אֶ֫רֶץ

For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and the waters rose and lifted the ark high above the earth.

So the waters continued to surge and rise greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the waters.

Finally, the waters completely prevailed upon the earth, so that all the high mountains under all the heavens were covered.

And every living thing that moved upon the earth perished—birds, livestock, animals, every creature that swarms upon the earth, and all mankind.

And every living thing on the face of the earth was destroyed—man and livestock, crawling creatures and birds of the air; they were blotted out from the earth, and only Noah and those with him in the ark remained.

And the waters prevailed upon the earth for 150 days.

But God remembered Noah and all the animals and livestock that were with him in the ark. And God sent a wind over the earth, and the waters began to subside.

The waters receded steadily from the earth, and after 150 days the waters had gone down.

…and sent out a raven. It kept flying back and forth until the waters had dried up from the earth.

But the dove found no place to rest her foot, and she returned to him in the ark, because the waters were still covering the surface of all the earth. So he reached out his hand and brought her back inside the ark.

And behold, the dove returned to him in the evening with a freshly plucked olive leaf in her beak. So Noah knew that the waters had receded from the earth.

In Noah’s six hundred and first year, on the first day of the first month, the waters had dried up from the earth. So Noah removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry.

By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was fully dry.

Bring out all the living creatures that are with you—birds, livestock, and everything that crawls upon the ground—so that they can spread out over the earth and be fruitful and multiply upon it.”

Every living creature, every creeping thing, and every bird—everything that moves upon the earth—came out of the ark, kind by kind.

As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall never cease.”

And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

The fear and dread of you will fall on every living creature on the earth, every bird of the air, every creature that crawls on the ground, and all the fish of the sea. They are delivered into your hand.

But as for you, be fruitful and multiply; spread out across the earth and multiply upon it.”

…and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth—every living thing that came out of the ark.

And I establish My covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

I have set My rainbow in the clouds, and it will be a sign of the covenant between Me and the earth.

Whenever I form clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds,

And whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of every kind that is on the earth.”

So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between Me and every creature on the earth.”

These three were the sons of Noah, and from them the whole earth was populated.

From these, the maritime peoples separated into their territories, according to their languages, by clans within their nations.

Cush was the father of Nimrod, who began to be a mighty one on the earth.

His kingdom began in Babylon, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.

From that land he went forth into Assyria, where he built Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah,

These are the sons of Ham according to their clans, languages, lands, and nations.

Two sons were born to Eber: One was named Peleg, because in his days the earth was divided, and his brother was named Joktan.

These are the sons of Shem, according to their clans, languages, lands, and nations.

All these are the clans of Noah’s sons, according to their generations and nations. From these the nations of the earth spread out after the flood.

Now the whole world had one language and a common form of speech.

And as people journeyed eastward, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.

“Come,” they said, “let us build for ourselves a city with a tower that reaches to the heavens, that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of all the earth.”

So the LORD scattered them from there over the face of all the earth, and they stopped building the city.

That is why it is called Babel, for there the LORD confused the language of the whole world, and from that place the LORD scattered them over the face of all the earth.

During his father Terah’s lifetime, Haran died in his native land, in Ur of the Chaldeans.

And Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai the wife of Abram, and they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans for the land of Canaan. But when they arrived in Haran, they settled there.

Then the LORD said to Abram, “Leave your country, your kindred, and your father’s household, and go to the land I will show you.

And Abram took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, and all the possessions and people they had acquired in Haran, and set out for the land of Canaan. When they came to the land of Canaan,