The Flood

We can view the story of Noah and the Ark in various ways.

First, there are a number of ancient legends about major floods in the Middle East, including one in the Babylonian story "The Epic of Gilgamesh," which is older than the story of Noah and the Flood.

Second, scientists have found evidence that the Black Sea was once a freshwater lake which was lower than sea level. About 7,000 years ago, according to geological evidence, the rising waters of the Mediterranean Sea pushed through a channel that is now the Bosphorus. Seawater poured through that channel at about 200 times the flow of Niagara Falls and widened the Black Sea at the rate of a mile per day. That submerged the shoreline at a rapid pace.

That would certainly explain why it seemed like the whole world was flooding. Today seashells on the beach are marine in origin, but deep below the surface are shells of freshwater mollusks. That is evidence that something dramatic happened in the ancient past.

Third, the image of the Flood is powerful in American song and literature. An old spiritual includes the phrase "God gave Noah the rainbow sign, No more water but fire next time." James Baldwin's The Fire Next Time refers to this story in telling about the life of Black people in white society.

The image in the spiritual is often used to suggest the anger of Blacks who have to suffer under white oppression, suggesting that at some point that anger will rise to the surface—as is the case in the Black Lives Matter movement.

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