Board index ‹ Noah's Ark & the Flood

[AlphaT]

Given that the archetypal view of the Flood Narrative is true, do you think that the author of Genesis was trying to convey Noah as a new Adam? I've watched some of John Walton's work on the Flood, and how it's about God bringing the earth back to when it was formless, but I don't remember him saying anything about Noah specifically.

[jimwalton]

John is writing a book on Noah and the Flood, but it may not be out for another year. I know that John treats Adam & Eve as archetypal, but I don't recall him treating Noah as archetypal.

My opinion? The Flood is a regression to disorder, taking us to a parallel of Genesis 1.2, and God's words to Noah in Genesis 9.1ff. easily parallel Genesis 1. But the author of Genesis is not trying to convey Noah as a new Adam. Although that's an interesting notion, since Noah's "fall" in Gn. 9.18-29 come after the new creation of Gn. 9.1-17, paralleling Gn. 1-3, and then it's Noah's son who commits a dreadful sin, just as it was Adam's son in Gn. 3. There are very intriguing parallels between the two, even with the genealogy of Gn. 5 following the Adam story and the Table of Nations of Gn. 10 following the Noah story. But there is never a mention in the text, or anywhere in the Bible, of Noah having a place (even archetypally) as a new Adam. The only new Adam of Scripture is Jesus (Romans 5). Adam is actually very unimportant in the OT. After Genesis 5, he is only mentioned twice (in the OT), once in a genealogy list (1 Chr. 1.1) and once in reference to the covenant (Hos. 6.7). So I think it's pretty safe to say that the author of Genesis is NOT making a theological point about Noah being a new Adam, despite all the parallels between the two accounts.