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The Flood Begins

¹ Then the Lord said to Noah, "I have seen that you are a good man, even among the evil people of this time. So gather your family, and all of you go into the boat. ² Get seven pairs (seven males and seven females) of every kind of clean animal. And get one pair (one male and one female) of every other animal on the earth. Lead all these animals into the boat with you. ³ Get seven pairs (seven males and seven females) of all the birds. This will allow all these animals to continue living on the earth after the other animals are destroyed. ⁴ Seven days from now, I will send much rain on the earth. It will rain for 40 days and 40 nights, and I will wipe everything off the face of the earth. I will destroy everything I made." ⁵ Noah did everything the Lord told him to do.

⁶ Noah was 600 years old at the time the rains came. ⁷ He and his family went into the boat to be saved from the flood. His wife and his sons and their wives were on the boat with him. ⁸ All the clean animals, all the other animals on the earth, the birds, and everything that crawls on the earth ⁹ went into the boat with Noah. These animals went into the boat in groups of two, male and female, just as God commanded. ¹⁰ Seven days later the flood started. The rain began to fall on the earth.^11-13 On the 17th day of the second month, when Noah was 600 years old, the springs under the earth broke through the ground, and water flowed out everywhere. The sky also opened like windows and rain poured down. The rain fell on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. That same day Noah went into the boat with his wife, his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their wives. ¹⁴ They and every kind of animal on the earth were in the boat. Every kind of cattle, every kind of animal that crawls on the earth, and every kind of bird were in the boat. ¹⁵ All these animals went into the boat with Noah. They came in groups of two from every kind of animal that had the breath of life. ¹⁶ All these animals went into the boat in groups of two, just as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord closed the door behind Noah.

¹⁷ Water flooded the earth for 40 days. The water began rising and lifted the boat off the ground. ¹⁸ The water continued to rise, and the boat floated on the water high above the earth. ¹⁹ The water rose so much that even the highest mountains were covered by the water. ²⁰ The water continued to rise above the mountains. The water was more than 20 feet^[a] above the highest mountain.^21-22 Every living thing on earth died—every man and woman, every bird, and every kind of animal. All the many kinds of animals and all the things that crawl on the ground died. Every living, breathing thing on dry land died. ²³ In this way God wiped the earth clean—he destroyed every living thing on the earth—every human, every animal, everything that crawls, and every bird. All that was left was Noah and his family and the animals that were with him in the boat. ²⁴ The water continued to cover the earth for 150 days.