Genesis 9:1-17
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
Chapter 9
Covenant with Noah. 1 [a]God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them: Be fertile and multiply and fill the earth.(A) 2 [b]Fear and dread of you shall come upon all the animals of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon all the creatures that move about on the ground and all the fishes of the sea; into your power they are delivered. 3 (B)Any living creature that moves about shall be yours to eat; I give them all to you as I did the green plants. 4 (C)Only meat with its lifeblood still in it you shall not eat.[c] 5 Indeed for your own lifeblood I will demand an accounting: from every animal I will demand it, and from a human being, each one for the blood of another, I will demand an accounting for human life.(D)
6 [d]Anyone who sheds the blood of a human being,
by a human being shall that one’s blood be shed;
For in the image of God
have human beings been made.(E)
7 Be fertile, then, and multiply; abound on earth and subdue it.(F)
8 [e]God said to Noah and to his sons with him: 9 See, I am now establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you(G) 10 and with every living creature that was with you: the birds, the tame animals, and all the wild animals that were with you—all that came out of the ark. 11 I will establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all creatures be destroyed by the waters of a flood; there shall not be another flood to devastate the earth.(H) 12 God said: This is the sign of the covenant that I am making between me and you and every living creature with you for all ages to come: 13 (I)I set my bow in the clouds to serve as a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 When I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow appears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and every living creature—every mortal being—so that the waters will never again become a flood to destroy every mortal being.(J) 16 When the bow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature—every mortal being that is on earth. 17 God told Noah: This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and every mortal being that is on earth.
Read full chapterFootnotes
- 9:1 God reaffirms without change the original blessing and mandate of 1:28. In the Mesopotamian epic Atrahasis, on which the Genesis story is partly modeled, the gods changed their original plan by restricting human population through such means as childhood diseases, birth demons, and mandating celibacy among certain groups of women.
- 9:2–3 Pre-flood creatures, including human beings, are depicted as vegetarians (1:29–30). In view of the human propensity to violence, God changes the original prohibition against eating meat.
- 9:4 Because a living being dies when it loses most of its blood, the ancients regarded blood as the seat of life, and therefore as sacred. Jewish tradition considered the prohibition against eating meat with blood to be binding on all, because it was given by God to Noah, the new ancestor of all humankind; therefore the early Christian Church retained it for a time (Acts 15:20, 29).
- 9:6 The image of God, given to the first man and woman and transmitted to every human being, is the reason that no violent attacks can be made upon human beings. That image is the basis of the dignity of every individual who, in some sense, “represents” God in the world.
- 9:8–17 God makes a covenant with Noah and his descendants and, remarkably, with all the animals who come out of the ark: never again shall the world be destroyed by flood. The sign of this solemn promise is the appearance of a rainbow.
Scripture texts, prefaces, introductions, footnotes and cross references used in this work are taken from the New American Bible, revised edition © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc., Washington, DC All Rights Reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.