Genesis 7:10-20

10 Seven days later the flood started.

11 When Noah was six hundred years old, the flood started. On the seventeenth day of the second month of that year the underground springs split open, and the clouds in the sky poured out rain.

12 The rain fell on the earth for forty days and forty nights.

13 On that same day Noah and his wife, his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their wives went into the boat.

14 They had every kind of wild and tame animal, every kind of animal that crawls on the earth, and every kind of bird.

15 Every creature that had the breath of life came to Noah in the boat in groups of two.

16 One male and one female of every living thing came, just as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord closed the door behind them.

17 Water flooded the earth for forty days, and as it rose it lifted the boat off the ground.

18 The water continued to rise, and the boat floated on it above the earth.

19 The water rose so much that even the highest mountains under the sky were covered by it.

20 It continued to rise until it was more than twenty feet above the mountains.

Genesis 7:10-20 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS 7

This chapter begins with an order to Noah to come with his family and all the creatures into the ark, that they might be safe from the flood, which would quickly be upon the earth, Ge 7:1-4 and then gives an account of Noah's obedience to the divine command in every particular, Ge 7:5-9 and of the time of the beginning of the flood, and its prevalence, Ge 7:10-12 then follows a repetition of Noah, his family, and the creatures entering into the ark, Ge 7:13-16 and next a relation is given of the increase of the waters, and of the height they arrived unto, Ge 7:17-20 and of the consequences of the flood, the death and destruction of every living creature, except those in the ark, fowl, cattle, beast, creeping things, and men, Ge 7:21-23 and the chapter is closed with an account how long the waters continued before they began to ebb, even one hundred and fifty days, Ge 7:24.