The flood, creation and life: the mitigation
Part 4
This is the last piece of the article on the flood by Clines we will look at. So far we have read how the Noah story from the Bible stands out from other flood stories because there is a moral reason the flood was sent, and that the story doesn’t focus on the clever human who figured out a way to live despite the flood. We explored how the moral problem that was being addressed is that all of creation was destroying God’s created order and that the punishment sent - the destruction of creation - fit the crime. I left off in my last post that all of creation was returned to the chaos it was precreation… except for one man, his family and a bunch of creatures from creation.
The Mitigation1
Noah walked with God, so with the preservation of him, his family, and the creatures on the ark, God could start over with a righteous society - right? One of the first stories we read about after the flood is how Noah gets drunk, sleeps naked, and his son spies on him, leading his father to curse him (Genesis 9:18–27). We know from Leviticus 20:11–21 (laws about uncovering the nakedness of relatives) that what happens is again a rebellion against God’s created order. It seems that the pre-flood problem is the same. Clines suggests that the Noah story is not actually a judgement story, it’s actually one of mitigation, something we see often in the Hebrew Bible. God promises Adam and Eve “on the day that you eat of the fruit you will surely die.” Instead, God sends them into exile away from the land that he had made for them. Cain kills his brother and should justly be killed (an eye for an eye). Instead, God sends him away, marking him to preserve him from being killed. In the Noah story, all of creation is destroying itself and the designs that God had for it. God helps them along, but instead of starting over or giving up on his creation, he chooses to preserve a remnant of people.
I think the story does want us to notice that not everything is the same, though. Looking back at the story, in Genesis 8:1, God “remembers” Noah and all the different animals that are on the ark floating around in chaos.2 And then it says that “he causes a wind to cross over the water.” Remember wind and spirit are the same word in Hebrew. In the first creation, the wind/spirit of God was hovering over the waters. Now God sends a wind so that the waters subside.3 It’s as if God is a step further back than he was in the beginning.
We also see language from creation being repeated, but with changes. Compare Genesis 9:1–3 in light of Genesis 1:28–30. I have underlined the similar/same words, but look at the content around them that has changed:
| Genesis 1:28–30 | Genesis 9:1–3 |
|---|---|
| “God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so.” | “God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you shall rest on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of the air, on everything that creeps on the ground, and on all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and just as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.” |
Man’s relationship with creation has changed. Before, God gave to man and animals plants to eat. Now God gives to man everything, including the animals for food. And now the animals live in fear and dread of humanity. Clines argues that “violence is a part of natural order.”4 But, ultimately, God blesses the people and repeats that they should multiply on the earth (Gen 9:7).5 And God makes a covenant, not just with Noah, but with all flesh, that “all flesh would never again be destroyed by the waters of a flood” (Gen 9:15).
Clines puts this covenant into a canonical perspective (in light of the New Testament). He says “[o]nce, in primeval time, God has experimented with uncreation, and has put it behind Him forever. Even though we may expect a dissolution through fire of the earth that now is, that will be no uncreation, but the prelude to a new heavens and a new earth (2 Pet. 3:7- 13).”6
In spite of the continued destruction of creation by itself, God will remain faithful to it and preserve it. Clines eloquently concludes “The story of the Flood is therefore an affirmation of the story of creation, and speaks ultimately not of divine punishment but of God’s faithfulness to the works of His hands.”7
And that ends Cline’s article. In my next posts, I will reflect more on some of these themes we have uncovered as I continue to learn about the God of life and his creation.
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That is, “the process or result of making something less severe, dangerous, painful, harsh, or damaging” accesses Jan 25, 2025 https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mitigation . ↩︎
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This is the same language used when God decides to save his people from Egypt (Exodus 2:24) - God remembers them. The BibleProject has a nice reflection on this literary pattern here. ↩︎
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Note, this also looks forward to the Exodus story when God sends a wind to drive back the waters to make dry land (the Bible likes to show that there is a pattern to how God works). ↩︎
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139. Clines notes “Even in violence there is a limit. Man may take life, but he may not eat blood (9:4), which is the sign of life. “Even when man slaughters and kills, he is to know that he is touching something, which, because it is life, is in a special manner God’s property; and as a sign of this he is to keep his hands off the blood.”143 We will look at this deeper in a future post. ↩︎
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Fertility of any sort is evidence of God’s blessing in the Old Testament. ↩︎
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2 Peter looks forward to the purification of the world (think refiner’s fire - cf. Malachi 3:2–3). Clines, 140. ↩︎
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140. ↩︎
