My first point is that Noah existed. Please forget the wall paper, children's stories, and picture books. Noah, like many people from the ancient world, cannot easily be documented outside of singular ancient narratives. With Noah, it is the Jewish ancient text. But this is true regarding many ancient people from other ancient cultures, not just the Jews. One of the most famous would be an ancient Mesopotamian king named Gilgamesh. Outside of some very mystical and very ancient collection of stories entitled, "The Epic of Gilgamesh", there is simply no evidence for the existence of this man. However, it doesn't mean he didn't exists. Thus, my first main point is this: Noah was a historic person. He existed in time and space.Secondly, there was some kind of flood. In addition, the Epic of Gilgamesh, along with many other very old stories from different cultures around the glob, include a flood narrative. All of these narratives are mutually exclusive - that is, the stories conflict with one another at many points. There are not only ancient Mesopotamian stories, but Hindu, Greek, and even Mesoamareican flood stories. If humanity came from the descendants of the survivors of a cataclysmic "natural" disaster such as a regional or even world wide flood, then - like the telephone game - the story would exist everywhere but be different between people groups, and sometimes radically different. Yet, the intersections of such stores does imply that something happened. I choose to accept the biblical narrative for many reasons which I don't have time to discuss here.
Now, two easy questions that I was asked about Noah are: (1) What did the carnivores eat on Noah’s Ark and (2) how long were they aboard the wooden ship? These questions are answered by the biblical narrative. First, Noah was told by God to take 7 pairs not just a single pair, of every clean animal. As the text says, "Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate" (Genesis 7:2). So, they ate the clean animals. Secondly, how long was Noah on the Ark? A little over a year - 360 or 370 days. It is written, "Noah entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth. In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, on the seventeenth day of the second month--on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth..." (Genesis 7:10-11). He left the ark about a year later. As it is written, "By the first day of the first month of Noah's six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the earth was completely dry. (Genesis 8:14-15)
Finally, a question that many of my atheist and non-believing friends have is - was it really a global flood. To this, I say "maybe". First, the biblical narrative, both the Hebrew and Christian writings, use language much like we do - there are hyperbolic exaggerations to make a point (eg. "If I speak in the tongues of men and angels but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal...., 1 Cor 13:1) The main message is the universality of the wickedness of mankind at that time, not the universality of the flood. Since mankind's (human beings, not other hominids that may or may not have been in existence and not already extinct) population would have been local, all of mankind could have been destroyed in a relatively local flood event. Both believing and non-believing geologist agree that canyons, mountains, valleys, etc. formed throughout Earth’s 4.5 billion year history via both catastrophic events (such floods) and more gradual processes - and I agree with science AND truth - honest science that is, science without an agenda aside from understanding what is and what was.
Even so, there is evidence of sea creature fossils on mountain tops. Geological strata in odd locations do contained marine fossils. The fact that most of the earth is covered with water also gives credence to the possibility of a global flood. The flood in Genesis has water coming from the sky and from spings in the ground, so having a water covered planet would be needed to create such a world wide flood. The fact that many cultures have a flood myth (yes, I did say myth) can also imply a common real event. Thus, I take the narrative as written and strive to fully understand the genre of each type of text. Genesis is judicial, theological and historical from an ancient worlds perspective. I strive to read it that way in light of our modern world.
Finally, I must admit that my faith in God and my trust in the biblical narratives do require a certain spiritual framework which actually comes from God. As it is written, we should think of our selves with sober judgement "in accordance with the faith God has distributed ..." (Romans 12:3). Thus, faith comes from God and many cannot accept certain spiritual truths because it makes no sense to them. As it is written, "The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Corinthians 2:14). Even though this is true, it does not invalidate the facts of history or honest science. Any believer who refuses to explore the evidence is just as spiritually blind as the nonbeliever who cannot see it. But the non-believer is actually in a better position before God!
