Genesis 7:22

7:21-24 All the men, women, and children, that were in the world, excepting those in the ark, died. We may easily imagine what terror seized them. Our Saviour tells us, that till the very day that the flood came, they were eating and drinking, Lu 17:26,27; they were deaf and blind to all Divine warnings. In this posture death surprised them. They were convinced of their folly when it was too late. We may suppose they tried all ways and means possible to save themselves, but all in vain. And those that are not found in Christ, the Ark, are certainly undone, undone for ever. Let us pause, and consider this tremendous judgment! Who can stand before the Lord when he is angry? The sin of sinners will be their ruin, first or last, if not repented of. The righteous God knows how to bring ruin upon the world of the ungodly, 2Pe 2:5. How tremendous will be the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men! Happy they who are part of Christ's family, and safe with him as such; they may look forward without dismay, and rejoice that they shall triumph, when fire shall burn up the earth, and all that therein is. We are apt to suppose some favourable distinctions in our own case or character; but if we neglect, refuse, or abuse the salvation of Christ, we shall, notwithstanding such fancied advantages, be destroyed in the common ruin of an unbelieving world.

All in whose nostrils was the breath of life,.... Whether of fowls, beast, cattle, or creeping things: of all that was in the dry land, died; by which description fishes were excepted, since they breathe not, having no lungs, and are not on the dry land, where they cannot live, but in the waters. Some pretend it to be the opinion of some Jewish writers, that the fishes did die, the waters being made hot, and scalded them; but this fable I have not met with.

21. all flesh died … fowl … cattle, and … creeping thing—It has been a uniform principle in the divine procedure, when judgments were abroad on the earth, to include every thing connected with the sinful objects of His wrath (Ge 19:25; Ex 9:6). Besides, now that the human race was reduced to one single family, it was necessary that the beasts should be proportionally diminished, otherwise by their numbers they would have acquired the ascendancy and overmastered the few that were to repeople the world. Thus goodness was mingled with severity; the Lord exercises judgment in wisdom and in wrath remembers mercy.

There expired all flesh. - The resulting death of all by drowning is here recounted. "All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of live died." This statement refers solely to man, whose higher life is exclusively expressed by the phrase חיים נשׁמת nı̂shmat chayı̂ym, "breath of life" Genesis 2:7 . It affirms the death of the whole of mankind. The sum total of animal and vegetable life, with the exception of those in the ark, is here declared to be extinguished.

Genesis 7:17-24 contain a description of the flood: how the water increased more and more, till it was 15 cubits above all the lofty mountains of the earth, and how, on the one hand, it raised the ark above the earth and above the mountains, and, on the other, destroyed every living being upon the dry land, from man to cattle, creeping things, and birds. "The description is simple and majestic; the almighty judgment of God, and the love manifest in the midst of the wrath, hold the historian fast. The tautologies depict the fearful monotony of the immeasurable expanse of water: omnia pontus erant et deerant litera ponto." The words of Genesis 7:17 , "and the flood was (came) upon the earth for forty days," relate to the 40 days' rain combined with the bursting forth of the foundations beneath the earth. By these the water was eventually raised to the height given, at which it remained 150 days ( Genesis 7:24 ). But if the water covered "all the high hills under the whole heaven," this clearly indicates the universality of the flood. The statement, indeed, that it rose 15 cubits above the mountains, is probably founded upon the fact, that the ark drew 15 feet of water, and that when the waters subsided, it rested upon the top of Ararat, from which the conclusion would very naturally be drawn as to the greatest height attained.

Now as Ararat, according to the measurement of Perrot, is only 16,254 feet high, whereas the loftiest peaks of the Himalaya and Cordilleras are as much as 26,843, the submersion of these mountains has been thought impossible, and the statement in Genesis 7:19 has been regarded as a rhetorical expression, like Deuteronomy 2:25 and Deuteronomy 4:19 , which is not of universal application. But even if those peaks, which are higher than Ararat, were not covered by water, we cannot therefore pronounce the flood merely partial in its extent, but must regard it as universal, as extending over every part of the world, since the few peaks uncovered would not only sink into vanishing points in comparison with the surface covered, but would form an exception not worth mentioning, for the simple reason that no living beings could exist upon these mountains, covered with perpetual snow and ice; so that everything that lived upon the dry land, in whose nostrils there was a breath of life, would inevitably die, and, with the exception of those shut up in the ark, neither man nor beast would be able to rescue itself, and escape destruction. A flood which rose 15 cubits above the top of Ararat could not remain partial, if it only continued a few days, to say nothing of the fact that the water was rising for 40 days, and remained at the highest elevation for 150 days.

[Bible] 7:20. The water was fifteen cubits higher than the mountains which it covered. 7:21. And all flesh was destroyed that moved upon the earth, both of fowl and of cattle, and of beasts, and of all creeping things that creep upon the earth: and all men. 7:22. And all things wherein there is the breath of life on the earth, died. 7:23. And he destroyed all the substance that was upon the earth, from man even to beast, and the creeping things and fowls of the air: and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noe only remained, and they that were with him in the ark. 7:24. And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days. Genesis Chapter 8 The deluge ceaseth. Noe goeth out of the ark, and offereth a sacrifice. God's covenant to him. 8:1. And God remembered Noe, and all the living creatures, and all the cattle which were with him in the ark, and brought a wind upon the earth, and the waters were abated: 8:2. The fountains also of the deep, and the floodgates of heaven, were shut up, and the rain from heaven was restrained. 8:3. And the waters returned from off the earth going and coming: and they began to be abated after a hundred and fifty days. 8:4. And the ark rested in the seventh month, the seven and twentieth day of the month, upon the mountains of Armenia. 8:5. And the waters were going and decreasing until the tenth month: for in the tenth month, the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains appeared. 8:6. And after that forty days were passed, Noe opening the window of the ark, which he had made, sent forth a raven: 8:7. Which went forth and did not return, till the waters were dried up upon the earth. Did not return... The raven did not return into the ark; but (as it may be gathered from the Hebrew) went to and fro; sometimes going to the mountains, where it found carcasses to feed on: and other times returning, to rest upon the top of the ark. 8:8. He sent forth also a dove after him, to see if the waters had now ceased upon the face of the earth.

[Reformed Biblical] God, ## do bring, i.e. will assuredly and speedily bring, ## all flesh, i.e. all men, birds, and beasts. ## Every thing that is in the earth. This limitation is added to show, that the fishes are not included in the threatened destruction, either because they did not live in the same element wherein men lived and sinned; or because they were not so instrumental in men’s sins as the beasts might be; or because man had a greater command over the beasts than over the fishes, and greater service and benefit from them; and therefore the destruction of the former was a greater and more proper punishment to man than the latter. Genesis 6:18 Either, 1. My promise to preserve thee and thine, both till the flood and in it, notwithstanding all the scoffs and threats of the wicked world against thee all t