Genesis 9
9
God Blesses Noah and His Sons
1God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fertile, increase in number, and fill the earth. 2All the wild animals and all the birds will fear you and be terrified of you. Every creature that crawls on the ground and all the fish in the sea have been put under your control. 3Everything that lives and moves will be your food. I gave you green plants as food; I now give you everything else.
4“But you are not to eat meat with blood in it. (Blood is life.) 5In addition, I will demand your blood for your life. I will demand it from any animal or from any person. I will demand the life of any person ⌞who kills⌟ another person.
6Whoever sheds human blood,
by humans his blood will be shed,
because in the image of God, God made humans.
7Be fertile, and increase in number. Spread over the earth, and increase.”
God’s Promise—the Sign of the Rainbow
8God also said to Noah and his sons, 9“I am going to make my promise #9:9 Or “covenant.” to you, your descendants, 10and every living being that is with you—birds, domestic animals, and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ship—every living thing on earth. 11I am making my promise to you. Never again will all life be killed by floodwaters. Never again will there be a flood that destroys the earth.”
12God said, “This is the sign of the promise I am giving to you and every living being that is with you for generations to come. 13I will put my rainbow in the clouds to be a sign of my promise to the earth. 14Whenever I form clouds over the earth, a rainbow will appear in the clouds. 15Then I will remember my promise to you and every living animal. Never again will water become a flood to destroy all life. 16Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember my everlasting promise to every living animal on earth.”
17So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the promise I am making to all life on earth.”
Noah Curses Canaan but Blesses Shem and Japheth
18Noah’s sons, who came out of the ship, were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. 19These were Noah’s three sons. From them the whole earth was populated. Ham was the father of Canaan.#9:19 The second part of verse 18 (in Hebrew) has been placed just after verse 19 to express the complex Hebrew sentence structure more clearly in English.
20Noah, a farmer, was the first person to plant a vineyard. 21He drank some wine, got drunk, and lay naked inside his tent. 22Ham, father of Canaan, saw his father naked. So he went outside and told his two brothers.
23Shem and Japheth took a blanket and laid it over their shoulders. Then they walked in backwards and covered their father’s naked body. They turned their faces away so that they didn’t see their father naked.
24When Noah sobered up, he found out what his youngest son had done to him. 25So he said,
“Canaan is cursed!
He will be the lowest slave to his brothers.
26Praise the Lord, the God of Shem!
Canaan will be his slave.
27May God expand the territory of Japheth.#9:27 There is a play on words here between the Hebrew yapht (May God expand) and yepheth (Japheth).
May he live in the tents of Shem.
Canaan will be his slave.”
28Noah lived 350 years after the flood. 29Noah lived a total of 950 years; then he died.
GOD'S WORD® Translation ©1995, 2003, 2013, 2014, 2019, 2020 by God's Word to the Nations Mission Society. All rights reserved.
Genesis 9
9
1And God blesseth Noah, and his sons, and saith to them, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth;
2and your fear and your dread is on every beast of the earth, and on every fowl of the heavens, on all that creepeth on the ground, and on all fishes of the sea — into your hand they have been given.
3Every creeping thing that is alive, to you it is for food; as the green herb I have given to you the whole;
4only flesh in its life — its blood — ye do not eat.
5‘And only your blood for your lives do I require; from the hand of every living thing I require it, and from the hand of man, from the hand of every man's brother I require the life of man;
6whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man is his blood shed: for in the image of God hath He made man.
7And ye, be fruitful and multiply, teem in the earth, and multiply in it.’
8And God speaketh unto Noah, and unto his sons with him, saying,
9‘And I, lo, I am establishing My covenant with you, and with your seed after you,
10and with every living creature which [is] with you, among fowl, among cattle, and among every beast of the earth with you, from all who are going out of the ark — to every beast of the earth.
11And I have established My covenant with you, and all flesh is not any more cut off by waters of a deluge, and there is not any more a deluge to destroy the earth.’
12And God saith, ‘This is a token of the covenant which I am giving between Me and you, and every living creature that [is] with you, to generations age-during;
13My bow I have given in the cloud, and it hath been for a token of a covenant between Me and the earth;
14and it hath come to pass (in My sending a cloud over the earth) that the bow hath been seen in the cloud,
15and I have remembered My covenant which is between Me and you, and every living creature among all flesh, and the waters become no more a deluge to destroy all flesh;
16and the bow hath been in the cloud, and I have seen it — to remember the covenant age-during between God and every living creature among all flesh which [is] on the earth.’
17And God saith unto Noah, ‘This [is] a token of the covenant which I have established between Me and all flesh that [is] upon the earth.’
18And the sons of Noah who are going out of the ark are Shem, and Ham, and Japheth; and Ham is father of Canaan.
19These three [are] sons of Noah, and from these hath all the earth been overspread.
20And Noah remaineth a man of the ground, and planteth a vineyard,
21and drinketh of the wine, and is drunken, and uncovereth himself in the midst of the tent.
22And Ham, father of Canaan, seeth the nakedness of his father, and declareth to his two brethren without.
23And Shem taketh — Japheth also — the garment, and they place on the shoulder of them both, and go backward, and cover the nakedness of their father; and their faces [are] backward, and their father's nakedness they have not seen.
24And Noah awaketh from his wine, and knoweth that which his young son hath done to him,
25and saith: ‘Cursed [is] Canaan, Servant of servants he is to his brethren.’
26And he saith: ‘Blessed of Jehovah my God [is] Shem, And Canaan is servant to him.
27God doth give beauty to Japheth, And he dwelleth in tents of Shem, And Canaan is servant to him.’
28And Noah liveth after the deluge three hundred and fifty years;
29and all the days of Noah are nine hundred and fifty years, and he dieth.
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