The Deluge and Noah's Ark. When God destroyed sinful Mankind

The building of Noah’s Ark.

The wickedness of Mankind.

Noah completes The Ark. The animals come, two by two.

The coming of The Deluge.

Saved from a watery grave.

Our Eternal Father puts things right.

Some storm music to die to.

The parade of animals just seemed to go on for ever. They were strung out in a long line over the tree clad hills, and that was only one procession. They seemed to be coming from every direction. The first ones to arrive were those whose natural habitat had been in the countryside surrounding the enormous ship. The rats and the mice and two enormous fierce lions were encamped on the meadowland in front of the Ark. That was the name that mad old Noah had given the colossus that he had spent the previous hundred and twenty years building. His wife, who was as barmy as him, helped with the construction. So did his three prissy sons and their equally prissy wives. When they were not sawing and hammering, or stinking out the neighbourhood with their melting pitch, they were going round knocking on doors and haranguing everybody about their “wicked” lifestyles and how God was going to destroy the whole world if everyone didn’t repent. Some of the time they just got laughed at. But like a lot of religious nutjobs, before and since, they often turned up just when families were about to sit down to dinner after a hard day’s work in the fields. Then they got told to get lost and, on at least one occasion, the unwanted preachers found themselves being chased by the dogs.

Leila and her brother Cham stood on the top of the big hill that rose above the meadow where the Ark sat. It really was an impressive sight. Nothing so huge had ever been built like it before. It could have contained thousands of the little boats that their father used to catch fish and there could still be room for thousands more. Even the palace of the King, which was the biggest building in the country, looked like a dog kennel compared with the monstrosity that Noah had built. They were both still children. Leila was just over ninety and her little brother was only forty five. They lived just the other side of the hill from where the “cultists” were building their huge Ark. There were about sixty people living in the little village where the children had been born. They were all related in some way. Most of them had blonde hair and blue eyes. This is what happens when a group of people are all bred from the same stock.

“Every one of us is descended from Great Grandfather Adam” old Enos used to tell them.

Enos invented the little boats that the people used for fishing in the lake. Before then they had to spear the odd fish from the shore. They didn’t get many. But when the wise old man came up with the idea of carving out a large tree trunk so that someone could sit in it and float out to the middle of the lake; fish for dinner became much more common. He also thought of the really clever idea of weaving the reeds that grew all around the village into something he called a basket. Two men would go out in the hollowed log. One would propel it with a long stick pushed against the bottom of the shallow water. The other one would trail the basket through the water and capture the fish. The villagers depended mainly on the fish to eat nowadays. Once forests surrounded the village and they could hunt the animals. The women used to gather very useful herbs there as well. But since Noah and his mad family started cutting down all the trees to build his insane folly, the forest was gradually done away with. There wasn’t a tree to be seen anywhere in the vicinity now. Even when Leila and Cham climbed the big hill there was not a trace of living wood to be seen. The animals left with the forest. That is why catching the fish had become so important. They were lucky that Enos had invented the fishing boat before all the trees were gone. They could have starved, and all because of the obsession of a group of religious fanatics.

It was now one hundred and twenty years since the villagers first had their lives disrupted by the arrival of Noah and his “bunch of loonies”. The Ark was finally completed. Its builders made one more visit to the village. The alarmist message was still the same as ever.

“Repent or be destroyed. God has it in his mind to obliterate you all from the Earth. Abandon your wicked ways and enter the Ark to be saved”.

The people chased the “nutjobs” from their doors. The only “wicked ways” that they were aware of were the ones that caused the destruction of the trees and the migration of all the animals.

“Besides” they reasoned “who would want to live in that great hulk with that mad gang? That stupid Ark will never go anywhere. Even if it could be brought to the lake it would never float on the shallow water”.

Then the animals started to come back. As I said earlier, it was those that lived nearest to the Ark that started gathering first. Leila and Cham watched the performance from the top of the hill. There was a big doorway in the side of the Ark and a ramp going up. Noah and one of his sons stood in the doorway. They seemed to be directing the embarking of the animals. The old prophet, (for that is what he claimed to be), had an enormous sheet of parchment in his hands. The son would call out the names of the various animal types. Then the old loony would mark them off on the sheet. It went something like this.

“Two mice”. Then they would be recorded.

“Two Lions, two zebras, two aardvarks, two sparrows, two duck billed platypuses” etc.” You get the idea. They seemed to be letting in just two of each type. That was a very strict rule apparently. By the side there was an enormous magnifying glass. Every now and then Noah would have to leave down his list and he would scan the entrance with the glass. Then he would call out “two fleas” or “two head lice”. They would be marked in as well. All the larger hairy animals would be examined with the glass also, presumably to see if they were trying to sneak in any extra insect parasites. At one stage there was the most heated row at the entrance to the great ship. Two unicorns were trying to gain admittance. But a close examination under their tails had uncovered a whole colony of fleas that were hiding there. You could almost see the steam coming out of Noah’s ears when he discovered the attempted deception. He screamed at the malefactors.

“Depart hence you loathsome sinners. Die with the rest of God’s accursed ones”.

The two unicorns slunk back down the ramp.

The little children almost burst from laughing at this comical sight. This was really starting to become a seriously fun day.

The throng of assorted beasts continued all afternoon. They were still coming over the hills when Leila and Cham went home to their fish dinner. In the village all the talk was about Noah and the shenanigans that were happening in the big meadow. Nobody could make sense of it at all. It was obvious that the Ark could go nowhere. It was just too big. The prevailing opinion was that old Noah had finally flipped. Some of them charitably hoped that the mad family would not get eaten by one of their carnivorous lodgers. Others, (remembering what a nuisance the “nutjobs” had been), were inclined to hope that they would be.

All through the night the pounding of animal feet and the noises of endless animal voices made sure that nobody in the village got much sleep. Next morning the children bolted down their breakfast and ran to the hill to see what was happening now. The last few dozen creatures were just being counted into the Ark. The final two pairs were perhaps the most unusual. There were two rather comical little black and white birds waddling upright on little duck like feet and the very final couple hopped up the ramp on back legs that were much bigger than their front ones.

When these last rather strange animals had hopped into the vast body of the ship Noah and his son started pulling on a huge rope to lower the great door and seal off the Ark. Leila and Cham ran down the hill and straight up the ramp. Their childhood curiosity had just become too much to contain. They were panting with excitement when they reached the big doorway.

“Please Sir” they blurted out. “Can we come in to see the animals? We are only two as well”.

Old Noah ceased in his exertions at the rope. He just roared at the two young ones.

“Leave this place now, you abominations before the Face of The Lord. Take your punishment which has been justly handed down”.

The two children burst into shocked tears as they turned and ran down the ramp. The magnifying glass narrowly missed the head of Cham as it flew past, smashing to smithereens not ten paces in front of them. Which member of the family of “saints” had thrown it has never been determined.

They were still in a state of shock when they rested on top of the hill a few minutes later. Leila, who considered herself to be a big girl now, had dried her tears on her sleeve. She put her arm round her little brother to comfort him. He had reached the stage of making big gasping sobs, preparatory to calming down hopefully. They looked down at the Ark. There was no sign of any life there now. The door had been completely closed. The huge structure just sat lifelessly in the middle of the meadow. No birds were singing. There wasn’t even a rustle of a mouse to be heard in the grass. The whole world seemed to go completely silent. It was as if every living thing was waiting for some catastrophe to happen.

Then it started to rain. But this was like no other rain that either child could remember. It seemed like somebody had turned the sky into an inverted ocean. The water fell on the two children with such weight that it forced them to their knees. They clung together. They were screaming now. The strength of the deluge had stripped their trembling bodies of every vestige of clothing. Then the water started gushing from the ground beneath the hill. The sods of earth split open and boulders were dislodged by the sheer thrust of the uprushing torrent. The hill was getting rapidly smaller. Leila and Cham could see a watery death rushing up to claim them. There couldn’t be more than a few minutes left now.

Then, just when they felt that their absolutely final minute had arrived, they heard a voice calling their names.

“Leila. Cham. This way. Quick or you will be drowned”.

Enos was sitting in his fishing boat not two feet from where they were about to breathe their final breath. The little craft was full of water. But because it was a dug out log it was still floating. From the deepness of despair and horror, hope flooded into their lives again. They were saved. They would live. They scrambled to safety just as water buried the final sodden remnants of the hill.

For many days the water continued to pound the earth, both from above and below. The two children and the old man had tied themselves to the battered boat with strips made from Enos’s clothes. They had plenty to drink at least. They also managed to grab some fish that were swept into the boat by the raging waters. It was not much. But it kept them alive. Eventually the rain stopped and the waters no longer welled up from below. The dugout, with its bedraggled passengers floated on a featureless sea that stretched over every part of the globe. There was not even one mountain that didn’t have shoals of bemused fish swimming thousands of feet above its rocky pinnacle. Enos and the children wept great tears when they remembered all their friends that had drowned in the great inundation. But they were very grateful to be alive themselves.

From His eternal abode in Heaven, God surveyed the work which His divine hand had wrought. Things seemed to be just as they were planned to be. His entire world was hidden beneath a watery carpet. The bloated bodies, of the transgressors against the divine will, floated in stinking clumps everywhere He looked. He had provided food for many fishes. God smiled when His gaze fell upon the Ark. Its cargo was very precious to him. But something was not quite as it should be. A hint of uneasiness beclouded the thoughts of The Almighty as He surveyed His handiwork. When He saw the little boat with its half-starved passengers He knew what the problem was.

Leila, Cham, and old Enos didn’t know what happened to them when the thunderbolt from above shattered their craft and scattered their bones and guts all over the still waters.

The plans of God are not to

be thwarted.

How was it for the Canaanites when Israel came to The Promised Land?

Read the harrowing story here.

http://christopheranton.hubpages.com/hub/The-coming-of-Israel-to-the-land-promised-by-The-Lord