BibleProject - God’s Spirit in the Flood Narrative – Genesis E2

Episode Date: January 10, 2022

When we think of God’s Spirit, judgment is probably not what comes to mind. But the biblical authors saw God’s Spirit as the one who gave life and took it away—the one who could create, de-create, and recreate. In this episode, Tim, Jon, and Carissa follow the theme of God’s Spirit through the second half of the first movement of Genesis.View full show notes from this episode →Timestamps Part one (00:00-10:20)Part two (10:20-29:00)Part three (29:00-35:00)Part four (35:00-43:30)Part five (43:30-end)Referenced ResourcesInterested in more? Check out Tim’s library here.Show Music “Defender (Instrumental)” by TENTS“Meraki” by Juan RiosShow produced by Cooper Peltz. Edited by Dan Gummel and Zach McKinley. Show notes by Lindsey Ponder. Powered and distributed by Simplecast.

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it in. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

When you think of God's spirit, what comes to mind? Maybe it's the story of Elijah, who encounters God's still small voice on Mount worth. Maybe it's the spirit descending like a dove at Jesus' baptism, or Jesus promising the spirit to his disciples before ascending to the skies. Perhaps even it's the first mention of the Holy Spirit, when God hovers over the darkness, ready to bring order in life. Where God's spirit is, there is life. And so not many of us think about God's spirit

related to judgment. If all creation order is sustained by God's rulach, this spirit, it means that God has the progative to take it away. He deemed it so. This, at least in part, is why Adam and Eve were scared after they ate of the tree of knowing good and bad, they heard God coming, and he came in the sound of a storm.

The wind of the day in Genesis 3 verse 8 is foreshadowing the storms of God's justice when he shows up for the day at the Lord. And the next one appears in just a really complicated story about the sons of God and daughters of women and giants in Nephilim, O'Mai. The next one appears in just a really complicated story about the sons of God and daughters of women and giants in Nephilim or Mai. Today we're gonna look at the rule of God's spirit

and judgment. We're gonna look at some fascinating stories like the Nephilim and Genesis 6. What God makes this strange proclamation. Yawai said, Mai Rua will not dwell with humanity forever, because he also is flesh. And his days will be 120 years.

Where have I gotten the idea that God's life might live with humans forever? The Tree of Life in the Garden. And we'll look at the flood story in Genesis 7. But God lets the earth decree. Yet hope isn't lost. God finds one righteous person and creates a mini floating Eden. To outside the boat the breath of life is going to be taken away. But inside the breath of life remains in the remnant. It's the remnant that's sustained by the Spirit of God. The flood, this undoing of creation, actually returned the Earth to the original. Genesis 1, 2 state with God's Spirit. Over the waters ready to bring new creation.

I'm John Collins and this is Bible Project Podcast. Today Tim McEy, Chris Aquinn, and I trace the theme of God's Spirit, his Ruaugh, through the second half of the first movement of the Genesis scroll. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. Alright, we, and by we, I'm referring to myself Tim Mackey, Chris Aquinn. Hello.

We are walking through the first movement of Genesis, tracking the theme of God's Ruach, or in other words, God's Spirit. But we will call it God's Ruach often because embedded in this idea of Ruach is not just Spirit, but also breath and wind. Yes. Yes. And it's a very enchanted way of viewing the world, which is that the wind is God's spirit, and our breath is God's spirit. What a cool way to exist in the world.

Yeah, that's right. And also raises the possibility that if all creation order is sustained by God's rulach, it's his spirit. It means that God has the Progative to take it away if he deems it so. And that's what we looked at as the last example, or at least where somebody thinks that God

is showing up in the form of a wind after Adam and Eveeat from the tree. And disobeying out the command, he shows up in the wind and they're freaked out. In the wind of the day, or the... Sometimes translated the cool of the day, but you're saying it's foresh. In the wind of the day, or the... The wind of the day. Sometimes translated the cool of the day, but you're saying it's foreshadowing this idea

of the spirit being a force of de-creation. That's right. Yeah. Essentially a storm. Storm of the day. You can call it the day of the Lord. The wind of the day in Genesis 3 verse 8 is foreshadowing the storms of God's justice when he shows up for the day of the Lord. So quick, real quick recap.

Maybe Chris said, do you want to do the quick recap of the three hits? Yeah. So our first hit was Genesis 1, 2 God's Spirit and Creation, where God's Spirit is hovering over the waters and is about to animate life into all creation. The second hit is Genesis 2, 7 that zooms in on humans, and there we see a synonym for Rua, the breath of God. And it's the breath of God that goes into humans and gives humanity life in the same way that God gave life to all creation. And then the third hit is what we're talking about. It's the after that humans eat from

the tree, and they hear the sound of God in the rua of the day. It's this depiction of God's spirit about to bring some kind of de-creation. Yeah, though in that last case, that's what Adam thinks God's going to do. Yeah, okay. It turns out God comes just asking questions and looking for a confession. Mm-hmm. But he is going to exile them. Oh yeah, he does exile them, but- Which is a type of de-creation. Yeah, that's right, but like he doesn't kill them.

He doesn't kill them. And he doesn't even curse them. He curses the snake and he curses the ground, which will affect them negatively. You kind of get a sense that God's anger is slow. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, not only reason I'm using the word de-creation is because if spirit is slow. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Yeah, the only reason I'm using the word decoration is because if spirit is creation

in life, then the opposite of that or another way the spirit can function, function. Yeah, I like that. It would be decoration. Yeah, that's good. Because when you say exile is a type of decoration, it is. Yeah, it's exiled from the place where life,

eternal life is what means. Yeah, decoration is like the undoing of creation. Life, it's exiled from the place where life eternal life is. Yeah, de-creation is like the undoing of creation. That's right. That's right. Yeah, de-creation can happen in many ways. It can be the undoing of the order, or it can be the undoing of my little personal order that exists in my life, in my community, or in my body, which means that I die, which means death is an undoing of God's creative purpose. So what we're going to look at is the force through the eighth appearances of God's Ruaach in Genesis 1 through 11. And the next one appears in just a really complicated story about the sons of God and daughters of women and giants and Nephilim, oh my. Yeah. Welcome to the Bible.

Welcome to the Bible. So maybe just as a context here, let's back up and remember. Yeah, where are we at in this movement? Where we at. I'm so glad you asked, John. All right. So where we're at is the hits that we've looked at so far. We looked at God's Ruaq here.

The brought about order in the course of the six days of God's working, and then the culmination in the seventh day. And remember that was God creating by bringing land out of too much water. The Eden narrative picks up and it flips it over where God creates by bringing water to too much dry land. And what we found is right in the middle of this narrative here, Genesis chapter two, the opening of the Garden of Eden narrative, God's Ruaach, or God's Breath appears to animate the dirt, like Chris is summarized.

So what happens is that you have two individual humans who break the divine command. They want to become Elohim instead of just being satisfied as images of Elohim. So they're exiled from the garden. And that's where God's Ruaq shows up like a storm. Correct. So what the next narrative is about, is about, in Genesis 4, is the next generation of Adam and Eve's about their sons. So Cain and Abel. Cain replays his parents' failure, but this time by doing what's good in his own eyes, which is murdering his brother. And the blood of his brother cries out from the ground. That happens in this narrative here. Then Cain gives birth to a whole chain of descendants, and he builds a city,

and he calls it after his own name. And seven generations later, this is what the next literary unit's about after Cain mergers his brother, is in Cain's city. He has a descendant named Lemek, who murders flagrantly and says, man, if my ancestor Cain can murder and God forgave him, oh, then God is obligated to forgive me 70 times more than Cain. And it's...

It's the downward spiral. Yes, yeah. And you're left to imagine, man, if one person's innocent blood rises up to God and God hears it, imagine what happens when a whole city is built on the blood of the innocent. What's gonna happen then? Then you're given a divided lineage. You get a lineage, a genealogy that goes from the line of king. And then the last line of Genesis 4 is, but Adam and Eve had a third son that replaced

the dead able. And then that's the son that you get a 10-generation genealogy in Genesis chapter 5. That's Seth. And that's Seth. Who's Seth? And that leads to a guy named Noah. Noah. Ten generations from Seth is Noah.

Noah. So what's going to follow is a de-creation story. The outcry of innocent blood and the rise of violence among the city of Adam, the city of humanity. It's going to become, what do you say, something that God can't ignore. But there is yet still one more thing that is going to go wrong with creation. These are all about human rebellions. But actually, Genesis 3 involved humans in a spiritual being. The snake. The snake. Genesis 6 is going to bring it together and show that a mirror inversion of not only are the humans are bellowing but the spirit beings are bellowing.

Yes, welcome to the story we call Genesis chapter 6 verses 1. Rebellion of the Yellow Heam. Yeah, you got it. I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you

I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you I never told you So here's the story. And it came about when Adam, humanity, started or began to multiply on the land. And you're like, started. They've been multiplying for a while now.

So that's a little clue right there that we're going to be doing some kind of replay of a beginning narrative. A new section. Yeah. And the replay. Humans multiplying. Sounds good. Yeah. It sounds what God told the humans to do.

Be free for multiply. Multiply face the land and so when humans multiply you get sons and daughters born to them but the daughters are gonna play a role in the story so we're gonna highlight those daughters. Now the sons of Elohim saw the daughters of humanity that they were good, and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose. Bum-pum-pum, sons of Elohim. So, so far we've been talking about A Elohim, which is God. Yeah, that's right. And so, there's this phrase, the sons of Elohim.

The phrase appears about half a dozen times in Hebrew Bible, and it always has the same meaning. It refers to spiritual beings in God's heavenly, God's heavenly court, heavenly realm. So these are the hosts of heaven? Yeah, they're called in Genesis 1, the host of the skies. Yeah, the sons of can just be referring to a kind. Yeah, part of that group, like a kind of Elohim. Yeah. We saw it with goats in Leviticus. I think take the son of a goat. Take the son of a goat. Yeah, actually in the words of goat. The exact opposite of this phrase is the son of Adam, the son of man,

which means a member of the human kind. Oh, right. Yes. Son of man. And so to be a son of man, just to be a human, to be a son of Elohim is to be a spiritual being. Elohim like being that is a spiritual being. So that's one thing. The whole rabbit hole there. We have a past podcast here. Notice the wording of someone seeing that something is good and then taking it for themselves. Yes, we've seen that before.

Yeah, this is mirroring the language of Genesis 3, human failure. Yeah, so we'll actually talk about this exact design pattern in the next movement of Genesis. Yeah, in the Jacob story. In the Jacob story, but the saw, it was good and took it. When the man saw that something's good and she took. Now, what's also significant here is the players in the story. The reason the woman sees that this thing is good and then takes it, is precisely because of a snake

that is you read through on the Hebrew Bible, you discover is the force of spiritual evil. So you have a spiritual being deceiving a woman so that she sees that it's good and take. And here it's exactly the inversion in Genesis 6. You have spiritual beings who see that women are good. Human women are good and they take them for themselves.

So it's a good example of a mirror narrative where a way that the story is echoing and inverting. And just like all the way back to the, when you have two parallel lines of Hebrew poetry or like I use that analogy of the two plants or the multiple plants that my wife puts together on a shelf, you you read Genesis 3 and this little narrative and you ponder how they help you understand each other better. Yeah, so by activating this design pattern here, the author is portraying the sun's

of Elohim in a really negative light. They see the daughters and they take it. They take them. This is a fall narrative. Yeah, it's a fall narrative. And maybe if you weren't comparing to Genesis 3, you might not know that right away. You might have to assume that, oh, was that bad?

Were they not supposed to do that? Yeah. But saw that it was good. And we should know if we're looking back at Genesis 3, that this is not good. Yeah, that's right. So Genesis 3 is about a failure of the human images of Elohim because of the inst images of Elohim,

because of the instigation of spiritual beings. Here, it's the failure and rebellion of the sun's of Elohim, and the images of Elohim are the victim here. Okay, so let's just name, we're just trying to act like this is all normal. Yeah. Oh, this is very bizarre.

Yes, to especially to us. To the spiritual beings, taking women as their, what, as their what? As their mates. This is a very common motif in ancient literature, especially foundation stories of the empires of the ancient world. This is... This was humans that were a hybrid between the gods and humans. Yep, divine humans. The most famous ones are the ones that live on in the Marvel movies

still today, Thor, and Loki. But yeah, Greek mythology is filled with his ooze and so on. But even before that, more in the ancient biblical context, the story is about the founding, the founders of Babylon, and one of the founding kings in the area that would become Babylon was a king named Gilgamesh, whose part God and part human. He's an offspring of God and humans. And this is celebrated then in other cultures. It was celebrated. That's the system. Gilgamesh, that gave him a status. Yeah, that lets you know that this kingdom has the divine authority of the gods to conquer. Yeah, they're called the giants

or sometimes the men of renown. That's right, yeah, yeah. Here, that's what they're called later on in the story. So this is tapping into a motif that celebrated these hybrid divine humans who built the kingdoms of this world and conquered in their name. And the biblical story is saying that's actually not a good thing.

Yeah, it represents everything that's wrong with the world. Humans combining with spiritual forces in an natural way. Yeah. Or even spiritual beings and humans going their own way apart from God, building cities apart from God and ruling apart from Him maybe. Yeah. So this parallel with Genesis 3 is super important. In fact, the author is going to assume that you know the parallel in the next line that brings up our word, ruach. So this is the always response to what just happened.

Genesis 6 verse 3, you always said, my ruach will not dwell with humanity forever, because this one also, or he also is flesh. And his days will be 120 years. Okay. Okay. And then you get the famous Nephilim. The Nephilim were in the land in those days, and also long afterward, because Joshua and Caleb and the spies are going to meet a whole bunch in the land of Canaan. When the sons of Elohim went into the daughters of humanity and they bore children for them, these, that is the Nephilim, are the mighty warriors who are from ancient time men of the name. That's what you were referring to, Chris, the mighty warriors, men of the name.

We're now in a minute. These are the Nephilim. This is one of those passages where I just realized, well, my lens is so different than the ancient authors. Totally, in so many ways. So Nephilim is one of the main biblical words to talk about, these hybrid, divine, human, giant kings of old.

It's a noun made up of a passive of the verb to fall. To fall? Those who have fallen. Which many Christians probably meet, they go, oh yeah, like the fallen angels. That's like not the first and most primary reference. It means fallen in battle. Those who gain glory and fame by Conquest on the battlefield the fallen ones and Ezekiel will pick this up

He has a whole poem about the fallen kings of Oled who claimed to be gods in Ezekiel chapter 32 And he calls them the nofaleim, makes a play on it, those who were fallen in battle. That's why I hear they're even called the mighty warriors in parallel to the nephilim. Yeah, that's right. However, the idea of falling from the skies is a subtext here, because this is about a heavenly rebellion that comes down to the land, whereas Genesis 3 was about a earthly rebellion of humans trying to be Elohim to become higher than what they're supposed to be. So that's one thing going on here. But at the center here is

always interesting response. The center here. Yeah. And it is interesting this center because you can imagine it gone and this story would actually flow a little better. The story would flow better, verse three came somewhere else. If it came later. So it's a good example of how the three-part kind of symmetrical design is meant for meditation, not for nice sequential storytelling. Does that make sense?

Yeah. Yeah, because it starts with the sons of Elohim and the daughters of men, and then Yahweh speaks about how his breath won't dwell with humanity forever, his spirit, and then it goes back to the Nephilim, the sons of Elohim, and the daughters of humanity. It feels very repetitive. So when that happens, there's probably an underlying structure and something being highlighted. That's right. It's like three plants on my wife's shelf and the outer plants are very similar. So one and three match in important ways.

And two in the middle also links up with both parts because both have to do with something about humanity living and also about that the days of humanity will be limited. And what are those days? Well, those are the days when the giant hybrid warriors were cruising around. I see you have verse three highlighted and Yahweh said. Oh, yes. This is part of a bigger parallel design with the opening to the flood narrative. Yahweh says two things in Genesis 6 verses 1 to 12 and they're related. So the related thing, what God says in verse 7, which is I'm going to wipe away humanity that I've created from the face of the ground. It's a reference to the flood, which is I think meant

to illuminate what is going on here, but we'll get there in a second. So notice that what Yahweh says is in three bits. My spirit won't dwell with humanity forever because he also is flesh. And his days will be 120 years. So notice the opposition between my spirit and the fleshy humanity. This was the mud sculpture. Yep. This was God breathing in his life giving force. Yeah, that's right. Now what's interesting is where have I gotten the idea This was the mud sculpture. Yep. This was God breathing in his life giving force.

Yeah, that's right. Now what's interesting is where have I gotten the idea that God's life might live with humans forever? Where have I come across that idea of the tree of life in the garden? Yeah. In the garden, yeah. Now let's see, how was it that the humans lost access to forever life? That was their fall narrative that we looked at. Their fall narrative because of a spiritual being.

So, you had a spiritual being that was trying to get humans to the realm of the divine. On their own terms. On their own terms, and it resulted in the loss of eternal life. Now, you have spiritual beings mixing with humans, now also resulting in a loss of eternal life. Now you have spiritual beings mixing with humans, now also resulting in a loss of eternal life. That's interesting. So I think we're meant to infer here, like what's the goal here? This is kind of two sides of one coin in a way. Yeah, what are the sons of Elohim after here? Why are they trying to mix with humans in the first place? Well, they saw that they were good. They saw that they were good. But man, if the sons of Elohim aren't mortal, they don't die. Yeah. And we meant to infer that part of their motive here is this is plan number two to elevate humans to the divine. Oh,

interesting. Mixing with them. The first plan was get them to seize wisdom on their own terms, on their own terms, so that they can become Elohim. That's what this next said. I didn't work. Oh, and so God cut them off from eternal life. This is plot number two. Correct. Interesting. In other words, and you wouldn't get there, the story doesn't say, you know what the

sons of Elohim were trying to do? Yeah, you know what they came up next? This is Plan B. They're trying to restore eternal life and turn humans into Elohim. Yeah, because we already know that humans are gonna live forever, right? Yeah, that's right. They've already been dying. That's right.

They're outside the garden. That's right. Yeah. So yeah, why bring up this? Correct. Yahweh's response only makes sense. If somehow it's on the table yet again that humans are gonna live forever. And what narrative do I have that would talk about another grab

at getting eternal life to humans? And what we have is just a six verse to one and two. Well, that and it's also weird that it seems like the sons of Elohim who are being implicated here is doing something bad. But in verse three, it's Yahweh who says, I won't dwell with humans forever., I won't dwell with humans forever. My spirit won't dwell with humans forever. Right, he's not throwing down on the Elohim. Yeah, so somehow what the Suns of Elohim are doing is affecting humans. Yeah, it's as if the Suns of Elohim are trying to restore eternal life to humans, but

in their corrupt state. And it's as if saying the only way that humanity's ever gonna have life forever is for, you always spear it to be the one that recreates and brings about a new creation. And so this is a distorted grab at eternal life. Genesis 3 was a distorted grab for wisdom and Elohim like status. And this is a distorted grab to restore eternal life to humans. And not only do they not get eternal life, what they get is

a ticking clock, 120 years. We'll talk about that. But also what results is not human images of God. It's distorted humans who claim to be God and found the violent kings of our world. Ah, because who's the next mighty warrior that you're going to meet in the story? Is it Nimrod? It's a guy named Nimrod. Associated with Babel. Yeah, yeah, it's the founder of Babelon and of Nineveh in this year. Yeah, yeah.

So this is actually the origin story of Babylon, right here. So again, when God says my spirit, my breath, my ruac, will not dwell in humanity, we're uploading what we've already talked about in Genesis 2 and 3. And 3, that the reason why humanity has any life at all is because it's God's spirit. That's why he blew into humanity. And so God

will also take that away from some point. Yep. And what will remain is dust, is flesh. That's right. And yeah, tell me about the 120 years. 20 years. Okay. So there's two basic possibilities. One is it's saying there's a new cap on human life spans and it'll be 120 years. And the reason why some people think that is because in the previous chapter, it was a genealogy where people are living for centuries. Yeah. You know, Methuselah is almost a thousand years old. Right. This kind of thing. So, you know, 120 to us sounds like a lot generous cap. But, you know, compared to Methuselah, this is a real down, down grade.

But after this, humans live more than 120 years. Yes, Abraham goes on to live more than 100. Many biblical characters go on to live more than 120 years. So that's an interesting feature of the story. So is there another possibility? And so the problems with 120 years as a short and lifespan, oh yeah, it's because a lot of biblical characters will have passed it. Abraham lives 175 years.

Isaac, 180, Jacob, 147, and this is in the same scroll. Yeah. So it seems like they would have been aware of that. Yeah, totally. Perhaps it refers to the number of years this is sitting of a clock before the flood. 120 years until the flood. 120 years until the flood. This is actually the oldest interpretation we know of in the history of Jewish literature. So in the Dead Sea Scrolls, there's a retelling of the flood story that gives you a detail that's

not given in the biblical story that tells you that in the 480th year of Noah's life when Noah reached the end of those years and then it quotes Genesis 6 verse 3. The flood story begins by saying in the 600th year of Noah's life, it began the flood. You know how children's Bibles often rewrite biblical stories in light of their interpretations? So the Dead Sea Scroll off and do this. They have what's called rewritten Bible and they retell biblical stories but with their interpretations loaded in. So in the earliest Aramaic translations, they took this 120 years to be the little window of time before the flood and then later Jewish scholars like Rashi. Does that add up with how the genealogy is workout? Because that would mean that Noah is already alive. The Noah's already alive by now. Yeah, yep. That's right. And he appeared at the

end of chapter five. Okay. But the chronology is very interesting. The chronology and the literary sequence of these narratives, especially in Genesis 1 to 11, is really tricky. Because they don't. It's not straightforward. Yeah. They don't always follow a linear chronology. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. So yeah, this presumes that knows already life and that that's totally drives without stories are put together. Yeah. With us talking about the link of the spirit, this 120 years as a narrative countdown to the beginning of the flood, that seems compelling also because, yeah, always says, my spirit will not dwell with humanity forever. And we're learning already that the spirit

is associated with unduing creation. Yes, yeah, that's true. So it seems like when he says, it'll be 120 years, he's talking about unduing creation, which is later how we'll see the flood is described. Yeah, so actually, let's go to the next one. Yeah, let's go to the next ones, which exactly follow the train of thought

that you're putting out there So, after you walk away from the strange story about the sons of Elohim, daughters of humanity and God's Ruaach, so on, the next time you hear reference to God's Ruaach is in Genesis 6, verse 17, and it's an announcement that God makes to know about the coming of the flood. It hasn't come yet, it's about to come. And so, he describes the flood as a flood of water, Genesis 6, verse 17. Flood of water on the land, it's going to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life.

So, what's significant there is it's using the idea back from Genesis 2. But remember there, it was using the idea back from Genesis 2. But remember there it was that synonym for Rua. The Nishmah Khaim. Yeah, the Nishmah Khaim or the Nishamah. The exhalation of God. Exhalation, yeah. But here it uses, it combines the vocabulary of Genesis 1 verse 2,

the Rua, Elohim, and then the image of Genesis 2 verse 7. So everything that has the breath of life is going to perish. It's an undoing of Genesis 1. The waters that were separated are going to collapse back in on themselves. It's a tragic, tragic image, but remember the reason for this, actually, I'm just going to back up. The reason for this is because the earth became distorted or ruined in the eyes of Elohim. And the land was filled,

remember what God told humans, be fruitful and multiply and fill the land. And they filled the land all right with the blood of the innocent. Violence. Yep. And we already have two stories of that, cane, and then cane's descendant, lemic. blood of the innocent. Yes. And we already have two stories of that. Cane. And then Cane's descendant, Lemmeck.

So God looked at the land and behold, it was ruined. Everybody had ruined their way. And so God said, denouwa, the end. And actually, this word the end, Hawkeits, is spelled with three of the four letters of the word outcry of Cain's blood. So the outcry that Saka of Abel's blood rose up to God, and then in this story, the Huckets has come up before God. So it's a wordplay linking those two things. The end of all flesh is coming because of the outcry.

Because of the outcry. So this is not always because the Cain and Abel narrative is a couple chapters away now. It's not always evident to readers. That's what's happening, but it's the rebellion in the garden, cane murdering, magnified by his descendant, magnified yet again by the sons of God and the daughters of men, resulting in the violent warriors who do more stuff that Lemic did. And all of a sudden you've got a blood-soaked land that needs to be purified and washed. So the flood is God's way of undoing the order that he did.

It's a de-creation, de-creation store. Yeah, so just like in Genesis 1, God's spirit created the land and separated the waters and made the dry land appear. All of that creation that took place there and then the spirit going into humans and creating that life. Now those things are being undone. So there, what's this we're saying? That everything that has the spirit of life, the breath of life under the heavens will perish. Breath gets taken away, man gets submerged by the water. The whole creation, it's like the undoing of the spirit's work in creation and in humans.

But, but, my friends. Because of God's commitment to his purpose, to rule the world through humans, who he says his eyes will survey the land, and look to see if there's anybody who isn't going the way of corruption. And there is one guy and his family whom he saw and this guy's name is rest. No, he's righteous, he's blameless, and he takes walks with God. Remember that thing God showed up to do without a manoeuvre in the garden at the wind of the day? Yeah, to walk with him. To walk with him. And here's this guy, you just see.

We've already met Enoch, right? And the genial day. Yeah, yep, Enoch walked with God. He walked with God, yeah. And he was not because of God. And he was not. So in contrast to the generation of the flood, Noah stands out, which is why God tells Noah, hey, I'm going to spare you

in your family. So make for yourself a little wooden eaten, a little garden boat. And why am I calling a garden boat? Because you're going to hang out with the animals there. And it's made of trees. It's made of trees. Yeah, wood. Yep, same word. Yep. You're going to live there with all these different kinds of animals. And the list of animals comes from Genesis 1. And also, I'm just going to give you more food than you can imagine. Just take it all on board. So a little hiding place above the waters,

where you have enough food provided by God, and you live at peace with the animals. It probably doesn't smell as good as originally. Yeah, I bet the flowers the, covered over a lot of that, but on the boat, not so much. Yeah, so in contrast to the generation of the flood, they'll get washed away. You have a remnant who's spared a little floating eaten on the waters. 1,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5, So after God announces the flood's coming to take away the breath of life from everything

out there, you come across the narrative of that beginning to happen. And this is in Genesis 7, verse 15, the next appearance of the phrase, breath of life. And here it's in a list of Noah going into the ark and then all of the animals, two by two, in which is the breath of life. And why call this out here that the animals have the breath of life? Yeah, it seems like the God is taking away his breath, his spirit from all the earth. There's this remnant, Noah's family,

and the animals where that spirit isn't totally wiped out. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, no, it's exactly. And the fact that it's mentioned that all by tooths, male and female, it's recalling the one human that became two in Eden. And so now you have all these two's, no in his wife, his sons and his sons' wives, when it starts listing the animals, I think it gets translated each with its mate, but it's literally the word each and its wife. And it's Isha. But it's literally the word each and its wife. And it's Isha?

Yeah, it's a bunch of couples going on to the earth. So interesting. And they all have God's Spirit. Into Eden. And they have the breath of life just like Adam and Eve in the garden who are sustained by the breath of life so that they can be fruitful and multiply. But here it's the Remnant. There's a little seed of the ordering that the spirit did originally, going into the micro-edin,

the floating Eden in order to then be able to. Become many. Continue the work of the spirit after that. Yeah. Outside the boat, the breath of life is going to be taken away. But inside the little art, the breath of life remains in the remnant. It's the remnant that's sustained by the spirit of God. This is so important for the Kvizaea.

That's cool. The whole book of Isaiah is so rad. Anyway, it's so good. Isaiah 59.21, just took that one away. Okay, so that's the next appearance. We're cruising now. We're making a lot of progress. Okay, so God announced in next appearance. We're cruising now. We're making a lot of progress. Okay, so God announced to Noah that a flood was coming to take away life.

You had a narrative of knowing the animals going into the boat. God was going to preserve their breath of life. Then when the flood actually comes after they get onto the boat, this is in Genesis 7, verse 22. It literally repeats in narrative form what God said to know in his speech. It's like the fulfillment of it. That's right. Yeah. And it's actually a part of the repetition seems unnecessary, but it's a part of the literary design. It's creating a gigantic symmetry in panels as you go through

the story. So you read that all flesh, Genesis 721, all flesh. We've been using this word a lot, all flesh. Oh yeah, yeah. It's not a typical way of talking. Oh, you got it. Yeah. All flesh. What's, what's, what how's that different than your neffesh?

Ah, your neffesh refers to you as a whole integrated living being, body and energizing, life, body and ruaach. But if you took the spirit away from your meat case, you're just flesh. Exactly. Remember, back up in Genesis 6 for 3, spirit was contrasted with flesh. My spirit won't dwell with humanity forever because He is flesh.

So it's a synonym to the dirt. Yeah, okay. In Genesis 2, dirt plus divine breath equals living creature, living naffesh. So it's a way of describing a creature, but it is emphasizing temporal nature. Yeah, the created temporal nature. That's right. And the physical, the physical material nature, and immortal nature. Yeah. And the creature with just flesh is going to just, is going to be dead. Correct. It needs spirit, which is God's breath, which is God's breath.

And flesh could refer to humans or here in this verse Yeah, 721 it's birds cattle beasts everything swarming and all mankind. Yeah, that's right So in the Hebrew Bible it mainly refers to the material mortal frail slowly aging and dying Aspect of a human being in the Testament, it'll gain an additional layer of meaning in Jewish Greek for the appetites that come from our material nature, hunger, pleasure, sex, all these kinds of things.

Those can be called just desires of the flesh or the flesh. It's kind of similar how to spirit can be used, even though it just means your animated life force comes to be talked about often in the New Testament as also your will or mine. Yeah, your mind. Because it's a type of animation.

There seems to be a similarity there too of flesh, which just literally means like your atoms. Yeah, the dirt that you are can then be used as a way to talk about the desires that you have that drive you towards dirt. That's right. And that comes from the meat-like nature. Or comes from the fact that you are dirt. Yeah, the dirt needs to process dirt.

Yep. The Apostle Paul, it's a big term in Paul's writings, the flesh. The flesh. The flesh. You'll say, in my spirit, I wanted to obey the Torah of God, but in my flesh, I wanted This is a big term in Paul's writings, the flesh. The flesh. The flesh. Yeah. You'll say, in my spirit, I wanted to obey the Torah of God, but in my flesh, I want to break the commands. So it can be a neutral term, but it can also be contrasted with spirit.

That's right. Yeah, that's right. So back to Genesis 7, 21. All flesh that moved about on the land perished in the flood, and then it gives the same list from Genesis 1 of creatures. Everything that was on the dry land in whose nostrils was, the, ooh, here it uses all the terms together, the breath of the spirit of life.

The installation of the raw. Breath of life. And nostrils, so recalling when God breathed into the nostrils, the breath of the rule. Breath of the rule. And nostrils. So, recalling when God breathed into the nostrils, the breath of life. But then spirits mixed in here too. So, this is exactly the phrase used in Genesis 2, verse 7. We're God breathed into the dust, into the nostrils, the breath of life.

And that was just about humans. Here, it's talking about all creatures. Yeah, that's right. So in a way, it's recalling Genesis 1, the creation of the whole ordered world and the animals and the spirit that was breathed in or that was hovering and creating and then breathing in the breath of life to the humans in Genesis 2. It's like recalling.

Yeah, look at it's like a snowball. When you are tracing a theme, the vocabulary will be introduced like one at a time in a story, but then in later stories, it will just start picking up all the preceding terms and start using them and connecting them interchangeably. And this is a great example. It's using the language of flesh versus spirit. That's from Genesis 6, verse 3, nostrils, and the breath. That's Genesis Genesis 6 verse 3 nostrils and the breath that's Genesis 2 verse 7 and then the Rua Which is from Genesis 1. I'm just nothing that right now. That's so cool. So by recalling all of that It's like these couple verses are saying all of that is undone. Yes, that's right. Yeah, the whole sequence of Creation up to this point is undone. It's a low moment. It's a low moment. Yep, it is.

It's terrible. It's a god-handing creation over to its own violent, death-dealing tendencies. And he allows a created order to collapse in on itself. But, but there is a remnant that survives because of the righteousness of that remnant, God spares them, which opens up a window for the future, and that is what happens with the last appearance of Ruach in the section. 1,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5,5, So the last appearance of Ruach in Genesis 1 through 11 and it kind of both culminates and restarts. This whole narrative cycle is in Genesis 8, verse 1. So the picture, the flood waters have risen,

and the boat's just floating there, and everything's undone, decreated. And we read this little lion, but God remembered Noah and all the animals and all the cattle that were with him in the ark, and God caused a ruach to blow over the land. And those waters began to subside. Which is exactly what happened in Genesis 1, 2, and then look at this, all the fountains of the deep, these are the waters under the land. The Tahome. The Tahome. Yeah, this is the Tahome, the deep abyss of Genesis 1, verse 2. This is a new American standard. The flood gates of the sky. It's literally the windows of the skies.

Yeah, this is where the rain comes from. Yeah, yeah. In the ancient imagination. So these are the waters above and the waters below. So they were separated on day 2. Yeah. The flood began by the Yeah, God's spirit shows up. Yep over the chaos. Mm-hmm. When the chaos is just watery chaos. Mm-hmm. And then day one or sorry Date is separate day one is light and dark. Oh light and dark day two is separating waters the water's above from the waters below Yeah, which was a form of creation and ordering. And then that collapses in the flood. The water's from below and the water's from above, it rains, bubbles up, earth is destroyed,

and then here we're seeing God say, let's close that back off. It's recreating. Yeah, so in other words, this is a replay of day two of the creation story in Genesis 1. Then the waters receded from the land. Day three. And that's the replay of day three. Yeah, where the waters recede in the dryland land appears. Yeah, then check this out.

In the seventh month, on the 10th and 7th day of the month, the ark found rest. Genesis, what do you get it? The ark no-oct. Yeah, so what God did on the 7th day, now the ark is doing on the 7th month on the 10 plus 7th day. Is it 10 the words of God? Yeah, 10 speeches of God and 10 plus 7. And God said, let there be light. Yeah, totally. And it gets even better because you get a little story here about the emergence of

plants. He sends out the birds and the birds can't find any plants. Yeah. So one finally, and so on. Not only does it feel like a random story, but then it feels like it's repeated so much about these birds. Like why are they still sending out the birds? Yeah, he sends out a raven. Yeah. And then he sends out a dove three times, three plus, so the three plus one sending out of the birds, it's four times total.

And it's the test. He's testing to see if the waters have lightened from upon the land. And then when he finds that he gets off the boat. Yeah, by itself that passage about the dove and the raven kind of make a little bit of sense, but seem repetitive, but reading it in light of Genesis one,

that makes a lot more sense, that we're waiting for the shrubs to appear. The birds are mentioned. Which is day five, right? Yeah, the shrubs appear on day three. Oh, right. And then the birds appear on day five, right? The shrubs appear on day three. Oh, right. And then the birds appear on day five. And then that land animals appear on day six,

but the bonus on day six is God gives the shrubs and the plants to humans and the animals. Oh. And so it's a combining of all, yeah, the store is so awesome. But it's mixing together all these imagery from the days of creation to depict Noah getting off the boat. Another thing, this is rabbit trail, but in the other ancient Near Eastern parallels to

the flood story, the epic of Atrahasis and the one found in the Gilgamesh epic, they have very detailed parallels to the scene of after the hero gets off the boat, or excuse me, after the flood is over, the hero sends out birds to find out when the waters are receded. And it's both a raven and then a dove, it's paralleled. And so with greatest, the biblical authors are taking up a traditional motif

from other ancient parallels, but then totally transforming its purpose in the story by adding all these hyperlinks to the days of creation so that it becomes a recreation story. It's a really cool example of like the repurposing of a traditional story, but to a new agenda. So in this verse, Ruach is translated as wind usually. Yes, that's true. And that is like this invisible powerful energy, and it would dry up the waters. Like you feel that image, but should we also be thinking of God's spirit here reading in parallel to Genesis 1?

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, on the narrative level, a wind pushing back water, that makes sense. But the parallel to Genesis 1, verse 2, makes you know that this is not just a deeper meaning or a deeper layer to that wind, because that wind is that energizing presence of God that will bring about new creation. Tell me about this translation, God caused a wind, because if in the Hebrew imagination the wind is God's breath, what does that mean for God to cause the wind? Why wouldn't you just say God breathed the wind or God?

God winded a wind? Yeah, God winded a wind. Yeah, I mean, I think it has to do with just multiple layers of meaning to this image. So in Genesis 1, verse 2, it was God's own ruach. It was hovering. Here, God sends a ruach over the waters. The ruach comes from God. God sends it. So I think it's like a double, double meaning or double layers of meaning. The same thing is going to happen in the Exodus story with the parting of the waters. It's the same vocabulary. God causes a wind to go over the waters.

And in that case split them in half. Yeah, this is almost a bridging passage between the original creation with God's spirit hovering and the Exodus where God's wind parts the waters or pushes them back. Yeah, I guess it's the difference between saying where do you put the separation between the flame and the light that emerges from it? This is the famous puzzle that early Christians

used to or images used to talk about the father and the son. And there isn't common percept, there's no separation. They're both one, but yet there's a distinct, because the light that comes from the flame is distinct from the flame, but they're also distinct. Because the light that comes from the flame is distinct from the flame, but they're also one. And so in a similar way here, God's Ruaach that goes out and passes over comes from Elheim. So it's Elheim's Ruaach, but yet it's a... You get the Trinity beginning to form in a way here too.

Totally, that's right. Not that the Hebrew authors talked about the Trinity, but... Yeah, but they talked about God in a way that God is both simple, one, and also complex. More than one. Yeah. So here we saw that God's Spirit both de-created and recreated in the same event or in the same narrative that the flood, this undoing of creation, actually returned

the earth to the original Genesis 1, 2 state with God's Spirit over the waters ready to bring new creation. Yeah, that's right. So the new creation starts with God's wind. And then it's going to culminate in Noah getting off the boat and offering sacrifice. And that utter surrender of Noah compels God to say, you know what I'm never going to do again? Even though I know humans are no different, they're going to be as violent as they ever were, but I'm never going to undo creation like I've done. And so, Noah's the obedient surrender of the spared

remnant compels God to promise to carry out his new creation purposes into the future of the story. But the hinge and the narrative all was with the appearance of God through all. And these narratives are so rich. Yeah. There's just so much to talk about. You know, and these narratives are so rich. Yeah, there's just so much to talk about. Okay. You know what? So interesting is I just use Bible software to search the root of Rua and these chapters Genesis 1 through 11 So just the root the Resh, Vaav and Hatt so that could bring up a noun or a verb The only so all the hits are what we talked about the Rua the spirit, but the only other hit is this one, 821. The Lord smelled its Vairach. It's like he breathed in or smelled the soothing aroma. That's right. That's the same root as. Yeah. And I don't make sense because the smell is like to breathe

in. Yes. And the word aroma is the word reach. Yeah, the I saw the smell come up for some reason. Oh, he smelled. But yeah, it's a related, that's a related word. It's a related word. So God's Ruaach is the invisible life presence. And then there's a related noun, Reoch, which is a smell, which is again, you're very clearly something's going into your nose when you smell it, but you don't see any. What is it? Yeah.

It's the Reoch, which is like the Ruaach. The aroma. Wow, good call. Well, yeah, I'm trying to connect that even more so. It's wonderful. Okay, God's spirit creates, decreats, and then his, and he recreates by his spirit or his breath. And then in response to Noah's sacrifice,

he breathes in the smell. Yeah. And that is related to this covenant promise. Ooh, okay. So yeah, he breathed out exhalation into the nostrils of the human to go to the breath of life. Here, he breathes in, Noah sacrificed, and he says,

I'm never going to destroy all life like I just did. Yeah. So it's actually God inhaling the obedient surrender of the chosen one that compels God to make a promise that he will preserve life from this point on. Yeah, I like that because... Oh, good call. No, that surprised me too. That's really cool.

But the idea that God smells a soothing aroma and it's like, oh, that's great. I'm gonna make a promise. That's kind of weird to me. Oh, that smells good. Yeah, it feels fickle, but the idea that it's connected to his spirit and his life, like there's maybe more symbiotic connects. This is loaded with word plays, because the word soothing is the word play on Noah's name. Oh yeah. Soothing means to give rest.

So Noah's name is Noah. The word soothing is Nihach. So God, spirits, a Noah-like spirit smell. I mean that actually makes more sense to my mind than God's Melthe's soothing environment. God was happy with this whole this whole all the obedience. Yeah. Yeah. The point is Noah surrendered everything and God smells that Noah-like surrender and says I'm gonna all God needs is one person to surrender. Totally. That's what the story is showing us. What the humans didn't do in Eden.

They didn't surrender their desires to God. He just needs one. Just needs one. God could just have one righteous to surrender. He's a man. No one. He would give life to the many. If the Bible ended right here.

If the Bible ended right here. But then what does Noah do? Yeah. Yeah, he gets off the boat and blows it. And then Stora continues. So there you go. So that's the Holy Spirit in movement one of the first scroll of the first section of the Bible, the Torah, which is the first collection of books

that we call the Hebrew Bible. It's wanted to say one more thing about the, because we started with 120 years as a countdown clock. which is the first collection of books that we call the Hebrew Bible. It's wanted to say one more thing about the, because we started with 120 years, as a countdown clock. And it just hit me too, as we were talking about God kind of decreating, kind of being done with the violence.

Like let's just get rid of the violence, wash it clean. The countdown clock, it seems connected to also when God says, I need to get the humans out of the garden or otherwise they'll live forever. Oh yeah, sure. Right, like, so that's why I'm an exile them. So it's like, in that story, it's interesting

that God's saying, if they stay here, they're gonna live forever in the state of corruption. It's just gonna be bad. So I'm actually gonna get them out of here. And it's that same kind of idea of, that know, if I'm going to let humans propagate on the earth with all this violence, this is going to be nuts. So 120 years and then we're going to wash a clueless. Yeah, we're going to be done. Yeah, that problematic human in that case is these giborim, these violent wire kings.

And so they represent everything that's wrong with humanity. And that's why, as you read throughout the rest of the biblical story, you're gonna meet more giants, but they're always called like the remnant of the giants or the last of the giants. And so you're gonna keep having to kill off the giants. You know, and iterations throughout the rest of the biblical story But the whole thing is because those later stories are being patterned as little local floods of God's justice

That will have to be brought about to do away finally with that violence that corrupted land But um, anyhow. Okay, so that was movement one yep with the Holy Spirit We're gonna then come to movement two, which is a story of Abraham. And we're gonna trace a new theme. Yep. And those stories. And we'll introduce that theme when we get to Movement Two. Thanks for listening to this episode of Bible Project Podcast.

Next week, we're gonna look at the second movements of the Genesis scroll. It's the narratives of Abraham. And we're gonna trace through this movement, the Genesis scroll. It's the narratives of Abraham. And we're going to trace through this movement the theme of trees. The tree is right on pages one and two. In the opening, literally, units of Genesis, and then that image gets picked up and employed and developed in really neat ways throughout the story of Abraham.

Because Abraham and Sarah depicted as a new Adam and Eve, who God is calling to return to the garden so he can bless all the nations through them. Today's show is produced by Cooper Peltz, Dan Gummel, and Zach McKinley, are the editors and Lindsay Ponder, with the show notes. Bible Project is a crowd-funded non-profit. We exist to experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. One way that we're doing that this year is reading through the Bible movement by movement, tracing themes. This is to develop two really important skills

for how to read the Bible. As you follow along with this podcast, you could actually read the Bible yourself, tracing these themes in our Bible project app. It's available and free on iOS and Android. Everything that we make is free because of the generous support of many people just like you. So thank you so much for being a part of this with us.

Hi, this is Tiffany, and I'm from Agusta, Georgia. I first heard about Bible Project a couple of years ago. I use Bible Project for homeschooling our kids. My favorite thing about Bible Project is a fact that it's super simplistic, but it's also really in depth, so that every single person in our family can grow closer to God and learn more about his word. We believe the Bible

is a unified story that leads to Jesus. We're a crowd-funded project by people like me. Find free videos, study notes, podcasts, classes, and more at BibleProject.com.