The Covenant After the Flood, Genesis 9:1-17

Genesis 9:1–17 — The Covenant After the Flood

In this episode of Understanding the Light, Jess Chou explores Genesis 9:1–17 and the covenant God establishes with Noah after the flood. This discussion examines the changes introduced into the post-flood world, including mankind’s relationship with animals, the allowance of meat consumption, the prohibition against consuming blood, the establishment of justice and government, and the covenant sign of the rainbow.

The episode also examines the intersection of Scripture, science, biology, and creation theology, highlighting how God uses the natural world to communicate spiritual truth.

Key Topics Covered

God Repeats the Creation Mandate

• Genesis 9:1 repeats God’s original command to Adam and Eve:
  • “Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth.”
• Humanity receives a renewed beginning through Noah and his sons.

Reference:

• Genesis 9:1
• Genesis 1:28

Why Animals Now Fear Humans

• Genesis 9:2 introduces fear between animals and mankind.
• Discussion on the possibility that:
  • Animals were originally non-predatory.
  • Humans and animals may both have been vegetarian before the flood.
  • Violence before the flood appears primarily connected to humanity.

References:

• Genesis 9:2
• Genesis 1:29–30
• Genesis 6:11

Why God Allowed Meat Consumption After the Flood

• Examination of survival needs in a post-flood world:
  • Agriculture requires time to recover.
  • Animals and fish provide immediate food sources.
• Discussion of whether environmental and biological conditions changed after the flood.

Topics discussed:

• Post-flood reduction in human lifespan.
• Nutritional challenges of vegetarian diets.
• Ancient plant species and protein density.

References:

• Genesis 9:3
• Genesis 6:3

The Prohibition Against Consuming Blood

• Genesis 9:4 establishes the command not to eat blood.
• Exploration of:
  • Blood as the source of life.
  • Spiritual symbolism of blood throughout Scripture.
  • Scientific considerations regarding disease transmission and iron toxicity.

Topics include:

• Blood’s biological role:
  • Oxygen transport
  • Nutrient delivery
  • Waste removal
• Risks associated with consuming blood:
  • Hepatitis
  • Viral and bacterial infections
  • Iron overload
  • Drinking Blood: Is it safe?

References:

• Genesis 9:4
• Genesis 3:20
• book of Leviticus 17:11

The Establishment of Justice and Human Government

• Genesis 9:5–6 introduces accountability for unlawful bloodshed.
• Discussion of:
  • Human life bearing the image of God.
  • Lawful vs. unlawful killing.
  • Capital punishment in the biblical context.
  • The beginning of structured justice after the flood.

References:

• Genesis 9:5–6

The Rainbow Covenant

• God promises never again to destroy the earth with a flood.
• The rainbow becomes the sign of God’s covenant with creation.

Discussion includes:

• Rainbows as a natural phenomenon.
• God assigning spiritual meaning to elements of creation.
• The relationship between science and faith.

References:

• Genesis 9:8–17

Closing Thought

God consistently uses the natural world to communicate spiritual truth. From blood symbolizing life and sacrifice, to the rainbow symbolizing covenant and mercy, Genesis 9 reminds us that creation itself reflects the purposes and promises of God.

If this episode encouraged you or sparked your curiosity, be sure to subscribe so you don't miss upcoming deep dives into Genesis, the Flood, the Exodus, and more - with scientific and archaeological insight every step of the way.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:51

Welcome to Understanding.

SPEAKER_01 0:54

Hey there. Alright, so we are in Genesis 9 today, verses 1 through 17. The flood has finished, and Noah and his family and everybody is off the ark. And Noah has also sent up a burnt sacrifice to God. The first thing he did when he got off the ark was make an altar and burn um uh some sacrifice uh and so so that um the animals could or so that God could he could rededicate his commitment to God. Uh so now we're here and this is God confirming his covenant with Noah. And there's some interesting things that take place here. Uh as we're probably very familiar with this part of the story because at the end of the story, this is where the rainbow shows up. Um but it says, uh then God blessed Noah and his sons and told them be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. So this passage is deeply significant because it marks the beginning of a new era for all of humankind and animal kind on a new world. Uh the flood is over, the earth is starting over, and God now lays down some new instructions, but also some old instructions. Um, there's also some new boundaries, and there's a uh renewed covenant relationship, but also a new part of that covenant as well. So, verse one, God blesses Noah and his sons and tells them to be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth. This actually should sound very familiar because this is what God told Adam and Eve in Genesis 1. Uh, humanity is essentially being told to do the same thing again. Fill out the earth, spread out far and wide, and fill it up. But something does change. Um, and and pretty quickly, it does say in verse 2 all of the animals of the earth, all the birds of the sky, all the small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the fish in the sea will look on you with fear and terror. So this is a little bit of a new piece to just be fruitful and multiply, which was what God gave to Adam and Eve. He's telling Noah and his sons to do that. He's also telling them now that the animals are going to be afraid of humans, which suggests that before the flood, animals were not fearful of humans. Uh, and actually that makes sense when we look at Genesis as a big picture, because prior to this moment, uh both animals and humans appear to have been vegetarian. And actually in verse 3 it says, I have given them to you for food, just as I have given you grain and vegetables. So now, uh before the flood, people did not eat meat. Um, it it's in Genesis 1, it said God gives plants and fruit for both food to both mankind and animals. There's no indication that animals hunted each other, nor that animals hunted our humans hunted animals. So there's no indication that there was any necessity for the killing of animals, except for the covering of our sins through their skin. But they did not consume these animals. So humans also were probably not fearful of the animals like we are today. Um, and animals were not fearful of us. So why are they going to be fearful of us? Well, if animals had not yet been given the instinct to kill, then the relationship between humans and animals would have been fundamentally different from what we experience now. Some people might object and say, wasn't there already violence before the flood? The Bible actually says that the world was full of violence. Yes, absolutely. But notice that there's something important. The violence is associated with humanity. God didn't bring the flood because the animals were violent. He brought the flood because the humans were violent. Human beings were already killing each other, uh, killing the animals, maybe unnecessarily. Sin had corrupted mankind deeply. And this was going on all over the place, very much against what God's heart was in creation. So death and killing definitely existed before the flood. Um, but they were not sanctioned by God as part of the created order. So this actually changes in Genesis 9. For the first time, God explicitly permits the eating of animals. And the question becomes, why now? So, I mean, just thinking at it from our perspective here, why would God all of a sudden just allow uh us to start killing animals? And you may wonder about that for a minute, but I ask you to think about it from um Noah's perspective and what they were dealing with. It may have been just one of survival. A very practical explanation. So after the flood, you know, the earth would have been devastated agriculturally, and crops take time to grow. Wheat takes months to mature. Uh, fruit trees take years before they produce sustainable fruit, but animals can reproduce and be eaten much faster than that. A chicken or a rabbit can actually reach maturity in a matter of weeks to be eaten. Fish would also have been around in the waters, the ones that weren't destroyed by the flood, because a lot of fish may have survived the flood. Um, and it was the land-dwelling creatures that were brought on the ark. So there would have been fish available that was there. So allowing meat consumption may have been necessary for humanity's survival during the rebuilding period. So another question is, and this is one that's popped up some um, you know, as as people get into health kicks and eating, uh, you know, you may have heard of the Daniel fast, um, which is from the book of Daniel, and or or thing, or you know, things like that. So some people wonder if maybe human biology changed. Um and or what is it called? The paleo diet, right? Which is eat like your paleo paleo uh human ancestors, whatever that means. Um things because they uh well according to evolution, we didn't we didn't farm anything, we just hunted and gathered and then and then we farmed. Um obviously with the Bible, uh that kind of goes out the window because uh we farmed right from the beginning, but um, you know, the the there's these different ancient diets that people try to do to get on these health kicks, and vegetarianism is one of them. And so, you know, there's it's arguable that our vegetarian diet is healthier because that was what Adam and Eve were created to eat. Um, and then the question is, well, if we're allowed to eat meat, maybe something changed in Noah. Maybe there's something biological that changed as a result of the flood that now we need to eat meat. And it's possible. So we do know that the lifespans of humans dramatically decreased after the after the flood, uh, eventually aligning with God's declaration in Genesis 6.3 that mankind's years would be limited to 120 years. So, you know, nobody was living over 200 years and definitely not to 600 years. Some studies do show that um meat consumption can correlate with shorter lifespans compared to vegetarian diets. However, if a vegetarian diet is only going to increase your lifespan by like five to seven years, it's not going to give you hundreds of years as was seen in lifespans prior to the flood. So that that that kind of goes, you know, away. That vegetarian aspect is well, it's not going to give you a significantly longer lifespan. But it's an interesting quote question regarding the plant world. So let's look at the plants that people were eating. Uh, one of the greatest challenges in maintaining a vegetarian diet in a healthful way is obtaining sufficient protein because plants generally do not contain protein in the same density as animal products. So protein is a big thing right now. Lots of people are focusing on getting enough protein. However, there is some evidence that certain ancient plant groups, okay, so we're talking about things like ferns, mosses, uh, and then a certain type of uh plant called a gymnosperm. These are things like ginkgo trees, which are a particularly ancient type of tree, um, they contain higher protein levels than many modern crops do. So modern crops, things like corn or wheat, uh, or you know, sweet potatoes, things like that. There's an element of protein, but not a very high level. So apparently the ancient forms of these plants actually that still exist today, so like ferns and mosses, they're still around today. We can test them and look at them, and they have higher levels of proteins. So it stands to reason that if these plants, which are the ferns and the mosses, um, were around before our modern plants developed, uh, and they were around before the flood, then it's possible that the extinct ancient plants may have contained significantly greater protein density than what we see today, which would make it more sustain sustainable as a diet for to have a vegetarian diet before the flood, uh, because the plants had more protein in them. Whereas after the flood, uh we have a uh that some of the plant life actually decreased in their protein, their nutrient density, and you know that because we don't know what became extinct as a plant when the flood happened. A lot of these these plants just stopped existing because of the flood, and they could have had high contents of protein. All we have is what was was left and what we can see now. Um, so it's interesting to think about that. Now, there are plenty of people who live very happily on a vegetarian diet and they focus on getting that protein that they need, and that works really well for them. So it's not like it's impossible, um, but it might have been easier before the flood to be a vegetarian. That's that's really what I'm coming down to saying. Um, so moving into verse four says, You must never eat any meat that still has the lifeblood in it. This is a very specific restriction. Uh so the lifeblood. God is literally saying you cannot consume blood. So again, before the flood, there's the God had to kill animals in order to or God showed them to kill animals to cover their sins with their skins, but it does not say that they were eating any part of these animals. They may have offered them as sacrifices. The Bible's very quiet about that, um, especially uh which kind of makes sense because they were offered as a sin offering uh to cover their sins, so it could make sense that they did burn them, but up until this point, all of that, all of the meat was either gotten rid of or dedicated to God. So they did not consume any of it. So God's giving them a very specific instruction here about blood. And the the the symbol of blood has enormous spiritual significance throughout all of scripture. Um, it's it's it from the very beginning to the very end. Blood carries a significant special symbol in the Word of God. Um, but I also believe that when God gives these laws, and as we get into some of the further laws, God's not only saying things to help people be set apart, his people be set apart, he's also saying things that are going to help them practically and and biologically. So there's things that God just knows about that we don't, and so he uses the law um to to protect his people, also at the same time give it spiritual significance, which I think is actually really amazing, uh, because there's certain laws that that come forth, uh, especially when we get into like Leviticus um and Deuteronomy, where it makes you kind of wonder, like, why aren't they allowed to eat shellfish? Well, shellfish were are highly can can carry a lot of toxins. And um that this is just something I happen to know about being a marine biologist, they can actually be very dangerous. Um, and and and God just was aware of that, and he was like, Well, just don't eat them, you know, you can't eat them. So that it's it's and then when Jesus came later, thousands of years later, he kind of lifted the law. He said, I fulfilled the law, and you can feel free, you know, to eat. And it's because probably th things had changed or um uh animal husbandry practices had improved and so waters were cleaner, and and so that was allowed to be lifted scientifically, but you know, the people didn't know that, but God knew that, and so God was able to to work those things together for him. Um so I hope you're kind of understanding what I'm saying. That when God gives us a law in our lives, it's not it's not to it is to show here's the right way, here's the wrong way. However, we focus too much on that because once we're told we can't do something, then that's what we want to do, right? But it's more, it's more because he actually protects us and he loves us and he cares about us and he knows if we do the the wrong way, it's going to hurt us. And so he just makes the right way the way that is going to be the best way for us. And it's the same thing here with the blood. No, do not consume the blood. Um, and it doesn't actually say anything spiritual about the blood in the verses here, it just says, do not eat it, right? So he's not even attaching any spiritual significance to the blood at this point, he's just saying don't eat it, because they needed to know what they could and they couldn't eat. So these laws, they set his people, they set God's people apart spiritually, um, but they formed his divine protection. So in Genesis 3.20, yeah. So we after humanity's, I'm sorry, I'm reading my notes and I'm I'm kind of got ahead of myself here. Um, so let's talk about blood and specifically why scientifically it's not a good idea to eat blood anyway, right? Uh, and this is cut just kind of apart from scripture. So blood does a lot of things in our life, it carries oxygen and nutrients to every cell of our body. Um, it's very it goes to every single cell of your body, which is why whenever you cut yourself, there's blood, it's right there. It it comes, there's no part of you that does not have blood in it. It also removes waste products and carbon dioxide. So if a person loses too much blood, death can occur very quickly. You can actually lose a large portion of the rest of you. Like you can even lose some of your brain matter, and you can still function. But if you lose too much bread, blood, you will die quickly. And that's because your life really is carried in the blood, and and so God's tying that together. And but blood can carry a lot of, I mean, this is a good thing, those are the good things that blood does for you. It carries the food and the oxygen, but it also takes away the toxins and the carbon dioxide. Um, but also blood, if you consume blood, certain things start to happen. So, and there are cultures, there's many cultures throughout history that have practiced drinking or cooking blood. Yet, medically speaking, blood actually carries significant risks. So uh it can transmit pathogens and diseases, things like hepatitis, bacterial infections, viral infections, parasites, foodborne illnesses. Uh, if you've really if you worked for any place, I think really there's I I can't think of a place that you would work that does not go through some kind of OSHA training. Um, that and you have a blood-borne pathogen training where you have to get the right personal protective equipment, uh, and and there's a certain protocol to follow when blood gets spilled or any uh human fluid, um, but specifically blood, there's there's a safe way to deal with it, and you got to glove up. You can't even like let it touch you. Never mind drink it, right? Or eat it. Um, but that's it's very, it's very, it can be very dangerous. And so um blood is also highly concentrated in iron, and an excessive amount of iron accumulation can actually damage the heart, the liver, the pancreas, the joints, and your endocrine system. So this is this, and it doesn't take a lot of blood to get you over your limit here. So, again, we see something very fascinating. God gives this command with a spiritual symbolism, but the command contains practical biological wisdom. So it serves multiple purposes, it protects the people, it also shows that they are a different people to the people around them, it sets them apart. So, whenever you know the the um Noah's sons and his family tend to grow into um multiple peoples, and then the people and the people um specifically the Hebrew people, as the they start to multiply and fill the earth, right? The Hebrew people continue to track with God, and they don't drink the blood, but the other people in the world do, and uh I know this because in different cultures there there are um recipes that have things like black sausage or bloody rice. I mean, um I'm referencing now like Scottish heritage has black sausage, which is literally blood-boiled sausage. Um, bloody rice is just like it says, it's it's blood on rice and it's kind of cooked together and it's a delicacy in Asian countries. So there's there's multiple facets of cultural blood consumption that takes place, but the Hebrews were set apart because they did not drink the blood. And so this is one way that they showed that they were a different people, just like we are supposed to be a different people from the people that we rub shoulders with if we are following God. So, and then we get to verse 5. So let's stop talking about blood because that's kind of I don't know, blood's a little bit gross to talk about for too long. Uh, it's interesting. This whole thing is very interesting, but blood can be, yeah, we can just move on. Um, so then verse five through seven is very interesting because here we see the first form of God setting up law and government, right? Up until this point, it was just kind of like not coaching, but it was don't do this, you know, uh do this, don't do this. But it wasn't, there weren't a whole lot of things that God told them. He said, Go be fruitful and multiply. Um, and then he said, Don't eat of this tree, right? And then he made them stay out of the garden after they ate of the tree. And um, and then he said, uh, I mean, he didn't even really talk about he, I mean, he talked about killing with Cain and Abel, um, like, like they should know that it was wrong to kill other humans. Um, but here he has to explicitly say, do not kill other humans, because apparently it just kept happening, which is why the world was full of violence. So, verse 5, I will require the blood of anyone who takes another person's life. If a wild animal kills a person, it must die. And anyone who murders a fellow human must die. If anyone takes a human life, that person's life will also be taken by human hands. For God made human beings in his own image now be fruitful and multiply and repopulate the earth. So this is the first form that we see of government. God begins defining what's lawful and unlawful bloodshed. So there are there are there is lawful bloodshed and there is unlawful blood bloodshed. The unlawful bloodshed takes place between humans to killing other humans because they are made in God's image. And you are cut you're essentially uh going against God when you kill another human. And the consequence for this is capital punishment, where that human actually has to be put to death. Lawful bloodshed, and it also um it talks about animals killing humans. So remember before the flood, animals did not kill humans, they didn't have that instinct. Well, now animals are going to be hungry for meat, and they might see humans as pretty opportunistic, and they might try to kill humans. So there's that healthy fear that God put in animals to be afraid of humans, which that kind of goes to explain this. Um, but also if an animal kills a human, that's unlawful, and that animal has to be put to death. And we see this go we see this go out when like bears get a little bit too friendly with humans, they have to be put down. Uh, I was actually reading an article recently about this bear who I think it was in New Hampshire. Yeah, it was in New Hampshire. A kind of a remote area. Um, but this it had been hanging around near a college in New Hampshire, and it had been there for like some 20 years. Uh, it had had a number of cubs, it was a female bear, but it was just getting a little bit too close to human activity, and so and I I didn't actually kill anybody, but it was just it was becoming a little bit too content in its area near this college, and so the game wardens that were there, they took this bear 120 miles up north into Canada, right? They just moved this bear uh and said that's probably far enough. Well, guess what? After about two weeks, the bear shows up again. It found its way back to its its territory, it's very territorial, and so now they had to euthanize the bear because it became dangerous. Um, and and but they they they tried everything they could to move this bear. So, yeah, the animals um are not allowed to kill the humans, but the lawful bloodshed does include humans killing the animals for food and clothing. So this is not unlawful, and that would kind of make sense because he literally just said you can go ahead and eat animals. Uh, so this is lawful bloodshed. So the relationship between mankind and the animal kingdom has fundamentally changed. Animals are no longer simply co-inhabitants of creation. Uh, predation now enters the world in a very sanctioned way. And so, and then verse 6 gives the reason why human life carries greater value than animal life is for in the image of God made he man. So human beings are distinct from animals because humanity bears the image of God. This is not just biologically, this is spiritually. We possess souls, we have moral accountability, we have spiritual consciousness, and we also have eternal significance. We we go somewhere after this earth. Um, there's a couple of places we could go, but we go, we don't just stop. Whereas animals just stop. Um, this distinction matters very deeply throughout all of scripture, and it matters in the scientific world too. Uh, we don't test animals, or well, we actually do test animals and hope that the same things that we do to animals affect us as humans. Um, I'm thinking about lab rats and and and um drug tests. The problem is that humans are not rats, and so while they do respond to things and we can somewhat apply that, a lot of times it doesn't work. Uh, and that's because we are different biologically. Um, so then in verse 8, God establishes his covenant with Noah. He promises that the earth will never again be destroyed by a flood, and the sign of that covenant is the rainbow. Um, and so you know, verses eight through thirteen, it says, I will never um destroy the earth again with a flood. I'm giving you a sign of my covenant with you and all living creatures for all generations to come. I've placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is the sign of my covenant with you and with all the earth. When and then he says, When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds. So there this is when um when we can't see, you know, outer space because of the clouds, the rainbow is there as a sign to us he's not gonna destroy the earth through flood. And then it also says, uh, and I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. And so he will see the rainbow and he'll remember too. Never again will the flood waters destroy all life. And again, God doesn't forget his promises. Uh, when it says remember, it just means he will continue in his covenant. Um I personally, yeah, so when when God uses these scientific elements of things, like rainbows, for example. Rainbows happen, rainbows happen all the time, they happen as a result of light shining through a prism. Now, thinking about this from the perspective of the people that are writing the word of God, they may not have understood what a prism was or how light refracts and uh shows different wavelengths of colors, like we do. So, what God is doing is he's taking something that he created, he did science, he made the science, and he's assigning a spiritual significance to it, right? So rainbows are a natural result of the sunlight interacting with water droplets. Water droplets come during rainstorms and during the clouds. So he's specifically assigning it to the clouds, and the rainbow is a product of that interaction with sunlight and clouds, and so God knew the rainbows were gonna be present um during rainstorms, and that's why he used the rainbow. And and I mean he can use a lot of other things, and he does use other things for spiritual significance in in the word for different meaning, but the rainbow is very appropriately applied here because it's gonna show up when it's gonna rain. So, were rainbows not around before the flood? I I really think they probably were. The pre-flood world, everything points to there being greater moisture in the in the pre-flood world, hence that tropical environment, um, which you requires just more humidity in the air, that's going to cause there to still be rainbows because you have all these prisms and sunlight. So rainbows existed before this moment, but now God is taking the rainbow and he's assigning this significance to it. He's changing the meaning, he's consecrating a natural phenomenon and giving it a covenant significance. And that's very important spiritually. Sometimes we separate science and faith as though they exist in opposition to one another, but like they almost can't be in the same room with each other. But the natural world was created by God. We can't forget that he made all this stuff. He made the laws of physics, he made biology, he made the interaction of water droplets and light to form a rainbow. He designed all of this. And so when he created the clouds in the sunlight, he already knew that he was going to someday use this rainbow as a covenant sign. When he designed blood to sustain life the way that he did, he already knew that blood would become the central symbol of sacrifice, atonement, and redemption through scripture. So God consistently uses this physical world to communicate spiritual truths. Creation itself becomes the language through which, a language, it's not the only language, but it's a language through which God reveals his purposes. Everything he creates has a present purpose, but often it also has a future purpose too. And Genesis 9 beautifully reminds us that the natural world and the spiritual world are not disconnected from each other, they are intertwined by the creator himself. So that's what I have for today. Um I'm really I'm really enjoying talking about this, and uh, and and I hope that you see that um this is just there's just so much richness to this and how God is is using the world that He created to speak to us. I mean, if you've ever hiked up to a mountaintop, or if you've gone to you know the beach and seen the crashing waves and just considered how big the ocean is, or looked at a pic a picture of the earth from space, um, or like a a nebula out in outer space, like there's just so much depth to this universe and to the what God's created here, and there's so much richness to it that it's really awe, it's awe-inspiring, and it's amazing. And you know, the a the old scientists, I'm talking like um 200 years ago, but even recent, uh, more modern scientists, but a lot of them will say it you can't look at nature and not see the beauty and significance of God in it. And uh that's absolutely true. I we God speaks to us spiritually, to our souls, but he also speaks to us physically and he protects us, he made us for this world. And uh, I just I'm really grateful to him for that, and I'm thankful that that that is the case. All right, until next.

SPEAKER_00 30:16

I hope today's show has enriched your walk with God. I know I'm always amazed at all of the new and interesting things that I find every time I open the Bible. Until next time, grow deep in God's word as you follow the light.