Many are the critics of the word of God, but few scholars offer a reasonable explanation of how life began, and how the earth came to be what we see it is today. Few value the word of God as precious and a source for truth. Instead, folks seem to want to correct God’s word or show how things simply couldn’t possibly be, as they are described in the Bible. For example, some critics try to tell us the ark simply didn’t have enough room to accommodate all the species of animals that would have had to have been on the ark, and what about feeding them, only eight souls …really?[1]
Another question might be, “Where did all the water come from?” or “Where did all the water go?”[2] On the other hand, since when should we accept the critic at his word? Why should we assume his questions are fair? Is evidence withheld in order to plant doubt in the minds of believers or would-be believers? According to the Bible, all men knew in the beginning what was true (Romans 1:21), but they didn’t hold the truth precious. Instead, they considered themselves wise (Romans 1:22) and foolishly pushed knowledge of God out of their lives (Romans 1:28), and, as it was in the time of Noah, so it is today.
Did the Lord forget Noah, and did he have to be reminded of Noah’s plight? The Hebrew word for remembered is zakar (H2142), and can be translated: was mindful (Nehemiah 9:17; Psalm 115:12) or thought of (Nehemiah 5:19; 6:14). It is used in prayer to ask God to act on one’s request. In Genesis 8:1-2 the Lord thought of Noah and every living thing with him, both man and beast, in order to act on his behalf. God had to step in to stop the fountains of the deep from gushing out its waters, and the Lord had to act to stop the rainfall, and he brought a wind to pass over the earth and caused the waters to recede.
For five months it rained, continually, and the waters kept rising for 150 days (Genesis 7:12). Now, at the end of those 150 days the floodwaters began receding (Genesis 8:3), and immediately, on the 17th day of the seventh month or 150 days after the floodwaters began to cover the earth (cp. Genesis 7:11, 24), the ark was brought to rest on one of the mountains of Ararat (Genesis 8:3-4), where it stayed until everyone on the ark could leave. So, when the Lord remembered Noah (Genesis 8:1), he immediately acted, to bring the ark to rest on a mountain in Ararat, because the rapid flow of the receding waters would have posed a great danger to their lives. Removing the waters from off the face of the earth, proved to be just as violent, as breaking up the fountains of the great deep (Genesis 7:11). These receding floodwaters are the same waters that carved out places like the Grand Canyon of Arizona. If the ark wasn’t brought to rest, almost immediately after the first 150 days (Genesis 7:24; 8:3), no one would have survived the event.
So, the floodwaters continued to fall, until on the first day of the tenth month, or about 73 days after the ark was brought to rest on one of the mountains of Ararat, the tops of the mountains could be seen (Genesis 8:5), from the window Noah had made in the ark (cp. verse-6).
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[1] See an earlier study of mine, Is the Genesis Flood a Myth?
[2] +See my two earlier studies in 2013, Where Did All the Water Come From? and Where Did All the Water Go?
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