Noah

The righteous Noah is the man whom God found just in a corrupt generation and through whom He preserved life on earth at the time of the flood. The Church honours him among the holy forefathers and sees in his ark a figure of the Church, in which those who enter are saved. His story is told in the Book of Genesis, chapters 5 to 9, and the dates of his life cannot be established.

A righteous man in a corrupt generation

Noah was the son of Lamech, the tenth patriarch from Adam, of the line of Seth. His Hebrew name is linked with the meaning of comfort and rest. His father hoped that he would bring relief from the toil of men's hands. When Noah was five hundred years old, his sons Shem, Ham and Japheth were born.

Scripture says that he found favour with the Lord. Seeing the wicked deeds of men, God decided to destroy them from the earth, together with the cattle, creeping things and birds, but He spared Noah, his sons and their wives. For this reason He commanded him to build an ark and take into it a pair of every creature. The Apostle Peter calls him a preacher of righteousness, and the epistle to the Hebrews recalls his faith, which obeyed a word about things not yet seen.

The flood

At the age of six hundred, Noah entered the ark with his wife, his three sons and their wives, eight souls in all, together with living creatures of every kind. The rain fell for forty days and forty nights, and the waters remained on the earth for a hundred and fifty days. The men and animals on the earth perished. When the waters began to subside, the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. Noah sent out first a raven and then a dove, which the second time returned with an olive leaf in its beak, a sign of God's mercy.

The covenant

Coming out of the ark, Noah built an altar and offered sacrifice to the Lord. God blessed Noah and his sons and told them to be fruitful and multiply, then made a covenant with them and with every living creature, promising never again to destroy the world by water. The rainbow was set in the clouds as the sign of this covenant.

Noah worked the soil and planted a vineyard. Scripture tells that one day he drank of the wine and lay uncovered in his tent, and Ham saw him and told his brothers. Shem and Japheth covered him with respect, turning their faces away. Noah cursed Canaan, the son of Ham, and blessed Shem and Japheth. From the three sons the nations of the earth spread. Noah lived three hundred and fifty years after the flood and reposed at the age of nine hundred and fifty.

Meaning in the Church

The ark is a figure of the Church, which is called the ark of salvation. The Apostle Peter shows that the water of the flood foreshadowed Baptism. The Saviour, speaking of the end of the world, told His disciples that as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man: people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark. The righteous Noah is remembered among the holy forefathers before the Nativity of the Lord.