1God remembered Noah and all the wild and domestic animals with him in the ship. So God made a wind blow over the earth, and the water started to go down. 2The deep springs and the sky had been shut, and the rain had stopped pouring. 3The water began to recede from the land. At the end of 150 days the water had decreased. 4On the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ship came to rest in the mountains of Ararat. 5The water kept decreasing until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains appeared.

6After 40 more days Noah opened the window he had made in the ship 7and sent out a raven. It kept flying back and forth until the water on the land had dried up. 8Next, he sent out a dove to see if the water was gone from the surface of the ground. 9The dove couldn’t find a place to land because the water was still all over the earth. So it came back to Noah in the ship. He reached out and brought the dove back into the ship. 10He waited seven more days and again sent the dove out of the ship. 11The dove came to him in the evening, and in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf. Then Noah knew that the water was gone from the earth. 12He waited seven more days and sent out the dove again, but it never came back to him.

13By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water on the land had dried up. Noah opened the top of the ship, looked out, and saw the surface of the ground. 14By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the land was dry.

15Then God spoke to Noah, 16“Come out of the ship with your wife, your sons, and your sons’ wives. 17Bring out every animal that’s with you: birds, domestic animals, and every creature that crawls on the earth. Be fertile, increase in number, and spread over the earth.”

18So Noah came out with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives. 19Every animal, crawling creature, and bird—everything that moves on the earth—came out of the ship, one kind after another.

20Noah built an altar to the Lord. On it he made a burnt offering of each type of clean #8:20 “Clean” refers to anything that is presentable to God. animal and clean bird. 21The Lord smelled the soothing aroma. He said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of humans, even though from birth their hearts are set on nothing but evil. I will never again kill every living creature as I have just done.

22As long as the earth exists,

planting and harvesting,

cold and heat,

summer and winter,

day and night

will never stop.”

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Genesis 8

The water goes down

1God did not forget about Noah and the animals with him in the boat. So God made a wind blow, and the water started going down. 2God stopped up the places where the water had been gushing out from under the earth. He also closed up the sky, and the rain stopped. 3For one hundred and fifty days the water slowly went down. 4Then on the seventeenth day of the seventh month of the year, the boat came to rest somewhere in the Ararat mountains. 5The water kept going down, and the mountain tops could be seen on the first day of the tenth month.

6-7Forty days later Noah opened a window to send out a raven, but it kept flying around until the water had dried up. 8Noah wanted to find out if the water had gone down, and he sent out a dove. 9Deep water was still everywhere, and the dove could not find a place to land. So it flew back to the boat. Noah held out his hand and helped it back in.

10Seven days later Noah sent the dove out again. 11It returned in the evening, holding in its beak a green leaf from an olive tree. Noah knew that the water was finally going down. 12He waited seven more days before sending the dove out again, and this time it did not return.

13Noah was now six hundred and one years old. And by the first day of that year, almost all the water had gone away. Noah made an opening in the roof of the boat#8.13 made…boat: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text. and saw that the ground was getting dry. 14By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was completely dry.

15God said to Noah, 16“You, your wife, your sons, and your daughters-in-law may now leave the boat. 17Let out the birds, animals, and reptiles, so they can mate and live all over the earth.” 18After Noah and his family had gone out of the boat, 19the living creatures left in groups of their own kind.

The LORD's promise for the earth

20Noah built an altar where he could offer sacrifices to the LORD. Then he offered on the altar one of each kind of animal and bird that could be used for a sacrifice.#8.20 animal…sacrifice: See the note at 7.2. 21The smell of the burning offering pleased God, and he said:

Never again will I punish the earth for the sinful things its people do. All of them have evil thoughts from the time they are young, but I will never destroy everything that breathes, as I did this time.

22As long as the earth remains,

there will be planting

and harvest,

cold and heat;

winter and summer,

day and night.

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Genesis 8

Genesis 8