Genesis 8:20. The very first thing Noah did after he and his family and his animals landed in the neck-deep mud and slime of the year’s Deluge was to build an altar and offer up a thanksgiving sacrifice to the loving God. It is recorded that Noah took one each “of every clean beast and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar” to Yahweh there in the mud. As there were only two of these different kinds of animals and fowls (“the male and his female”) in the ark, and Noah killed and burnt in sacrifice one (whether male or female) of each kind, how the species was ever afterwards replenished on the earth.
On one occasion during His earthly ministry, Jesus responded to the critics of His day by saying, “Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God” (Matthew 22:29 KJV). Anyone remotely familiar with the Bible is abundantly aware that the inquirer above demonstrates by his question a definite lack of knowledge of the Scriptures. In addition, the assumptions (i.e., “neck-deep mud and slime”) contained in the question are not in evidence, and they are prejudicial, too.
First, Noah, his family and the floating zoo remained on the ark for 150 days after the rain stopped, and during which time the flood waters were receding. “The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped, and the rain from heaven was restrained; And the waters returned from off the earth continually: and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated” (Genesis 8:2-3). Secondly, the ark came to rest atop one of the tallest mountain ranges in the world (i.e., the two highest peaks are 12,782 feet and 16,854 feet high). “And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat” (Genesis 8:4). How Noah waited inside the ark until the waters were gone from off the earth before leaving it is described in Genesis 8:5-12; Noah stepped forth from the ark on to dry land (Genesis 8:13-14). The criticism that the survivors of the worldwide deluge “landed in the neck-deep mud and slime” is without basis – they exited the ark in a mountain after the waters had gone down.
How many of each kind of animals were on the ark? Look again! Genesis 6:19 specifies that animals were to be boarded on the ark by pairs or by twos. However, the details as to the number of ceremonially clean and unclean creatures that were to board the ark are found in Genesis 7:2-3, “Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female: and of beasts that are not clean by two, the male and his female. Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the female; to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.” Fourteen pairs of each kind of clean animal, two pairs of each kind of unclean animal and seven pairs of each kind of bird were loaded on to Noah’s ark. Obviously, then, the querist is mistaken about Noah putting animals on the short and terminal list of endangered (soon to be extinct) species by offering some of them as sacrifices upon leaving the ark.
