destroy everything that breathes, as I did this time.
22As long as the earth remains,
there will be planting
and harvest,
cold and heat;
winter and summer,
day and night.
Contemporary English Version, Second Edition (CEV®)
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