Genesis 8:3

3 And the waters receded from the earth {gradually}, and the waters abated at the end of one hundred and fifty days.

Genesis 8:3 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 8:3

And the waters returned from off the earth continually,
&c.] Or "going and returning" ^F19; they went off from the earth, and returned to their proper places appointed for them; some were dried up by the wind, and exhaled by the sun into the air: and others returned to their channels and cavities in the earth, or soaked into it:

and after the end of the hundred and fifty days, the waters were
abated;
or began to abate, as Jarchi and the Vulgate Latin version; which days are to be reckoned from the beginning of the flood, including the forty days' rain; though Jarchi reckons them from the time of the ceasing of it; so that there were from the beginning of the flood one hundred and ninety days; six months, and ten days of the year of the flood now past; and in this he is followed by Dr. Lightfoot ^F20: but the former reckoning seems best, and agrees better with what follows.

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FOOTNOTES:

F19 (bwvw Kwlh) , "eundo et redeundo", Pagninus, Montanus.
F20 Works, vol. 1. p. 6.

Genesis 8:3 In-Context

1 And God remembered Noah and all the wild animals, and all the domesticated animals that [were] with him in the ark. And God caused a wind to blow over the earth, and the waters subsided.

2 And the fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed, and the rain from the heavens was restrained.

3 And the waters receded from the earth {gradually}, and the waters abated at the end of one hundred and fifty days.

4 And the ark came to rest in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat.

5 And the waters {continued to recede} to the tenth month; in the tenth month, on the first of the month, the tops of the mountains appeared.

Footnotes

• [a]. Literally "going and returning"