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Noah’s Children
The Wickedness of the People
Methuselah’s wisdom and knowledge were inherited by his grandson Noah, the son of Lemech. Noah was a righteous and pious man.
When Noah was five hundred years old, he had three sons--Shem, Ham, and Japheth. They too were good and pious men, fearing and loving G-d, and unlike all the other inhabitants of the earth, who had gradually become more and more depraved. Yet neither Noah nor Methuselah could change the evil ways of the people around them, in spite of the many warnings G-d sent through them to their fellow-men. Everyone thought only of his own welfare and recognized only the laws that were in his own favor. Mutual respect and cooperation had given way to violence and sin.
Finally G-d gave them a last chance. He ordered Noah to build an ark slowly, and to complete it in one hundred and twenty years. This was to be the last period of grace within which the people could change their evil ways. Time passed and yet the people had not repented. So fearful was the prevailing corruption that G-d determined to destroy all life by a universal Deluge; not only the men but the beasts also were to perish, so that no trace might remain of that wicked age.
Only Noah found grace in the eyes of G-d, and he was to be spared the fate of all the other living things, because he was the only pious person who had tried to arouse the conscience of the people and warn them of the punishment to come.
The Ark
G-d told Noah to build his ark in public and to tell everyone its purpose: that it would save him from the coming Flood. The Ark was to be three hundred cubits in length, fifty in width, and thirty in height, and was to consist of three stories, divided into small rooms to hold people, animals, and food. Noah and his wife, their three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their wives were to live in it. Some animals of every kind in the world were to live in the Ark too. Noah’s family and the animals were to live in the Ark until the Flood ended. Noah did as G-d commanded. His neighbors made fun of him for his faith, and they paid no attention to his warnings of the Flood that was to come.
The Flood
Noah was six hundred year old when G-d told him to go into the Ark with his whole family, and to admit the animals which G-d had selected.
The Flood commenced on the seventeenth day of the second month. The gates of heaven broke loose, and the depths of the earth opened to send forth streams of raging, boiling water, swallowing everything in its path. Rain fell for forty days and forty nights and the water which covered the earth rose higher and higher. It covered the peaks of the highest mountains. Every living thing died, and all growing things were destroyed. Amid this terrible scene of ruins and devastation the Ark, guided by G-d, floated securely. But the ship was fiercely tossed about and shaken at the heights of the stormy flood, so that it seemed to Noah that it was about to break apart.