Noah, A Global Flood, And The Case Against Racism

Feedback: Noah, A Global Flood, And The Case Against Racism

Bodie Hodge and Dr. Tommy Mitchell

Biblical Authority Ministries, March 10, 2026 (Donate) 

[Editor’s note: Here is an old feedback article I co-authored with a dear friend who I miss, who passed into glory years ago; all verses NKJV] 

Letter unedited: 

The Bible does not say that all races came from Noah and his three sons. Noah was white, he was perfect in his generation, he was a direct descendant of Adam. In Hebrew Adam literally means white man blood in the face red. Adam is the father of the white race, no other. Noah's flood was local. If everybody came from Noah than why did God condemn interracial relations and marriage. It shouldn't make a difference. Ask a doctor if you can receive a blood transfusion from a black man. He will say no because the blood types are not related. You could get very sick and die. All the races made it through the flood. This is an archeological, anthropological, and historical fact. Noah was a white man, and his sons were white. They cannot produce black children, asian children, or children of any other race.

T.G., U.S.A 

Response:

Thank you for contacting the ministry. We often receive correspondence such as this, and we are taking the opportunity to respond to this one in kindness to help correct the false theology in this letter.

The Bible does not say that all races came from Noah and his three sons.

There are two things wrong right off the start. First, the Bible doesn’t lump people into multiple “races.”

Second, the Bible does teach that people throughout the entire earth are descendants of Noah.

Now the sons of Noah who went out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And Ham was the father of Canaan. These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was populated (Genesis 9:18-19).

The Bible indicates that all people came through Noah and his sons since all other humans and land animals died in the Flood (Genesis 7:21-23). But let’s back up even further. On the sixth day of creation, God made the land animals and man. Thus, Adam and the Woman were made on that day. Genesis 3:20 says,

“And Adam called his wife Eve; because she was mother of all the living.”

Adam and Eve were likely middle brown in skin tone; Image requested by Bodie Hodge (ChatGPT)

Note that Scripture indicates that Eve was mother of all, not some, of the living. Obviously, this is referring to humans; otherwise, other so-called races of humans weren’t living! Therefore, all humans trace their ancestry back to these two people, Adam and Eve.

Different people groups developed after the Flood from the descendants of Noah. After the Flood, all people spoke the same language. Genesis 11 explains that God confused their languages at the Tower of Babel to force them to scatter over the earth. This scattering isolated portions of the human gene pool geographically.

The physical characteristics of various ethnic groups developed in these isolated groups due to the sorting and isolation of genetic information already present in man’s DNA. The information in that DNA had originally been present in Adam’s DNA and has just been shuffled and sorted. Therefore, the development of so-called races has nothing to do with molecules-to-man evolution. All people groups are still humans, descended from one original human. The book of Acts confirms that humans are all related:

"And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings (Acts 17:26).

All men are related and of “one blood” through Noah and, ultimately, Adam and Eve. Even secular scientists are finally realizing that all the so called “races” are, indeed, one blood.[1]

Noah was white,

The Bible does not say that Noah was “white”. In fact no one is “white”, we are all brownish in tone—some more some less. The Bible never describes Noah’s physical appearance. He could have just as easily had a variety of features. To make such a dogmatic claim without a Scriptural basis would imply that you are omnipresent and omniscient.

National Geographic lined up a bunch of girls to show that skin tone was largely based on a brownish pigment called melanin; Adam and Eve were likely in the middle; Credit: National Geographic's "Skin Information and Facts"

he was perfect in his generation, he was a direct descendant of Adam.

Everyone, including Noah, was a direct descendent of Adam, but that didn’t make them perfect in their generation. Everyone, including Noah and Adam, was a sinner. Noah was called perfect in his generations because he found grace in the eyes of the Lord (Genesis 6:8-9). Hebrews 11:7 explains that Noah’s righteousness was by faith. In other words, like all people in his generation, Noah was a sinner.

But unlike the other people, Noah trusted in God’s forgiving grace. As a result, as Genesis 6:9 says, Noah walked with God. Noah was even a preacher of righteousness (2 Peter 2:5). Noah escaped death in the worldwide Flood because of his faith in God’s grace, not because he was a white man, directly descended from Adam.

In Hebrew Adam literally means white man blood in the face red.

Strong’s Concordance says that Adam’s name in Hebrew means “to show blood in the face, red, ruddy, rosy, a human being.” This Hebrew word has nothing to do with being white.

According to the Bible, the life of the flesh is in the blood. When God breathed life into Adam, Adam became a living soul. Perhaps the association of life with blood explains God’s name for Adam. Some have tried to make the assertion that Adam was red-skinned or red haired, but there is no reason to think his name referred to these features over the red life-blood. God’s name for the first man implied nothing about white skin.

Adam is the father of the white race, no other.

What do you mean by “white”? Irish? Russians? The claim that Adam was “white” is pure conjecture and totally unsupportable. Nothing in Scripture suggests that Adam was “white” or that Adam was the father of only “white” people.

Adam and Eve, and later Noah and his wife, probably had skin tones closer to middle brown. Adam’s DNA had to contain information for a wide variety of skin tones. Only in this way could human DNA possess the genetic variability to produce the many skin tones we now see. Shuffling and sorting of this genetic information produces a variety of skin tones.

Potential style of Babel; Image requested by Bodie Hodge (ChatGPT)

After the scattering of people from the Tower of Babel, genetic information was sorted and isolated into many geographic areas. Certain groups lost the ability to produce children of other skin shades because the genetic information for those skin shades was not present in their population group.

Noah's flood was local.

Noah’s flood was global, not local. But don’t take our word for it; let's see what the Bible has to say.

The waters prevailed and greatly increased on the earth, and the ark moved about on the surface of the waters. And the waters prevailed exceedingly on the earth, and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward, and the mountains were covered (Genesis 7:18-20).

Image from Presentation Library

Additionally, there are many problems with the claim that Noah’s Flood was local. For instance:

1. Why did God tell Noah to build an Ark? If the Flood had been only local, Noah and his family could have just moved to higher ground or over the mountain to avoid the flood waters.
2. The wicked people that the Flood was intended to destroy could have escaped God’s judgment in the same manner.
3. Why take all the birds on the Ark when they could have flown over the hill!
4. If the Flood were local, then God would be a liar, for God promised in Genesis 9:11 never to send a Flood to destroy the earth again. Yet the world has seen many local floods.

Over the years, we have found that there are primarily two groups of people who promote a local flood for Noah’s day:

1. Those who believe that the geologic layers represent millions of years instead of a global Flood.
2. Those that are “racist” and insist that people of a particular shade of skin are not Adam and Noah’s kin, and survived outside the Ark.

Why take such preconceived beliefs to the Bible to try to twist Genesis 6-9? I want to encourage readers to read these passages and then ask: how, biblically, can people get a local flood out of these chapters? The Bible should be starting point, not an afterthought for our theology.

If everybody came from Noah than why did God condemn interracial relations and marriage. It shouldn't make a difference.

Where did God condemn “interracial” marriage? He doesn’t. God doesn’t lump people into multiple “races” anyway. The concept of “races” is a man-made idea.

Since there is only one race of humans, “interracial relations” makes no difference from a biological point of view.[2] However, from a spiritual point of view, marriages make a huge difference. God told the children of Israel not to intermarry with people from other cultures who were not godly (Deuteronomy 7:3–4). These were pagan cultures with their own customs and their own gods and would lead people astray. God knew that intermarrying with these people would soon lead them away from the worship of the one true God.

One only need look to the life of Solomon, who far exceeded others in wisdom (1 Kings 4:29-32), to see the effect that taking strange wives had on his life and his descendants. To maintain Israel as a peculiar people, God wanted separation from pagan cultures, but not by “racial” division. After all, Rahab (Canaanite) and Ruth (Moabite), who were not Israelites, were incorporated when they changed to serve the true God.

In the Bible, there is only one type of marriage that is forbidden. That is a marriage between a saved and an unsaved person:

Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? (2 Corinthians 6:14).

Again, this mimicked the command to the Israelites to not marry people who are not seeking after God and would lead both the person and their children astray.

Ask a doctor if you can receive a blood transfusion from a black man. He will say no because the blood types are not related. You could get very sick and die.

I (Dr. Tommy Mitchell, a medical internist) don’t have to ask a doctor. I am a doctor. What you state is absolutely incorrect. Blood is not typed on the basis of race. It is typed on the basis of antigens found on the red blood cells. It is ultimately more complicated than this. This is the basis for the ABO blood grouping and the Rh antigen typing classifications. When one needs a blood transfusion, the donor blood is checked for these various antigens to determine if it is compatible with the recipient’s immune system.

A transfusion of improperly matched blood can lead to a serious reaction (and sometimes even death) to the person receiving the blood. However, this has absolutely nothing to do with “race.” In fact, it is common in transplant medicine to find the closest tissue match from someone from another “race” as was the case in Blood brothers.

All the races made it through the flood. This is an archeological, anthropological, and historical fact. Noah was a white man, and his sons were white.

I agree that all the “races”, if such a term could even be used, made it through the Flood, but not at the sake of forsaking Genesis 6-9 as a local Flood. The authors’ term here would be “people groups”, not “races” anyway. All people groups are the descendants of Noah and his family. These eight people ultimately gave rise to all people groups on earth. Thus, we would agree that it is an anthropological and historical fact.

But we will go one step further. Archaeologically and anthropologically, most of the people in Africa are descendants of Cush, Mizraim, and Phut, three of Noah’s great grandsons. Mizraim is still the Hebrew name for Egypt. Parts of modern day Libya and Morocco is the land of Phut and was Libya was renamed for one of Mizraim’s sons named Lybyos (Lehabites). Ethiopians still calls themselves Cushites today! The indigenous African continent is primarily inhabited by people who go back to Noah’s son Ham outside some places on Mediterranean coast. This has rarely been disputed in history, and even Josephus, writing nearly 2000 years ago confirms this.[3] In fact, Noah’s descendants’ names can be found in many parts of the world, if one takes the time to look. The following chart shows a few:

	Early Descendant of Noah	What is it?[4]
Aramaic	Aram	This language came out of Babel and still survives, likely with changes down the ages. Some short parts of the Bible are written in Aramaic. Jesus spoke it on the cross when He said: “ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?” (Mark 15:34)
Cush	Cush	Ancient name of Ethiopia. In fact, people of Ethiopia still call themselves Cushites.
Medes	Madai	People group often associated with the Persians
Ashkenaz	Ashkenaz	This is still the Hebrew name for Germany
Galacia, Gaul, and Galicia	Gomer	These regions are the old names for an area in modern Turkey, France, and Northwestern Spain respectively, where Gomer was said to have lived. His family lines continued to spread about across southern Europe. The book of Galatians by Paul was written to the church at Galatia.
Gomeraeg	Gomer	This is the old name for the Welsh language on the British Isles from their ancestor, Gomer, whose ancestors began to populate the Isle from the mainland.
Javan	Javan	This is still the Hebrew name for Greece. His sons, Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim (Chittim), and Dodanim still have reference to places in Greece. For example, Paul, the author who penned much of the New Testament, was from the region of Tarshish (Acts 21:39) and a city called Tarsus. Jeremiah mentions Kittim in Jeremiah 2:10 and is modern day Cyprus (and other nearby ancient regions that now have varied names such as Cethim, Citius, Cethima Cilicia). The Greeks worshiped Jupiter Dodanaeus from Japheth/Dodanim. The Elysians, were ancient Greek people.
Meshech/ Moscow	Mechech	Mechech is the old name for Moscow, Russia, and one region called the Mechech Lowland still holds the original name today as does a state park.
Canaan	Canaan	The region of Palestine that God removed from the Canaanites for their sin and gave as an inheritance to the Israelites beginning with the conquest of Joshua. It is often termed the Holy Land and is where modern-day Israel resides.
Elamites	Elam	This was the old name for the Persians prior to Cyrus.
Assyria	Asshur	Asshur is still the Hebrew name for Assyria.
Hebrew	Eber	This people group and language was named for Eber. Abraham was a Hebrew, and the bulk of the Old Testament is written in Hebrew.
Libya	Lybyos	Mizraim’s son and modern-day Libya, the same region is also known as the land of Phut, one of Noah’s grandsons
Taurus/Toros	Tarshish	A mountain range in Turkey
Tanais	Tarshish	The old name of the Don River flowing into the Black Sea.
Mizraim	Mizraim	This is still the Hebrew name for Egypt.

 

They cannot produce black children, asian children, or children of any other race.

Since the sorting of genetic material that has occurred after the Tower of Babel, many darker skinned peoples have lost the ability to have light skinned children. By the same token, many light skinned peoples have lost the variability needed to produce darker-skinned offspring.[5]

Perhaps you did not know what the Bible teaches, or perhaps you have been taught these beliefs and didn’t test them against the Scriptures. I pray that you would consider what is written here in response and be like the Bereans who “searched the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so” (Acts 17:11).

In kindness with Christ,

Dr. Tommy Mitchell and Bodie Hodge

Originally at Answers in Genesis; Edited; Republished by permission. 

---

[1] “Dr. Venter (head of the Celera Genomics Corporation, Rockville, MD) and scientists at the National Institutes of Health recently announced that they had put together a draft of the entire sequence of the human genome, and the researchers had unanimously declared, there is only one race-the human race.” (Natalie Angier, Do races differ? Not Really, DNA shows, New York Times, Aug. 22, 2000.)

[2] In Leviticus 18, God forbade marriage between close relations. He knew, as one reason, that at that point due to mutations in the gene pool, the risk of birth defects would be greatly increased. Even though we all still marry a relative (as we all are related as descendants of Adam and Eve), a union between more distantly related people would be less likely to produce problems in offspring. This instruction from God has nothing to do with race.

[3] Josephus, The Antiquity of the Jews, 1st Century A.D. in: William Whiston, The Works of Josephus Complete and Unabridged, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, MA, 1987, pp. 36-37.

[4] Josephus, The Antiquity of the Jews, 1st Century A.D. in: William Whiston, The Works of Josephus Complete and Unabridged, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, MA, 1987, pp. 36-37; Bill Cooper, After the Flood, New Wine Press, 1995, pp. 170-208; Harold Hunt with Russell Grigg, The sixteen grandsons of Noah, Creation 20(4), September 1998, pages 22-25; there are many other references to these as well ,but this should suffice to get you started including James Anderson’s Royal Genealogies. 

[5] This is assuming they marry within their own ethnic/people group and little genetic material that had been lost is reintroduced into the gene pool. 

Living 900 Years Old…Really?

Living 900 Years Old…Really?

Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI

Biblical Authority Ministries, August 22, 2025 (Donate)

I looked at this subject a number of times in the past and I’m going to pool together some of that information here under one article.

When we look at the ages of the patriarchs, like Adam who lived 930 years or Noah who lived 950 years, we tend to look with our “eyebrow raised”. Did people really live this long? Today, hitting 80 is an accomplishment—and that is above the average!

Exhibit of an aged Methuselah in the Creation Museum; Photo by Bodie Hodge

So, was this even feasible? In our secularized culture, they teach that we evolved from animals whose lifespans were quite short. In light of this, it is assumed in our distant past, man also had short life spans. So, when non-Christians see the biblical data that reaches to 900+ years old, many think these ages were quite fanciful and false. But was it?

God said they lived this long. That should settle the issue. Nevertheless, let’s dive into this subject in more detail.

Ages Dropping Off

Let’s start by considering something else right up front—a God of life created man in a perfect world where they should never have died if they hadn’t sinned! I sometimes think we are asking the wrong question—it should be why did they live such short lives of only 900 years or so, and why do our lives tread even shorter?

Man was designed to live forever, but sin destroyed that perfection and death now reigned as of the third chapter in the Bible. From Adam to Noah, people lived around 900 years old—with the exception of Enoch who was taken to heaven without death (translated) at 325.

	Patriarch	Age	Bible reference
1	Adam	930	Genesis 5:4
2	Seth	912	Genesis 5:8
3	Enosh	905	Genesis 5:11
4	Cainan	910	Genesis 5:14
5	Mahalalel	895	Genesis 5:17
6	Jared	962	Genesis 5:20
7	Enoch	365 (translated)	Genesis 5:23
8	Methuselah	969	Genesis 5:27
9	Lamech	777	Genesis 5:31
10	Noah	950	Genesis 9:29
11	Shem	600	Genesis 11:10–11
12	Arphaxad	438	Genesis 11:12–13
13	Shelah	433	Genesis 11:14–15
14	Eber	464	Genesis 11:16–17
15	Peleg	239	Genesis 11:18–19
16	Reu	239	Genesis 11:20–21
17	Serug	230	Genesis 11:22–23
18	Nahor	148	Genesis 11:24–25
19	Terah	205	Genesis 11:32
20	Abram (Abraham)	175	Genesis 25:7
21	Isaac	180	Genesis 35:28–29
22	Jacob (Israel)	147	Genesis 47:28
23	Joseph	110	Genesis 50:22, 26

Table 1. Ages of the Patriarchs from Adam to Joseph

Noah’s father Lamech died at 777—he was a young pup compared to the other patriarchs. In fact, Lamech’s father was almost 200 years older than him when he died. After Noah, the ages dipped down through Shem’s line. Since all are descendants Noah’s three sons, and none live to 900 today, then all three lines dropped off in great ages.

Although we are given Shem’s line, it is possible that Ham’s and Japheth’s line could have been slower or faster in their decline. For instance, Japheth or Ham could still have lived 800-900 years old and then the ages drop off. We simply don’t know. We just know that Shem lived to a mere 600 years old, though he surely expected to live about the ages of his father, grandfather and great grandfather.

The ages did drop off over the next millennium or more. Over the years, several people have proposed ideas as to why this happened. 

 

Diet

For example, some thought it had something to do with diet. People were first permitted to eat meat after the Flood (Genesis 9:3) so some thought the original vegetarian diet (Genesis 1:29) would help them live to such great ages. Some have further pointed toward Daniel and his request of a temporary vegetarian diet (Daniel 1:8-16) so that he didn’t have to eat the king’s food that was sacrificed to false gods.

However, vegetarian diets never allowed people to live to such ages as 900 years even today. In fact, vegetarians do not attain a life span much different than those who retain meat in the diet.

Increased Oxygen

Some proposed that increased oxygen prior to the Flood (and changed significantly due to the Flood) would allow the body to better heal, and eliminate disease and thus, reach such ages. And although there are some benefits to temporary increased oxygen in some cases (e.g. hyperbaric medicine), in other cases it is detrimental to your health (e.g., birth defects such as blindness in children due to supplemental oxygen, oxygen toxicity, swelling of lenses in the eye causing blurred vision, etc.). 

Increased oxygen can cause a host of other problems because oxygen is extremely reactive causing oxidation where your body doesn’t want it. People often eat foods that are high in antioxidants to reduce these extra “free radicals” of oxygen. Regardless, the simple fact is that such experiments have not permitted people to live to ages remotely close to 900 years.

Environmental Changes

It is true that the world changed significantly due to the Flood. Vegetation, as well as land and sea life, were drastically reduced and made to virtually “start all over again”. But did this cause aging to significantly drop off?

Noah, who was already 600 years old, stepped off the Ark into this new world as well. If the environment was the cause massive reduced aging, why did Noah live 350 more years?  The new environment didn’t seem to touch him!

Model of Noah in the Creation Museum; Photo by Bodie Hodge

Noah was the third longest living person recoded in the Bible (after Methuselah and Jared)! If the environmental effects were the cause, then this does not make sense, unless these environmental effects were more gradual. Though, this is not to say environmental changes did not do something, but its effects were not the primary cause of ages dropping about 9 times.

Some have suggested that carbon 14 was greater in the post-Flood world and that might have a detrimental effect on aging.[1] Again, Noah was subject to this, yet lived 950 years old, 350 of those years post-Flood.

Genetics

Genetics were likely the prime culprit. Dr. David Menton and Dr. Georgia Purdom look specifically at genetics and resulting functions of anatomical features with regards to aging.[2]

We need to keep in mind that there were two major genetic bottlenecks:

1.         At the Flood

2.         At the Tower of Babel

Flood Bottleneck

Genetic bottlenecks cause a significant loss of access to other people’s versions of genes (called alleles) that are essentially lost. The obvious loss of pre-Flood people reduced the alleles in the gene pool in humanity to only 8 people, but really only 6.

Scripture reveals that Noah and his wife had no more sons after the Flood (Genesis 10). Thus, this leaves Shem, Ham, and Japheth and their wives, and, of course, these three men each inherited their genes from the same two parents.

So, early generations after the Flood, like early generations after the Garden of Eden, saw marriages between people who were close relatives. Of course, such close intermarriage was not forbidden until the time of Moses. Regardless, this bottleneck saw the loss of a great many alleles from the gene pool of those who died in the Flood.

Tower Bottleneck

If you look at the ages of people born after the Flood, the ages do a sudden drop but are stabilized at about 445 years or so:

1          Arphaxad        438      Genesis 11:12–13

2          Shelah             433      Genesis 11:14–15

3          Eber                464      Genesis 11:16–17

The ages seem to drop in half, where Shem, who was born prior to Flood, lived to 600. After the Tower, ages suddenly drop from about 450 to about 235 or so for three generations:

1          Peleg   239      Genesis 11:18–19

2          Reu      239      Genesis 11:20–21

3          Serug   230      Genesis 11:22–23

Even 2 generations after this Terah lived to 205.  But these ages trickle down from here.

The Flood and the Tower bottlenecks did something significant to cause ages to suddenly drop. In both cases, there is a loss or splitting up of the gene pool. Consider also how mutations can affect age with an extreme example: One tiny flaw, and 50 years lost!

With these bottlenecks, a host of alleles will be filtered out and lost. Consequently, immune systems may not be as good, or a host of other functions, resulting in more infectious disease and so on.

Shem An Intriguing Clue

Another interesting clue comes from Shem. The bottleneck at the Flood would not have affected Noah as his genetics were not bound by that event. And he lived 350 years after the Flood and died at 950 years.

Again, Ham and Japheth’s ages are not recorded in Scripture. But Shem was 600 years. Either bottleneck, the Flood or the Tower would not have affected Shem’s genetic longevity, in the same way it didn’t affect Noah, which was prior to the Flood as well.

And yet, his age was significantly dropped off too, by 300 to 350 years. The Bible does not record the cause of death, so it is possible that something caused a premature death. However, it likely just the age of Shem in his old age. And this is a clue that there may have been a genetic problem that passed through Noah to Shem (and perhaps Ham and Japheth too) to trigger a drop in ages.

Consider Lamech again. Noah’s father, only lived to 777. In the reality of his day, he was young when he died!  Methuselah, Lamech’s father, lived nearly 200 years longer than Lamech! So, is it possible that there was a genetic mistake hidden within Lamech that occurred between Methuselah and his son Lamech?

If this defective gene was passed to Noah from Lamech, and yet masked by a good gene from Noah’s mother, it may not affect him and hence, he still lives to a ripe old age of 950 years. But Noah could still pass this defective along to his sons, such as Shem, who lived to 600 years. But why couldn’t this have been masked by a good gene from Noah’s mother…unless she too had a defective gene?

The Bible reveals that Noah was the only one righteous among his generations (Genesis 6:8-9). Yet he failed to have been fruitful and multiply until he was 500 years old (Genesis 1:28; Genesis 5:32); which may signify that Noah had to wait for a long time to find a godly wife (as opposed to intentionally ignoring God’s command).

Perhaps like Isaac, he went back to common relation to find a wife who was godly as opposed to finding a wife among the ungodly (Genesis 24:37-38). Methuselah and Lamech (Noah grandfather and Lamech’s father), who were trained by Enoch, who walked with God as well and was translated without death to heaven (Genesis 5:24), seems to be strongest candidates whose families could offer a godly wife. But with this, the same defective gene could be in her genes as well if it also passed to Lamech.

After the Flood in Genesis 9 [prior to the assembly at Babel while Noah and his descendants were still living in tents west from Shinar], righteous Noah became rather drunk, so drunk in fact, that he lay naked in his tent and failed to recognize that his son Ham had gazed into the tent and observed him and then proceed to spread the raunchy words about his father (Genesis 9:21-22).

It was Shem and Japheth’s responsibility to walk in backwards, not looking at their father’s nakedness, and lay a covering over him (Genesis 9:23). Did you ever stop and ask, why was it their responsibility to cover Noah? Where was Noah’s wife? And why would Noah get so drunk in the first place?

Could it have simply been that she had already died…perhaps even recently to warrant Noah’s act of getting drunk? According to Archbishop Ussher, the events at Babel occurred about 106 years after the Flood (according to the Bible about 3-4 generations had been born, so this is in the ballpark but may be off a little.) This means that this event occurred in less than this time, which is enough for Canaan to be born (Ham’s youngest) and cursed by Noah when he awoke.

If this were the case, then Noah and Mrs. Noah could have had defective genes that were passed to their sons and this could explain why Shem only lived to 600 years, Noah’s wife is missing in Genesis 9, and why ages began dropping.

Further, this explains one aspect of how this could have coupled in subsequent generations to drop the ages even further.

Common Denominator Of All People Today

All people today go back to Noah and his wife (Mrs. Noah). So, something with reduced aging has to come through them. Consider the name of Noah and the prophecy associated with it:

And he called his name Noah, saying, "This one will comfort us concerning our work and the toil of our hands, because of the ground which the LORD has cursed." (Genesis 5:29)

Noah’s name literally means “rest”. This is obviously looking back to Genesis 3:17-19, where the “ground was cursed” due to sin, “by the sweat of your brow” and “through painful toil will you work” the ground.

How can we have rest or comfort in this? It is by either better ways to doing the work…or not doing it as long. Commentators have long stated many ideas on this such as Noah comforting us in being a type of Christ with the Ark. Others have pointed out that this relates to the post-Flood statement by God that He would no longer curse the ground with new curses due to man’s sake, among other comments too.

Some have said that this was the advent of farming, however, Adam worked the ground (Genesis 3:23) and so did Cain (Genesis 4:2-3). So, this may not be the best interpretation. Consider:

Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, "Write: ‘Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.’" "Yes," says the Spirit, "that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them." (Revelation 14:13)

This verse gives support to the idea that rest or comfort from work and labor, means that you have died and now rest in the Lord. Let’s face it, the people after Noah did not work for 900 years, but far less than that by the sheer fact that they did not live that long.

Could Genesis 5:29 mean that through Noah people would not live as long and therefore have rest concerning their work and toil? It is possible. I’m sure an entire book could be written on the subject.

Conclusion

There are goo logical reasons, starting with God’s Word, that the ages of the patriarchs are indeed really old. But the real question remains—why do they die so early? Instead of living 5,000 years old, why so young at 900?

We are in a sin-cursed and broken world where death reigns due to man’s sin. God forbid man from reaching out and taking form the Tree of Life and living forever in a sin-broken world. He even put Cherubim with flaming swords to block that path.

Man would eventually die (surely die) just as God said due to our sin. But the fact remains, that God solved the sin-death problem with His Son, Christ Jesus.

When Jesus died on the cross, God’s wrath was satisfied to punish Him instead of us. Christ, being God Himself, could endure that punishment and walk out of the grave, since He is the God of life.

In heaven, 900 years is but a blink of the eye. For in heaven, those who repent and trust in Jesus Christ, and His death, burial and resurrection, will live forever in perfection again with God and all His eternal blessings. We will, never die but have eternal life.

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Bodie Hodge, Ken Ham's son in law, has been an apologist since 1998 helping out in various churches and running an apologetics website. He spent 21 years working at Answers in Genesis as a speaker, writer, and researcher as well as a founding news anchor for Answers News. He was also head of the Oversight Council. 

Bodie launched Biblical Authority Ministries in 2015 as a personal website and it was organized officially in 2025 as a 501(c)(3). He has spoken on multiple continents and hosts of US states in churches, colleges, and universities. He is married with four children.

Portions originally at Answers in Genesis; Edited; Republished by permission.

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[1] Raul Lopez, Jr., Radiocarbon and the Longevity of Prediluvian Patriarchs, CRSQ, Vol. 62, Number 1, Summer 2025, p. 32-52.

[2] David Menton and Georgia Purdom, The New Answers Book Volume 2, Ken Ham and Bodie Hodge, gen. eds., Master Books, Green Forest, AR, 2009.