What happened to the plants during Noah’s flood?

The reported flood covered the Earth with water tens of thousands of feet deep (to cover the tops of mountains) and the water reportedly stayed for somewhere between a little over a month to a little over a year (biblical accounts vary).

Every species of animal was reportedly taken aboard an ark (in a week by eight people without transportation and without knowledge of the continents) – which seems a little unlikely. However, there is no mention of any provision for plants.

Many (most?) species of terrestrial plants cannot withstand emersion in water for extended periods. Even aquatic plants require specific environmental conditions that would be drastically altered by the reported flood.

Were all plants killed? How did they survive? What provided food for animals from the ark?

Does it seem more likely that the tale of the flood is legend and fable made up by people who had little understanding of plants and nature? If the bible was guided by omniscient knowledge, as claimed, the fable would not have ignored the survival of plants.

Issa Murkle!

Ever stopped to think that the word 'world' might not mean what modern people mean by it? I mean, do you think that the East Romans (Byzantines) had a galactic empire a la Star Wars simply because they called their Empire the Oekumene (Universe)?

Learn to approach the texts more sensibly and you might get more sensible answers. Of course, if all you want to do is ridicule, sticking with the most ridiculous, literalist view you can find probably serves your cause, but don't try and pretend that your criticism generalises in any way to the faith at large.

James

JamesThePersian said:

sticking with the most ridiculous, literalist view you can find probably serves your cause, but don't try and pretend that your criticism generalises in any way to the faith at large.

Click to expand...

I grew up Southern Baptist, and the very literalist interpretation was quite common. Disturbingly common. Even among the pastor, who'd gone to college and seminary and should have been better educated. "The whole world flooded, it says it and thus it's so, end of story." It sounds to me like the OP is posting about that POV. (That said, that is a good argument against extreme literalists. I'll have to remember if it comes up in debate with my southern baptist fundie parents. ^.^)

Then again, if one truly wanted to interpret the story literally, it wouldn't necessarily be the "whole world". According to this fascinating site, "Contrary to the common literalist reading, Genesis 7:4 does not assert that the flood it describes was a world-wide event. Rather, it simply states that the flood covered the eretz, the Hebrew word that can refer to land, territory, or the whole earth, and destroyed all living things on the 'adamah, the ground, the land, territory, country, or the whole earth. Thus, the biblical flood story can be read as well as a story about a local event as it can as a story about a world-wide one."

Personally, the most logical explanation for the flood story that I've ever heard is that it possibly has Sumerian/Akkadian origins. There are a lot of striking parallels between the flood story in the Epic of Gilgamesh and the flood story in Genesis.

Perhaps the spores of them were brought upon the ark, too.

Or their DNA was preserved in order to reproduce them much later, as could have been the case for the animals.

JamesThePersian said:

Ever stopped to think that the word 'world' might not mean what modern people mean by it?

Click to expand...

Evidently any word in the bible can "not mean what modern people mean by it" (even considering translations). Therefore, one is free to "interpret" anything to mean anything. Right? Or is there one "correct" "interpretation"?

JamesThePersian said:

Learn to approach the texts more sensibly and you might get more sensible answers.

Click to expand...

"Sensibly" in whose terms? What appears sensible to one person might be totally out of reason to another. Who is right, and why?

Does "sensibly" as used above translate to "as I think it should be interpreted" or do we recognize that no one has particular claim on truth?

Perhaps there was a separate ark for plants -- one that has not been mentioned.

The Earth must have been re-vegetated very rapidly for there to have been no evidence left of barren continents recently. Regrowth must have been rapid to feed the ark animals too.

What did the carnivores eat aboard the ark and immediately afterward?


Is this sounding like a legend?

Since Noah's birdy (a dove wasn't it?) flew off and then returned with a leaf from an olive vine I'm led to believe that God fibbed about the proportions of the flood or olives have good scuba gear.

Jaiket said:

Since Noah's birdy (a dove wasn't it?) flew off and then returned with a leaf from an olive vine I'm led to believe that God fibbed about the proportions of the flood or olives have good scuba gear.

Click to expand...

Hydroponics, young Jim. It's the way of the future. Also apparently, the distant past.

And what about dinosaurs?

Oh, sorry, that's a completely different debate.

What happened to the plants?
I grew up with a litteral translation of the Bible and I don't remember anyone saying anything about the plants.
So... I dunno.

Massive floods on the order of, pardon the pun, Biblical proportions are a scientific fact. One example happened right here in my neck of the woods at the end of the last ice age. Glacial lake Missoula (Montana) was blocked by an ice dam that periodically ruptured sending at times as much as 500 cubic miles of water across eastern Washington and out to the Pacific. My home town of Portland OR would have been under over 100 feet of water. There is evidence to support this type of massive flood in the Black Sea area as well. So let us not totally discount the flood story.
http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Glossary/Glaciers/IceSheets/description_lake_missoula.html

LeMaverick said:

Evidently any word in the bible can "not mean what modern people mean by it" (even considering translations). Therefore, one is free to "interpret" anything to mean anything. Right? Or is there one "correct" "interpretation"?

Click to expand...

No, one is not free to interpret anything to mean anything. Well I guess one could do that but it doesn't mean anything without scholarly support. That is why one consults language experts, historians, theologians, etc to find the best interpretation out of many possible ones. (incidentally that is also one of the jobs of apostolic tradition in the Roman Catholic Church)

LeMaverick said:

"Sensibly" in whose terms? What appears sensible to one person might be totally out of reason to another. Who is right, and why?

Does "sensibly" as used above translate to "as I think it should be interpreted" or do we recognize that no one has particular claim on truth?

Click to expand...

Sensible as in the one that makes the most sense. To interpret the flood story as being a literal worldwide event, like apparently some Christian fundamentalists, leads to questions like those posed in the OP, difficult to even take seriously. Interpreting the flood story in light of scientific proof of massive localized floods and linguistic studies like those proposed by Makhsihed leads to a more sensible interpretation.

Makhsihed said:

it simply states that the flood covered the eretz, the Hebrew word that can refer to land, territory, or the whole earth, and destroyed all living things on the 'adamah, the ground, the land, territory, country, or the whole earth. Thus, the biblical flood story can be read as well as a story about a local event as it can as a story about a world-wide one."

Click to expand...

In this way a more sensible interpretation might be that the flood story is based on the actual surviver stories of someone who floated through one of these massive localized flood events with a few animals and his family which was subsequently taken on by Hebrew writers and story tellers.

LeMaverick said:

The reported flood covered the Earth with water tens of thousands of feet deep (to cover the tops of mountains) and the water reportedly stayed for somewhere between a little over a month to a little over a year (biblical accounts vary).

Every species of animal was reportedly taken aboard an ark (in a week by eight people without transportation and without knowledge of the continents) – which seems a little unlikely. However, there is no mention of any provision for plants.

Many (most?) species of terrestrial plants cannot withstand emersion in water for extended periods. Even aquatic plants require specific environmental conditions that would be drastically altered by the reported flood.

Were all plants killed? How did they survive? What provided food for animals from the ark?

Does it seem more likely that the tale of the flood is legend and fable made up by people who had little understanding of plants and nature? If the bible was guided by omniscient knowledge, as claimed, the fable would not have ignored the survival of plants.

Click to expand...

I've always assumed that Noah had plant life aboard the Ark. To me, it's not rocket science...Noah had to eat. I would wager that plant life was part of his diet.

dawny0826 said:

I tend to be a literalist in terms of biblical interpretation and understanding.

I would imagine that Noah and his family would need to eat for forty days and forty nights. I've always assumed that Noah had plan life aboard the Ark.

Whether you want to read the story literally or not...is it unfeasible to think that Noah could have brought plant life upon the Ark to consume and preserve for post flood planting?

Click to expand...

That is a good point there, although I don't take the most literal approach to the story the animals would have had to eat and seeds don't take up allot of space...

Runlikethewind said:

That is a good point there, although I don't take the most literal approach to the story the animals would have had to eat and seeds don't take up allot of space...

Click to expand...

I changed my post a bit.

I do tend to take a literal approach when reading the bible. I don't think it unfeasible that Noah took plant life aboard the Ark.

I don't think it unfeasible that the entire world was flooded. I have no trouble believing this on faith. And if it wasn't...that fact wouldn't really matter much in the long run.

Noah had to eat. I imagine plant life was involved to some degree.

LeMaverick said:

Therefore, one is free to "interpret" anything to mean anything. Right? Or is there one "correct" "interpretation"?

"Sensibly" in whose terms? What appears sensible to one person might be totally out of reason to another. Who is right, and why?

Does "sensibly" as used above translate to "as I think it should be interpreted" or do we recognize that no one has particular claim on truth?

Click to expand...

I humbly suggest a course in textual criticism is in order.

Papersock said:

What happened to the plants?
I grew up with a litteral translation of the Bible and I don't remember anyone saying anything about the plants.
So... I dunno.

Click to expand...

When I was a child, I asked about the plants.

And got a great deal of condemnation for my "lack of faith."

Apparently God gave us brains as some sort of "test" to see if we could resist the temptation to use them.

Yes, well, then I grew up and realized there was more to religion than the tiny slice I'd been exposed to.

For those who haven't been very "exposed" to the realities of the diversity of humans and faith, this is a great place to stumble upon.

As I have written in Is the biblical story of Noah’s Flood a true account? in post 80, if the flood really covered the entire globe and even the highest mountains, then the water would have mixed with the seas and oceans. Freshwater lakes and rivers would have been contaminated by the salt.

The level of salt in the flood would have spread and destroyed everything. Salt just don't disappeared, and when the land dried, no plants could possibly grow, if you are to believe global flood, which the Bible indicated. All forest and trees would have died out. And realistically people could not have possibly "farm" the lands.

Where did all the salt go?

For that matter, where did all the water go?

There is no scientific basis of the Genesis' Deluge, especially if you believe that the flood water level at least covered the mountains of Ararat. Do you know how high Mount Ararat is? Around 1,000 metres (3,300 feet) above sea level. It would have taken centuries before it could possibly dry out Mesopotamia, Egypt and elsewhere. Noah would have been stuck on that mountain for centuries. For certain Nimrod could not built all those major cities in the lower part of Mesopotamia (Babylonia).

Can you possibly imagine that Flood covered Everest, if you are to believe that Bible covering even the highest mountain? It would have taken millennium or two before the water receded that life could be possible in Mesopotamia.

LeMaverick said:

The reported flood covered the Earth with water tens of thousands of feet deep (to cover the tops of mountains) and the water reportedly stayed for somewhere between a little over a month to a little over a year (biblical accounts vary).

Every species of animal was reportedly taken aboard an ark (in a week by eight people without transportation and without knowledge of the continents) – which seems a little unlikely. However, there is no mention of any provision for plants.

Many (most?) species of terrestrial plants cannot withstand emersion in water for extended periods. Even aquatic plants require specific environmental conditions that would be drastically altered by the reported flood.

Were all plants killed? How did they survive? What provided food for animals from the ark?

Does it seem more likely that the tale of the flood is legend and fable made up by people who had little understanding of plants and nature? If the bible was guided by omniscient knowledge, as claimed, the fable would not have ignored the survival of plants.

Click to expand...

A careful reading of the Genesis flood account (and others) leads us to believe that the flood was local, and not global, in extent.

The purpose of the great flood was to extinguish reprobate mankind...and since mankind was localized within a relatively small area, there would have been no need to flood the entire globe...

A few thoughts.

I'm not totally sure of any of this, but as far as the plants go, the plants would have died, but couldn't the seeds of the dead plants still be left behind so that when the water receeded, the seeds would start to grow. I'm not a botanist, so I'm not totally sure if this is possible under those depths.

To answer the salt water question, and this is also a guess. Since it rained, and rain is always fresh water, not salt water, wouldn't there be more fresh water on earth than salt water during the flood. And when the water receeded, the fresh water which was at a higher altitude than the salt water, would have settled into the valleys and formed lake beds, to once again form fresh water lakes, or at the least, very low salt content lakes. Not to mention, could there have been a difference in the ocean temperature than the rain temperature. If the rain was warmer than the ocean, wouldn't the warm fresh water rain stay higher than the cold salt water which would prevent the two from fully mixing.

Like I said, all these are guesses and hypothesis that I just thought of and didn't read anywhere else, so I could be totally off my rocker , but they are at least worth considering.

Apple Pie said:

The purpose of the great flood was to extinguish reprobate mankind...and since mankind was localized within a relatively small area, there would have been no need to flood the entire globe...

Click to expand...

If your town floods tomorrow would you blame God and believe that He was extinguishing man there? Of course not.

Floods happen. Storms happen. Firey rocks fall from the sky all the time, they are not fireballs from heaven, they're meteors!

In it's history the earth has changed many times. It's entire surface was pelted with asteroids, covered with ash and volcanic soot, it was almost entirely covered in ice a number of times, it was submerged under water (but not entirely as the bible says), and not a single one of these events was caused by God.

The ancient ignorant writers of the bible could not understand how these things could happen if not from God.