1. Was it universal geographically, overspreading the entire globe?
2. Was it universal as to all living men, leaving absolutely none alive on the face of all the earth, except those in the ark?
1. That the deluge was of limited extent geographically, and not universal, may be fairly assumed on the following grounds:
(1.) The moral reasons for a deluge do not seem to require it to be universal, since obviously that corrupt generation whose sins demanded such a judgment did not overspread all the continents and lands of theglobe, but appear to have been confined within a quite limited area in Western Asia.
(2.) While on the one hand we may not limit the miraculous power of the Almighty; on the other hand, it is not legitimate to assume an expenditure of miraculous power indefinitely beyond what the occasion demands.——This objection is designed to apply, not specially to the supply of water requisite to flood the whole earth at once, for there is water enough in the oceans and seas to submerge the continents, provided only that the ocean beds be temporarily uplifted and the continents relatively depressed: but it does apply with great force to the preservation of the living animals and plants of the whole world. The narrative assumes that the deluge will destroy the land animals and the fowls of the air unless they are protected in the ark. It also gives us the dimensions of the ark, and leaves us to estimate proximately how many could be saved alive in it. The narrative, therefore, does not authorize us to resort to miracle for the preservation of these animal races.——Now it is entirely certain that only an exceedingly small part of all the land animals, insects and birds of the whole world were saved in the ark. Men versed in natural science estimate the living species of vertebrate animals at 21,000; of articulates, 300,000—numbers by far too great to be provided for in Noah’s ark.——Yet again: To a great extent the “fauna” (as they are called)—the animal species of the several continents—differ widely from each other. South America has its families, many of them unknown to other continents; Australia has its special group, and Africa its own. It is simply incredible that all or even the mass of these animals came to Noah and were preserved in the ark. If they had been destroyed by the flood, there should be traces of their sudden annihilation in the drift of that flood, and geological research might trace the introduction of new races by special creation to repeople those continents. No such line of proofs for a universal deluge is found. The absence of such traces of destruction and of new creation makes it far more than probable that the flood was limited in extent and not universal.
Still further it is urged against a universal deluge—and for aught that appears conclusively—that volcaniccones exist—of Etna in Sicily and of Auvergne in Southern France—which, being composed of loose scoriæ and ashes, must have been washed away by any deluge that should reach them. The cones of Etna are estimated to be 12,000 years old.
(3.) The apparently universal language of the narrative may be readily explained as other similar language must be in the Scriptures, without assuming a range of meaning beyond the writer’s personal knowledge. The writer of this narrative (Gen. chaps. 6–9) speaks as an eye-witness, especially of the great rain; of the ark borne up upon the waters; of the surging back and forth of the billows, and of their covering “the high hills under the whole heaven,” i. e. as far as the eye could reach. The same style of universal language appears frequently in the Scriptures, yet subject to limitations from the known nature of the case; e. g. Deut. 2: 25: “This day will I begin to put the fear of thee” [Israel] “upon the nations that are under the whole heaven;” Acts 2: 5—“There were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven.” Mat. 3: 5: “Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan.”——It is in point to notice also that the word “the earth,” so frequently used in this narrative, very often has the sense—the land. It should manifestly have a meaning as broad when used of the extent of the judgment as when used of the extent of the sin, and not necessarily any more broad. Of the sin it is said repeatedly—“The earth was corrupt before God;” “the earth was filled with violence.” Obviously this same “earth,” to the same geographical extent and not apparently any thing more, was destroyed by the flood. It may be noticed also that the word “ground” [Heb. adamah] is used (Gen. 7: 23) as a synonym for “earth”—“every living substance which was upon the face of the ground”—but this carries with it no sense of universality as to this globe.
There is every reason to suppose that at this time both the righteous descendants of Seth and the wicked descendants of Cain were living in the great basin of the Euphrates and the Tigris—with great probability not reaching out beyond the area bounded by the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf, the Caspian, Black, Mediterraneanand Red Seas. This, therefore, we may assume to have been the area submerged by this deluge, and we have no occasion to look for its traces beyond these limits.
2. Whether the deluge destroyed all living men from the face of the whole geographical earth except those in the ark, it is perhaps impossible to decide with absolute certainty. If any were not reached, they must have been such as had wandered early, far from their native home, suppose into China or Africa, where neither the corruption which became the moral cause of the deluge nor the deluge itself reached them. The question is one of probabilities only, for we have no certain knowledge on the subject and can not have. The probabilities are in my view quite against the supposition.
Traditions of a Great Deluge.