1   The Lord said to Noah, ‘Go into the ark, you and all your household; for I have seen that you alone are righteous before me in this generation. 2   Take with you seven pairs, male and female, of all beasts that are ritually clean, and one pair, male and female, of all beasts that are not clean; 3   also seven pairs, male and female, of every bird—to ensure that life continues on earth. 4   In seven days' time I will send rain over the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe off the face of the earth every living thing that I have made.’ 5   Noah did all that the Lord had commanded him. 6   He was six hundred years old when the waters of the flood came upon the earth.

7   And so, to escape the waters of the flood, Noah went into the ark with his sons, his wife, and his sons' wives. 8    9   And into the ark with Noah went one pair, male and female, of all beasts, clean and unclean, of birds and of everything that crawls on the ground, two by two, as God had

The flood and the tower of Babel commanded. 10   Towards the end of seven days the waters of the flood came upon the earth. 11   In the year when Noah was six hundred years old, on the seventeenth day of the second month, on that very day, all the springs of the great abyss broke through, the windows of the sky were opened, 12   and rain fell on the earth for forty days and forty nights. 13   On that very day Noah entered the ark with his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, his own wife, and his three sons' wives. ^note 14   Wild animals of every kind, cattle of every kind, reptiles of every kind that move upon the ground, 15   and birds of every kind ^note—all came to Noah in the ark, two by two of all creatures that had life ^note in them. 16   Those which came were one male and one female of all living things; they came in as God had commanded Noah, and the Lord closed the door on him. 17   The flood continued upon the earth for forty days, and the waters swelled and lifted up the ark so that it rose high above the ground. 18   They swelled and increased over the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the waters. 19   More and more the waters increased over the earth until they covered all the high mountains everywhere under heaven. 20   The waters increased and the mountains were covered to a depth of fifteen cubits. 21   Every living creature that moves on earth perished, birds, cattle, wild animals, all reptiles, and all mankind. 22   Everything died that had the breath of life ^note in its nostrils, everything on dry land. 23   God wiped out every living thing that existed on earth, man and beast, reptile and bird; they were all wiped out over the whole earth, and only Noah and his company in the ark survived.

24   When the waters had increased over the earth for a hundred and fifty days,

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