I have always wondered, since the days of Sunday school, how in the heck Noah was able to corral billions of different animal and insect species and the supplies needed to sustain them all into one boat that he built on his own?

So, if any resident Einstein can figure that one out, by all means reply to this thread.

Yo he didnt built that shit on his own, dude. He got all his brother and sons and their wives to help. And it took him a long ass time to do it. That boat musta been huge! The only other thing i can think of, maybe it was way back in the days before darwin, and there werent' nearly as many species around as there are today.

The bible said Noah as the man of the ark, it looks like the massive killer flood, was a story was passed on for generations. There were texts and drawing of the flood about 1000 years before the bible. The text hinted that it was a samarian man who built a boat, but that may also be just a story. And I am very certain the two of every animals was definately fiction.

Yes, not to mention the fact that they had to travel to every end of the earth and gather every species of animal and insect.

Don't bother arguing the complete lunacy of the story as it will just be explained away as a supernatural act of God to which no logical counter argument can ever be presented.

Noah's ark:

1) it took 120 years to build. He and his three sons did the labor witht the help of their four wives.

2) the ark was appx. 450 ft. by 75 ft. It was a barge shape as opposed to say a cruise liner. Assuming the length of a cubit is 17.5 inches the avaliable floor space on the three-decked barge would be over 95,000 sq. ft. and it's total volumn was 1,396,000 cubic feet. Pretty big, huh? (quoted from The World That Perished by John C. Whitcomb)

3) the animals came in pairs....male/female, except those for food and sacrifice, which consisted of 7 pairs each. Remember that the term species as used today means any variation of a given group. Species is simply say canines, felines, humans, reptiles and their variations, etc. All dogs we see came from one set of canines......like that. If you can see that you can see how the problem of species would be solved.

4) if we look at the flood as direct intervention of God in the natural process of the earth, we can see how it could have occured. Could not the God who created all things by his spoken word, cause pairs of animals to answer His call to come as directed?

5) again if we look at the circumstances of the flood, you can see that God did not do for Noah what Noah could do himself. Noah could, and did, build the ark. He could and did provide food and supplies or all the beasts.

6) what Noah could NOT do God did. Noah could not cause "all the fountains of the deep" to open. This means that the waters under the crust of the earth burst forth in volcanic eruptions spewing water and dirt thousands of feet into the air. Noah could not make the waters above the heavens come down. Now imagine these eruptions going n for 40 days and nights!!

7) when it was over and they had spent a year (yep...a year) on the barge, the Bible says te "fountains fo the deep were closed and the water receded steadily from the earth." If you look at Psalms 104:8 it says the mountains rose and the valleys sank down. Now, could not he God who did all the above push down the valleys and raise the mountains, thus making room for the waters and explainig the high mts. we have today that the water could not possibly have covered?

But the problem is that people look at the earth today and suppose it has always been so and that change has been steady. It's called uniformitarinism. (spelling I think??)

Lookit....if things were uniform let me quote some statistics from my book..not being a scientist and all.

Present rate of erosion of the continents: they would be eroded 170-340 times over in 3.5 billion years.

Rates of uplift of mountains: Mts. rising at a rate of 100 cm/1000 years, would result in mts. 100 km high in 100 million years.

Growth of human pop. (1993 edition of book): present pop. size could be 3200 years, while man is assumed to be here over 100 times longer.

These are just a few of the stats. to be found.

I didn't even get into what the earth would look like and what we could expect to find as evidence for a year long, world wide flood. It is interesting to note, as you pointed out, that most cultures have a collective, historical menory of a catistrophic world wide flood. If we evolved why the memory? All of the same thing? Why even the need to invent a god in the first place? Unless there is the historical, ancient memory of God.

Food for thought!!! I case you actually wanted to know!!

Honestly, I don't know how God did it. I just know He did. I really don't think about it much because anything would be a guess. And, since we're talking about God, it could be anything . . . or none of the above.

First of all, if you DON'T believe in God, eh, why bother even talking about it? Write it off as myth and move on. If you DO believe, here are some scatter brained ideas.

1. If you say every "type" of animal could have been "species" or "genus", then you have to admit that evolution DOES occur . . . LOL! So, the animals on the ark DID evolve into today's creatures (theory).

2. Since Jesus fed thousands with a couple of loaves and fishes, then you could argue that spatial co-ordinates are hardly a stumbling block for the almighty. For you D&D guys, call it a HUGE bag of holding!

3. Maybe, just maybe "the world" God destroys is only the world inhabbited by man. Since man was the source of evil, only man needed to be destroyed. At the time, maybe man only lived in a very limited area so "the world" being flooded may only include part of Asia or something? Who knows?

4. It happened just the way it says, and God pulled off a miracle . . . hardly a stretch, though . . .

Oh, and for what it's worth, to all you guys who throw up the "Well, you'll just claim that God can do anything so you can't rationally discuss this" poo-poo, HEY . . . IT'S A BIBLICAL STORY!!!! I don't go to Hollywood and tell them that Arnie can't walk through a hailstrom of bullets. I don't tell them that it's REALLY DUMB to make movies where the Secret Service guys don't wear vests, can't hit the broad side of a barn, and can be killed en mass by 2 terrorists who snuck 22 pounds of C-4 and 12 automatic weapons on board Air Force One inside the garter belt of a 6'2", gorgeous 92 pound blonde blue-eyed model . . . because she wouldn't attract attention. If the director or God writes it that way, that's what the viewer sees! LOL! Remember, in the movies I can beat up 12 ninjas . . . if the script says I can. Same goes for Noah. :D

Maybe Noah was really an alien and his ark was a space craft and he took the animals on board in teh form of DNA, and later created exact replicas?

I think you're onto something Manu!

Originally posted by Manu
Maybe Noah was really an alien and his ark was a space craft and he took the animals on board in teh form of DNA, and later created exact replicas?

Ahh, kinda like Titan A.E., huh?

Originally posted by Brian


Ahh, kinda like Titan A.E., huh?

Sshhhh...don't let them sue me for copyright infrigement :P

LOL!

Well, I hate to spoil the fun with my quacky ideas, but I'm going with Azimov's theory, that the world was not really flooded, but just a large portion of the middle east. From the perspective of the average savage of the time and area, it would seem as though the entire world had been flooded. The ark story probably spawned from a farmer trying to save his livestock.

Or so it seams to Azimov, and myself.

The flooded area is now the black sea.

Originally posted by pitchafit
Well, I hate to spoil the fun with my quacky ideas, but I'm going with Azimov's theory, that the world was not really flooded, but just a large portion of the middle east. From the perspective of the average savage of the time and area, it would seem as though the entire world had been flooded. The ark story probably spawned from a farmer trying to save his livestock.

Or so it seams to Azimov, and myself.

I believe you're correct. From what I remember in school (I went to Catholic school, FWIW), Noah, as well as everything else before Abram/Abraham, was pretty much myth and legend (I believe Noah was before Abram/Abraham, but, since I don't have a Bible in front of me, please correct me if I am wrong)Basically, these stories were used to explain to the people how the worls happened, why there was pain and death in the world, etc. Abram was a historical figure (i.e., he's mentioned in ancient records, etc.), and from there the Bible picks up with real people.

There probably was a great flood in that general area back then. Remember, the population of the time generally didn't move around much--they had no idea how big the world was. Therefore, they thought the world was destroyed. Since none of us was there, we'll never know. But I believe that it probably did spawn from some guy trying to save his livestock and family.

Originally posted by pitchafit
Well, I hate to spoil the fun with my quacky ideas, but I'm going with Azimov's theory, that the world was not really flooded, but just a large portion of the Middle East. From the perspective of the average savage of the time and area, it would seem as though the entire world had been flooded. The ark story probably spawned from a farmer trying to save his livestock.

Or so it seams to Azimov, and myself.

Now, don’t get me wrong pitchafit…I read many of Azimov’s books. Shucks read the Foundation Trilogy in one day…that was before kids (BK) when I was in the Navy and had weekends to myself. :D

Let me ask this about that theory: if it were simply a local flood, why the boat? Why not simply migrate for a time. Or why the story that is in all societies of a WORLD COVERING flood that destroyed all life? Read Gilgamesh…even though he was alone (how did he reproduce?) the flood covered the entire earth. All the stories are the same in this respect. Cultures separated by ages and continents, all have the same story.

Becky

"I believe you're correct. From what I remember in school (I went to Catholic school, FWIW), Noah, as well as everything else before Abram/Abraham, was pretty much myth and legend (I believe Noah was before Abram/Abraham, but, since I don't have a Bible in front of me, please correct me if I am wrong) Basically, these stories were used to explain to the people how the worlds happened, why there was pain and death in the world, etc. Abram was a historical figure (i.e., he's mentioned in ancient records, etc.), and from there the Bible picks up with real people"


The only problem with this theory, from the perspective of Christianity or Catholicism for that matter, would be this: Jesus himself used Noah as an example for the End of the Age and Adam and Eve for an example of marriage and how it is to work. He used them as historical examples, real live examples for how to live and why sin and death came into the world and how it had filled with evil and how he started over. Jesus himself used them….and I’ll take him over any teacher.


Becky

Originally posted by Momof6


Let me ask this about that theory: if it were simply a local flood, why the boat? Why not simply migrate for a time. Or why the story that is in all societies of a WORLD COVERING flood that destroyed all life? Read Gilgamesh…even though he was alone (how did he reproduce?) the flood covered the entire earth. All the stories are the same in this respect. Cultures separated by ages and continents, all have the same story.

Becky

Stories get around. It's a pretty old one, and if I remember correctly, the story can be traced back as far as Mesapotamia(sp?). Why not the boat? Makes for a good plot IMO, just like a lot of the things in the bible. All depends on your perception.

mom, I am in no means claiming to have the answers...

But have ya ever played a game of telephone?

Even with 13 people the setence can get so muddled by the time it reaches the end.

Imagine letting these things go for a few hundred years as vocal tales and then being written down...

the point is there is a basis for the telephone calls, or in other words an underlying statement or fact. The fact is, is that most civilizations have the same general story, with few modifications. Please remember that all the languages descended from one language as well, thus solidifying the idea.

Why would civilizations from literally around the world, including some of the American natives, South American natives, Chineses, etc. all have the same basic story? Remember that according to the Bible we all descended from the 8 people on the boat. Noah lived to be about 700 or 800ish and his sons as long. All spoke the same language until the tower of Babel, where the languages were seperated and the people spread abroad......carrying the story with them.


Just a little food for thought.

Originally posted by Momof6
with few modifications.

I dunno, Ma, we might disagree there. Could you give me some examples please?

Originally posted by Manu
But have ya ever played a game of telephone?

very, very good point.

Pitchafit,

Here are links to some stories I found. Many are very embellished, as expected by the distance in time and area from the original flood. As you read though, you can see in many of them basic similarities. A boat or wooden craft of some type, a few people, male and female saved, and animals saved-sometimes even in pairs. You can also see that in some of the stories birds were sent out to check to see if the flood was dried up yet. As Manu noted in the game telephone, the more the length in time from the original comment or incident, the more the story gets distorted, but the BASIC details remain in many of them. You can also see in many of them that one male and one female were made in the beginning.

I tend to look at it like this: the differences in the stories actually REINFORCE the fact that the flood is true, by the simple fact that the seed of the story of the flood is still there after almost 5,000 years. Shows how well, and how faulty, oral traditions are. So, there ya go. Enjoy the reading…I found it fascinating and informative.


Becky



http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/magazines/docs/v7n2_biami.asp

http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/3768.asp

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/flood-myths.html#Greek

Sounds to me like a helluva wave must have swept the earth from a meteor.... mainly because of the great range of stories presented. Seems a lot of them had different ways of dealing with it.

That it might....just might be true!!! And I thought jarheards were all that! :p

Pretty cool though huh?

Originally posted by TheMan
I have always wondered, since the days of Sunday school, how in the heck Noah was able to corral billions of different animal and insect species and the supplies needed to sustain them all into one boat that he built on his own?

So, if any resident Einstein can figure that one out, by all means reply to this thread.
With God all things are possible.

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by TheMan
I have always wondered, since the days of Sunday school, how in the heck Noah was able to corral billions of different animal and insect species and the supplies needed to sustain them all into one boat that he built on his own?

So, if any resident Einstein can figure that one out, by all means reply to this thread.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


1) he didn't build it on his own, he had three sons. Not to mention it took 120 years.

2) there weren't "billions" of animals to take in. He only needed 2 of each "kind" as they are called in the Bible. 2 canines of each major grouping (as in wolves and domesticated dog), 2 felines of each major grouping (as in tiger, lion, cat, etc), 2 elephants, etc. The kinds were not as diverse as they are after all this time, I would imagine.


3) as mentioned above the ark was HUGE. The three decked barge had a total floor space of 95,000 sq. ft. and it's volume was 1,396,000 cubic ft. Or imagine this.........10 frieght trains, each pulling 52 boxcars, moving by at a very slow speed. That is how much space was avaliable in the ark, according to the bible's given measurments if a cubit was 17.5 inches, as is believed.

Sounds like plenty of room to me. And he did not corral the animals, God brought them. Men when they discuss the flood, forget ot include the divine intervention of God in many of the things that happened. God did not build the ark, as Noah could. God did bring the animals, as Noah couldn't. God didn't gather the food, as Noah could. Noad couldn't make it rain for 40 days/nights or open the fountains of the deep or any of the other DIRECT interventions in the natural processes in the earth....so God did!!

What is so hard to understand....unless one simply does not believe God can do all things. IF the God who spoke and made all things......why could He not speak and destroy all things?

Becky

Originally posted by Momof6
quote:

1) he didn't build it on his own, he had three sons. Not to mention it took 120 years.



For soem reason having three sons help him for 120 years does not make it seem more plausible to me.

In repsonse to divine intervention, of course if you invoke God as an explanation for how things happened as they do, then you can explain anything. The problem is not that people forget the effects of divine intervention, it is more that people are trying to rationalize the stories in the bible without the need for God. Many people do not believe that God intervenes in the world, and so they scrutinize the stories under this premise. Explaining the story by "God made it happen" will never please this group of people. You believe that he does intervene, and so you look at the story with different premises. It makes perfect sense for you to say that "God did it." That I think is why people do not include divine intervention in their analysis of bible stories.