Weather during the Global Flood

Critias said:

Hebrews talks of the flood in the context of it being brought on by the world's unbelief. Peter talks of the flood twice within the context of the world, instead of referring to it as a localized area - which would have been appropriate if it was.

Click to expand...

One thing we need to keep in mind is that even if the flood was localized, the story speaks of flood which destroyed all terrestrial life except that in the ark. So the flood in the story is "global" even if the actual flood was not. Peter talks of the flood in the story. He would not have known anything about the actual flood which was the basis of the story.

As I previously said, since Jesus walked the earth and is God, and Peter walked with Jesus, Peter would have been corrected. Jesus spoke of the flood in the Gospels and I bet He spoke more about it then we have recorded. Peter was there, yet he was not corrected by Jesus.

Maybe a minor point for some, but I believe Jesus knew and knows that people would question this. They questioned it being global at His time, and yet no correction to say it was local.

Just my view and I suppose it is something no one is concerned about. I would just think to come to the conclusion that it was local you would have to say either Jesus was wrong or Jesus didn't care that there were going to be errors in His and the Apostles teachings. I suppose some here though think Jesus didn't have God fully within Him, only partly.

gluadys said:

One thing we need to keep in mind is that even if the flood was localized, the story speaks of flood which destroyed all terrestrial life except that in the ark......

Click to expand...

There is just one problem with the destruction of all terrestrial life:
What about the plants? Were they in the ark too? The Bible does not talk of that. So, how come there are plants?

This, for me, is absolutely compelling evidence that the flood was not global.

Floodnut said:

The seeds of most plants, except cabbages could survive in saltwater, other could survive attached to floating debris, or in the entrails of animals, or buried under sediments, and then re-exposed in erosion at the conclusion of the Flood. Others would have been on the Ark in seed, in animal coats, in bedding. A good article on this objection, with references to research is at AiG.

Click to expand...

And what about the plants that produce asexually?

And where did the green olive branch come from?

Etc.?


I have the greatest respect for people who say that they believe in a global flood because that is how they read the Bible. I respect their honesty and sincerity, even though I don't share their views.

But this does not apply to those who make up all sorts of pseudo-scientific babble that defies common sense.

Floodnut, I don't think it's very charitable to "duh" people and accusing them of being demonic ("diabolic" unbelief?) while you still haven't been able to defend your own talk from being babble. (Not that I am making new accusations, just repeating Rusticus'.) Let's look carefully at a literal reading of of the relevant passages from Genesis 8:

3 The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, 4 and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.

Click to expand...

Taking this as day 1 of the period in question. On day 1, the bottom of the Ark hits the top of Mount Ararat. Note that there is still no visible land, and therefore no olive sprout would have survived.

5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.

Click to expand...

We'll take this as about day 100. Noah can see the top of Mount Ararat. The language used shows that nothing else was visible. I.e., our olive seed in question still has not germinated.

6 After forty days Noah opened the window he had made in the ark 7 and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth. 8 Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. 9 But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark.

Click to expand...

Honestly this passage seems ambiguous to me, since on the one hand the water "has dried up from the earth" but on the other "there was water over all the surface of the earth". But we'll give it the benefit of the doubt and say that somewhere between day 101 and day 140 our olive seed found solid ground to sprout, on day 101 to give it the most time.

10 He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. 11 When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf!

Click to expand...

So on day 147, the dove comes back with a freshly plucked olive leaf. So the olive seed has had 47 (giving the benefit of the doubt) days to sprout forth. In the first place we're not even sure if it had that many days. But is this plausible?

I don't know too much about growing olives, but from this site: http://www.oliveoilsource.com/propagating_olive_trees.htm I've picked up some interesting facts (which may or may not have been interpreted rightly). First:

We have been asked if the pit of an olive in a jar of brined olives can be grown. The answer is no; the pit has been killed by the brine.

Click to expand...

Growing an olive from fresh olives is usually a frustrating experience as very few germinate but a tree dropping thousands of olives over hundreds of years will produce seedlings.

Click to expand...

This small fruited cultivar seems to have a fairly high percentage of seeds that germinate, although once again, germination occurs over a long period of time (up to two years!)

Click to expand...

So in the first place we need thousands of seeds over hundreds of years within half a day's flight of the ark. And all the seeds are half-dead having been soaked in salt water over a few months. (There's a lot of salt in the ocean, you know, and Mount Ararat isn't all that far. Water moves fast especially if many cubits of it have been suddenly dumped onto the earth out of nowhere - another difficulty.) And the kicker is that they have 47 days to accomplish what a modern, specially-bred-to-germinate variety can do in two years. Hmm. Call in the Goddidit squad because the only explanation is a pseudoscientific explanation.

shernren said:

So in the first place we need thousands of seeds over hundreds of years within half a day's flight of the ark. And all the seeds are half-dead having been soaked in salt water over a few months. (There's a lot of salt in the ocean, you know, and Mount Ararat isn't all that far. Water moves fast especially if many cubits of it have been suddenly dumped onto the earth out of nowhere - another difficulty.) And the kicker is that they have 47 days to accomplish what a modern, specially-bred-to-germinate variety can do in two years. Hmm. Call in the Goddidit squad because the only explanation is a pseudoscientific explanation.

Click to expand...

From what I know about Olive trees they are very tenacious. Granted there are many varieties to chose from. A common way to grow a Olive tree is to bury a cutting (branch) and a shoot will rapidly appear. Also the Olive tree even when cut down will grow back (from what I remember). There are many scriptures in the bible that speak about the Olive branch too, I don't care to post them all, I'm sure your well versed. Over all I don't think it was any form of a miracle that an olive leaf appeared in a weeks time, but more so that the dove plucked it and brought it back.

Andrew


Andrew

But has anybody ever tried immersing an olive tree in half-ocean-salinity (being generous) water to a depth of over twenty feet? And at what elevation do olive trees grow, anyway? Not asking sarcastically - am really curious. This is one of those nice moments when we're asking new questions which neither AiG nor TO has pep-one-sided answers to.

To Critias: I'm examining how Peter treated the Flood in his letters so do tell me if I'm right or wrong. In 2 Peter 2 the context is the impending condemnation of false teachers. The verse concerned is:

2 Peter 2:5: if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others;

Notice that the subject of the flood is "its ungodly people". I would hazard that the geographical scope was not as important to Peter as its sociological scope i.e. all the ungodly people of the day were destroyed. The parallel is that as all wicked people were killed by God in the flood, so all false teachers will be judged, condemned and punished by God. So I find no difficulty with a geographically local flood in this passage.

In 2 Peter 3 the context is how scoffers mock the idea of the coming of the Day of the Lord. Note that this cannot be construed as a Scriptural criticism of geological uniformitarianism. That (which is never used in its full force today, anyway) said that all happened in the past as it is happening in the present. But the scoffers say that all will happen in the future as it has happened in the past and is happening in the present. Uniformitarianism deduces the past from the present, the scoffers predict the future from the past and the present ("everything goes on...").

The passage concerned: 2 Peter 3:3-7 3First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. 4They will say, "Where is this 'coming' he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation." 5But they deliberately forget that long ago by God's word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. 6By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. 7By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

Peter invokes God's role as Creator and Judge. God's power over the universe is demonstrated in His act of creation. God's authority as judge of man is dictated in His reserving the universe for fire for judgment of ungodly men. (The universe will be destroyed not for its own sake but for the purpose of judging those who were wicked in it.) But to which does the Flood belong? If we can link 2 Peter 3:6 with 2 Peter 2:5 (though undoubtedly some will call it taking Scripture out of context) we may infer that Peter's undeveloped idea here is that the Flood was a past judgment of wickedness as the future destruction will be a future judgment of wickedness. To diagram it:

Challenge: The future will keep going on just as the past has!
Reply: You deliberately forget just what went on in the past:
a1. as God created the world in the past
b1. and flooded it in the past to judge ungodly men (implicit?)
a2. God will destroy the world in the future
b2. to judge ungodly men.

If we accept this, then the issue is did the Flood completely judge unrighteousness? And if it killed all humanity sans Noah's crew, it certainly did, whether or not kangaroos drowned in Australia and sloths in South America.

Rusticus said:

There is just one problem with the destruction of all terrestrial life:
What about the plants? Were they in the ark too? The Bible does not talk of that. So, how come there are plants?

This, for me, is absolutely compelling evidence that the flood was not global.

Click to expand...

I agree. The story is inconsistent in saying that all terrestrial animals died, but showing that plants (as in the olive branch) survived. That is another indication that it is a story, for this could not happen in real life.

What I am saying is that you cannot identify the flood in the biblical story with the real event--if there was a real event. The real event had to be local, as there is no possibility that any flood was global.

But the story is still about a global flood. There is no other way you can read the text. Hence the story is not about a real flood. Trying to harmonize the story with a real event is a wasted effort. The most that can be said is that the story may have been inspired by a real event. It is not a record of that event.

btw are you aware that biblical scholars have come to the conclusion that the Genesis flood story is actually two separate stories woven together by a later editor?

Floodnut said:

....So here is the example of how the deniers of Creation exhibit Christian Charity toward those who do not share their Evolutionist Faith.....

Click to expand...

What has evolution got to do with this? I thought we were talking about whether the Flood was global or local.

gluadys said:

The story is inconsistent in saying that all terrestrial animals died, but showing that plants (as in the olive branch) survived. That is another indication that it is a story, for this could not happen in real life.

Click to expand...

I don't see what is inconsistant here, are you saying all plant life should be dead except what is in the ark? Is this the scripture your talking about?
What is "this" that can't happen in real life?

destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish.

the LORD said, "I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth—men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air

You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them."

Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.


Andrew

Howdy friend!

shernren said:

To Critias: I'm examining how Peter treated the Flood in his letters so do tell me if I'm right or wrong. In 2 Peter 2 the context is the impending condemnation of false teachers. The verse concerned is:

2 Peter 2:5: if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others;

Notice that the subject of the flood is "its ungodly people". I would hazard that the geographical scope was not as important to Peter as its sociological scope i.e. all the ungodly people of the day were destroyed. The parallel is that as all wicked people were killed by God in the flood, so all false teachers will be judged, condemned and punished by God. So I find no difficulty with a geographically local flood in this passage.

Click to expand...

The subject of 2 Peter 2:4-5 (both verses are necessary) is God. The flood came because of the ungodly. Genesis states all mankind was ungodly except Noah and his family found favor in the Lord.

Man is to be the steward of the earth, including all animals. When sin came into the world because of man, sin affected all creation, not just man. This is because man is the steward of the earth.

At the time before the flood man's sinfulness spread and was at an all time high. Let's sidetrack for just a moment. If look to the relation of the passages, we can see what the future state of world will be like. Sinfulness at an all time high. Look to how mankind acted in those days to see how mankind will be in the future. Notice that two things at the top of God's hate list are sexual immorality and idol worship. Do you see increase in these today? I do. Jesus said, so in the times of Noah, so it will be in the time before He comes. This is to aid in our watchfulness of the times. These two things can get worse, but how much worse can they really get than in the times of Noah and Sodom and Gamorrah?

Ok, back on track now. If we are to take the point of view of the flood being local only, then you have to accept that animals and mankind did not move outside of this region. For all flesh was killed, including animals. That is quite an assertion to make, especially about animals. Everything would have to be in that specific region to state it was a local flood and all flesh died.

shernren said:

In 2 Peter 3 the context is how scoffers mock the idea of the coming of the Day of the Lord. Note that this cannot be construed as a Scriptural criticism of geological uniformitarianism. That (which is never used in its full force today, anyway) said that all happened in the past as it is happening in the present. But the scoffers say that all will happen in the future as it has happened in the past and is happening in the present. Uniformitarianism deduces the past from the present, the scoffers predict the future from the past and the present ("everything goes on...").

The passage concerned: 2 Peter 3:3-7 3First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. 4They will say, "Where is this 'coming' he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation." 5But they deliberately forget that long ago by God's word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. 6By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. 7By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

Peter invokes God's role as Creator and Judge. God's power over the universe is demonstrated in His act of creation. God's authority as judge of man is dictated in His reserving the universe for fire for judgment of ungodly men. (The universe will be destroyed not for its own sake but for the purpose of judging those who were wicked in it.) But to which does the Flood belong? If we can link 2 Peter 3:6 with 2 Peter 2:5 (though undoubtedly some will call it taking Scripture out of context) we may infer that Peter's undeveloped idea here is that the Flood was a past judgment of wickedness as the future destruction will be a future judgment of wickedness.

Click to expand...

First off, I want to make it quite clear that I am not advocating that Scripture is meant for teaching science. Scripture has scientific ideas that come from a theological teachings, but the point of these passages is not to teach the scientific ideas.

I believe today we have such a wide perspective of what science covers. That if we say six day creation, we trying to teach science. We are not. If say a global flood, we are trying to teach science. The "we" that I am referring to in this context is the YECs here in this forum. Granted there are places like AiG and ICR that do try to assert the Bible is teaching science. I disagree with that, but I agree with their assertion that the Bible must be the starting point of our presuppositions when looking to the world. The science they do (you may mock this) may not always be correct or it may never be correct, but they have started with the correct presupposition. The Bible is the ultimate source of truth. I do not agree that the Bible is only true in a theological sense. I believe it extends wider than this. I believe God works within mankinds history. I believe God reveals Himself to man within real history. I believe God reveals to man His work in real history. I do not support a pagan view point of a god of myths. I believe in God who has been trying to get our attention and turn us to Him in our very real existence. Not in myths and fairytales.

Now, that being said. I was not speaking for you or anyone else on what I believe. You might agree with me, you might not. It is not my place to tell you what you believe. It is not my place to make you to believe anything.

I came here with the wrong attitude. God has humbled me and made me realize the most I can do is present what I believe to be the truth. What you do with it is up to you. It is my responsibility to love you nonetheless.

That is what I wish for all my fellow YECs to realize and act on. I wish all of my fellow believers who are TEs would realize his and act on it.

Ok, now that I went way off track I will address what you stated. I don't believe you took the text out of context for one, as far as trying to bring the two verses together. I think you needed to add in few more verses, but I don't see a problem with bringing 2 Peter 2 and 2 Peter 3 together.

You stated that you see Peter invoking God's role as the Creator. If this is your view, then you need to stay consistent with that view. If you are going to see God acting in the universal sense, then stating the flood is local isn't consistent.

When Jesus comes to judge, He will judge all mankind. It is universal. So was the flood's judgement on man. The animals were also killed. As I said, you will have to assert that all animal life was only in this location, no where else. Birds didn't fly anywhere else except in this location. Do you think that is a valid assertion to make? I don't think so, but that is just me.

shernren said:

To diagram it:

Challenge: The future will keep going on just as the past has!
Reply: You deliberately forget just what went on in the past:
a1. as God created the world in the past
b1. and flooded it in the past to judge ungodly men (implicit?)
a2. God will destroy the world in the future
b2. to judge ungodly men.

If we accept this, then the issue is did the Flood completely judge unrighteousness? And if it killed all humanity sans Noah's crew, it certainly did, whether or not kangaroos drowned in Australia and sloths in South America.

Click to expand...

Don't forget this verse:

Genesis 7:21
"Every living thing that moved on the earth perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind."

How big would a population be after 1600 years or so? Too big for just 1 local area for them all to live in?

I think it's funny. God was preparing Noah for a 'local' flood, so he made him spend the next 120 years building a ship that would make the Titanic look like a tugboat and had him move in every living animal (seven of every clean and two of every unclean) into this ark. Not only that, but this localized flood lasted for over a year. Also, who says the olive branch had to be green? I didn't read that anywhere in the text. The olive tree could've stayed in the ground (they aren't very tall you know) and the bird just grabbed a branch from the tree. Noah, living in that area, would've been able to recognize that it was the branch of an olive tree and the ground was no longer covered.

Floodnut said:

.... But you unbelievers are so angry.....

Click to expand...

It seems to me it's not the unbelievers that are so angry.

Back to the topic, then:

In view of the length of the duration of the flood it would be reasonable to assume that all kinds of weather would have been encountered during the flood.

Floodnut said:

whew! thank you. If you want me to be the one guilty of angry fine. I am so sorry. Now help me out here, describe some of the weather in a world where everything is "sea level"

Click to expand...

There would be days of sunshine, days of rain, near the poles you might get pack-ice, there would be local storms every so often. Ocean currents of warm and cold water, whilst disrupted, would still exist (although they might running differently to before). The trade winds would probably not change (noticing that they are the most reliable in the pacific ocean today, the largest expanse of water we have). In many, if not most, ways the weather would just be "business as usual".