Genesis 7

God tells Noah to enter the ark, and Noah obeys. The waters come from below and above, cover the whole earth, and every living thing outside the ark dies. Noah’s family and the animals with him are kept safe, held up by the same waters that bring judgment on everything else.

Genesis 7:1

God invites Noah in with the word ‘Go into the ark’, and he does not send him alone. Noah’s household is included. The reason given is that God has found Noah righteous in a wicked age. Noah is not sinless, but he is a man who trusts God.

BSA: righteous (“just, upright”): Noah’s life was straight and fair in a crooked generation, and God noticed. ark (“the vessel of salvation”): The ark is a place of rescue that God himself provided.

Hebrew: צַדִּיק (tsaddiq, H6662) — “righteous, in the right.” The word describes someone whose life measures up to God’s standard. It is not about perfection but about being right with God and faithful to him.

See also: Hebrews 11:7; 2 Peter 2:5.

Genesis 7:2-3

Noah is to bring extra clean animals and birds, seven pairs of each, and one pair of each unclean kind. The extra clean animals would later be used for sacrifice and food. The purpose is stated plainly: to keep each kind alive on the earth after the flood.

BSA: clean (“pure, ceremonially acceptable”): Some animals were already counted fit for offering to God. preserve (“keep alive, save”): The animals are brought aboard so that life itself will carry on.

Hebrew: שִׁבְעָה (shiv’ah, H7651) — “seven.” Seven is repeated for the clean animals, ‘sevens, sevens’. It marks a generous supply, enough for both sacrifice and new flocks.

Genesis 7:4

God gives a seven-day warning before the rain starts. He also says what the flood will do: wipe out every living thing he made from the earth’s surface. The judgment is serious, but the delay shows God’s patience, and Noah has time to finish getting ready.

BSA: wipe (“completely destroy, erase”): God speaks of blotting out life as one wipes a page clean.

See also: Matthew 24:37-39.

Genesis 7:5

Noah did all that God commanded. The words are short, but they cover many years of building the ark and gathering what was needed. Faith here shows itself in plain obedience, with no part of the command left out.

BSA: all (“everything, without exception”): Noah’s obedience was complete, with nothing held back.

See also: Hebrews 11:7.

Genesis 7:6-7

Noah is 600 years old when the flood comes. He, his wife, his three sons and their wives go into the ark before the waters rise. Eight people go in, and they are the ones who will escape the waters of judgment.

BSA: escape (“flee from, be saved from”): They enter the ark to be saved from judgment, not simply to travel.

Hebrew: מַבּוּל (mabbul, H3999) — “flood, deluge.” This is a special word for the great flood. In the Old Testament it is used almost only of Noah’s flood, as something one of a kind.

See also: 1 Peter 3:20.

Genesis 7:8-9

The animals come to Noah, two by two, male and female. Noah does not have to hunt them down. It is God who commands, and creatures of every kind arrive to be kept safe. The ark is God’s gift to them as well as to Noah.

BSA: came (“in pairs, two by two”): The animals arrive as pairs, so each kind can have young after the flood.

Genesis 7:10

After the seven days God had promised, the floodwaters come. What God said would happen happens exactly as he said. The week of waiting was his last stretch of mercy, with the door of the ark open and the warning given.

BSA: seven (“a literal 24-hour period or a figurative space of time”): Whether read as a week or a set span, the waiting time was fixed by God and ended on schedule.

Genesis 7:11

The text gives the exact day: the seventeenth day of the second month in Noah’s 600th year. Water comes both from beneath the earth and from the sky. The flood comes as a breaking open of the created order, not as ordinary rain.

BSA: floodgates (“windows, or lattices”): The sky is pictured as having openings, and God opens them to let the waters pour down. deep (“the abyss, or the subterranean water supply”): The great deep is the vast water beneath and around the land.

Hebrew: תְּהוֹם (tehom, H8415) — “the deep, ocean depths.” This is the same word as the deep in Genesis 1:2. The waters that God once held back in creation now break loose.

See also: Genesis 1:2.

Genesis 7:12

Rain falls for forty days and forty nights. Forty is often a number of testing or a set period in Scripture, and here it marks a long, steady judgment. The rain is not brief. It goes on until the work God intended is done.

BSA: forty (“a significant period of time”): Forty marks a full and fixed period, often a time of trial.

Genesis 7:13-14

The text repeats that Noah entered the ark ‘on that very day’. It names his sons and lists the kinds of creatures with him. The careful naming shows that these were real people, saved by name, and the animals are listed as well.

BSA: Japheth (“a son, father of many nations”): Noah’s three sons are named because the whole human family after the flood comes from them.

Genesis 7:15-16

Creatures with the breath of life come in pairs, as God commanded. Then comes a gentle detail: the LORD himself shut Noah in. Noah did not close the door by his own strength. God sealed him in safety, as well as sealing the world’s judgment outside.

BSA: shut (“closed, bringing to an end”): The door is closed on the old world, with Noah safe behind it. breath (“spirit, life-giving essence”): Life is God’s gift, the breath he breathed into living things.

Hebrew: וַיִּסְגֹּר (vayisgor, H5462) — “and he shut.” The verb means to close a door firmly. God is the one who does it, so the shelter rests on his care and not on Noah’s work.

Genesis 7:17-18

The flood keeps coming for forty days. As the water rises, it lifts the ark off the ground and carries it along. The same water that destroys the earth holds up the ark. Noah is brought safely through judgment.

BSA: lifted (“to exalt, to raise up”): The rising waters raise the ark higher, so the danger itself carries it upward.

See also: 1 Peter 3:20.

Genesis 7:19-20

The waters rise until all the high mountains under the whole sky are covered. They stand fifteen cubits above the mountaintops, which is over twenty feet. No high place is left, and nowhere on earth is out of reach of the flood.

BSA: inundated (“overcame, rose very high on”): The waters overpowered the land completely.

Hebrew: וַיְכֻסּוּ (vaykhussu, H3680) — “and they were covered.” The word means hidden from sight. The highest peaks, where anyone might hope to escape, were hidden under the water.

Genesis 7:21-23

Every creature that lived on dry land died, including all mankind. The writer says it three times in different ways, so that no one can miss it. Only Noah and those with him in the ark remained. The text states the weight of judgment without softening it.

BSA: blotted out (“erased, removed”): Life was wiped away as writing is wiped off a page. remained (“were left, spared”): Noah’s family were spared, being kept by God and not by their own power.

Hebrew: נִשְׁמַת (nishmat, H5397) — “breath of.” This is the word for the breath God breathed into Adam in Genesis 2:7. It shows that what ended was life itself, the very breath God gave.

See also: Genesis 2:7; 2 Peter 3:6.

Genesis 7:24

The waters stay high over the earth for 150 days, about five months. The flood does not pass quickly. The chapter ends with the water still in control and the ark floating on it, with Noah waiting to see what God will do next.

BSA: prevailed (“flooded”): The waters held their strength and dominated the earth for a long time.

Hebrew: וַיִּגְבְּרוּ (vayigberu, H1396) — “and they prevailed, grew mighty.” The verb is related to the word for a strong man. The waters acted like a mighty power over the whole earth, until God turned them back.

See also: Genesis 8:1.