The two versions of the flood story
and the story of Noah's Ark
Yahweh and Elohim

      If Moses wrote the Bible, and the book came from God who told Moses who wrote the Torah to tell us, then it must be explained why there are conflicts and contradictions in the historical accounts in the manuscripts. These conflicts can be found even in a single story, like the story of Noah's Ark and the flood story in Genesis. The stories conflict in detail and the conflict in facts correspond to the two different names used for God in each version, Yahweh in one story, Elohim in the other story. This is no coincidence and indicate that the stories were composed of two separate stories, written by different, unknown authors, and that the stories were then chopped up and edited together in Genesis. It is a little known fact that famous stories in the Bible that we think we know are actually just one version of events. (See The Golden Calf story of the reception of the Ten Commandments, which demonstrates that there were actually two versions of the reception of the Ten Commandments, not just the famous story we are all familiar with from movies, and indicates that it was not simply Moses who wrote the Bible, or consider the multiple versions of the David and Goliath tale, both famous, and both a selective description of an event which on the pages of the Bible proves to be related in variant and contradictory forms.) Another example of the same sort of thing is the story of Noah's Ark. This story is quite interesting. If you consider both the story of David and Goliath and the story of the Golden Calf you will note that two contradictory traditions were spun and wove together in an attempt to weave one story out of multiple conflicting traditions. The effort fails, and the fact that it fails is interesting in and of itself. (Apparently nothing could be thrown out, which would have been simpler, but then again an attempt had to be made to submerge the obvious contradictions, which proves, on examination to be an exercise in futility. Why bother with such bizarre editing?)

      The story of the flood consists of two separate traditions chopped into pieces and then spun together, with inconsistent passages intact. In one version God is referred to as Elohim, which is usually translated God in the Bible, but is actually plural, and means gods. In the other version God is referred to as Yahweh, which is usually translated YAHWEH. These two different names of God each correspond to the different details in the two conflicting versions of the flood story. Separate the names of God, and you will separate the two flood stories, each emerging with its separate details intact, making the story of Noah's ark and the flood one of the most famous examples of the practice of source criticism and redaction criticism in the Bible. In one version, the one we are all familiar with, it rained for ‘forty days and nights." But another version is also present, but is ignored.

"The flood lasted forty days on the earth." (Genesis Chapter 7 verse 17)

"When the water had increased over the earth for a hundred and fifty days, God took thought for Noah and the beasts and cattle with him in the ark, and he caused a wind to blow over the earth, so that the water began to subside. The springs of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped up, the downpour from the skies was checked." (Genesis Chapter 7 verse 24)

      Similar conflicts are found in the story of the animals going onto the ark. In one version we are specifically told that all animals, ‘clean' and ‘unclean' went onto the ark two by two, and in the variant (priestly) version of the story the ‘clean' animals go on seven by seven. The reason for the variant is that Noah must be portrayed as offering up animal sacrifices upon leaving the ark in the priestly version, thus suggesting that priestly sacrificial doctrine had an illustrious history. Similarly in the priestly version the flood is said to last ‘forty days and nights' since it appears that ‘forty' was considered an illustrious number. (The Sinai mountain top expedition of Moses lasted ‘forty days and nights'. In the gospel account Joshua fasted for ‘forty days and nights,' and ‘afterward he was hungry,' which is another story altogether.)

"And to him on board the ark went one pair, a male and a female, of all animals, clean and unclean, of birds, and of everything that creeps on the ground, two by two, as God had commanded....Those which came were one male and one female of all living things; they came in as God had commanded Noah...the water had increased over the earth for a hundred and fifty days." (Genesis Chapter 7 verses 15, 24)

"Take with you seven pairs, a male and a female, of all ritually clean animals, and one pair, a male and a female, of all unclean animals; also seven pairs, male and female, of every bird-to ensure that life continues on the earth. For in seven days I am going to send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights." (Genesis Chapter 7 verse 2)