Did God really warn mankind before the Flood of Noah? (page 2)

moshe

This is good rationalization for JW's to believe the entire world of people is wicked , except JW's . This keeps JW's from looking outside their KH. I often wondered why so many worldly people seemed "nicer" than the friends at the KH. Of course, it's unreasonable to believe that the whole world except Noah was wicked. So much of the Christianities foundation is built upon two stories, Eden and the Flood. Try and find a Jew who doesn't wear a black hat who believes these stories to be literal ones.

jwfacts

I have seen statistics that estimate the population in Noahs day was 1 billion people. This is based on Bible records, which show 2000 years since Adam, with people living to several hundred years old, and having large families. There is no way that Noah could have reached even a fraction of these people, regardless of where they lived.

logic

Noah might have been a preacher of rightiousness, but he wasn't given the job to preach to the people, he was only told to build a boat. Jesus told the apostles to go and preach the good news to all the earth, but they went with the holy spirit. They performed miracles, and they did cover the earth that the bible deals with, not the entire world. The society takes all this information out of context and applies it to themselves today.

fresia

I've been told by my pioneer gilead graduate uncle that Noah didn't have to do any preaching work. He says Jehovah "saw that the whole earth was wicked except for him" so there was no necessity to preach.

Sick, twisted reasoning.

Yes well Noah did preach the coming deluge, those that wanted to repent could have, besides Noah preached the end of that world of that time, and Jehovah always gives warning before he acts. So Noah did preach and warned of the flood, but they all scoffed and laughed at him, then the flood came the door to the ark of salvation was closed and it was to late.

Jesus said..just like the days of Noah they took no note, and they died. (Mat 24:37-39)

Either you believe what the bible says or you don't.

Switch

Fresia, you've been relying on the WT too much. The scriptures say that God decided to destroy all mankind except Noah. Read Gen. 6:

5

Consequently Jehovah saw that the badness of man was abundant in the earth and every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only bad all the time. 6 And Jehovah felt regrets that he had made men in the earth, and he felt hurt at his heart. 7 So Jehovah said: "I am going to wipe men whom I have created off the surface of the ground, from man to domestic animal, to moving animal and to flying creature of the heavens, because I do regret that I have made them." 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of Jehovah.

According to the account, God had already decided to destroy everyone and only made provision for Noah and his family.

I've only just recently learned that other translations of Matt. 24:37-39 read differently than the NWT. Check out www.biblegateway.com and see how other translations read. It say that they were unaware, they didn't know, they didn't understand....

Even the Society's own purple Kingdom Interlinear says that "they knew not" in the direct Greek translation, so the WT's stance that Noah was actively preaching and warning people doesn't make sense if the majority were unaware or didn't know.

Just check out other threads on the subject of Noah and you'll rethink the whole scenario.

justhuman

If we consider:

1.The flood wasn't worldwide, but regional in the Mesopotamia basin

2. Noah preached only the people at his area

So technically speaking he could warn them

WTWizard

No. Noah had to spend the first 600 years of his life building Starbucks at every corner, so he could have somewhere to spend his endless coffee breaks while carrying out the work.

Hey, they are comparing the witless work with Noah? Noah didn't have any Starbucks, so the work couldn't have been the same.

civicsi00

This is a topic that has fascinated me recently. I looked up over 20 different translations (english and spanish) of Matthew 24:39 on the biblegateway website, and the texts disagree with how the Watchtower translated this text. From the WT point of view, they like to state that the people were warned but no one wanted to listen. But in the translations I read, it seems to me that the people in Noah's day had NO IDEA that the flood was coming! I even re-read chapter 6 and chapter 7 of Genesis, and nowhere do we find that God commissioned Noah to preach.

I brought this up to my mom, because of the recent Noah Watchtower article (I think it's either May or June), and she was confused at first. She says that there's a text in the bible that states that Noah preached for over 120 years! I was like, "What??" I asked her to find me the text, but she says she couldn't remember where it was at. (I can bring up these kinds of things to my mom, she won't turn me over to the elders). I even pointed out that the Watchtower writes that Noah preached, but there was no text to back it up. It's things like this, when the WT says something and then they fail to back it up with a text, that really piss me off!!

Check out a couple of translations:

New Internation Version " 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away."

The Message "They knew nothing—until the flood hit and swept everything away."

skeeder

The Bible calls Noah a preacher of righteousness. However, it gives no indication that he undertook a global campaign to warn people of a coming flood of which they 'took no note'.

In Gen chap 6 God gave Noah very detailed instructions about building the ark. In 6:18 and 7:1 he gave specific instructions about who to take into the ark. No instructions were given to Noah about warning anyone that they too should get on board with him.

The judging had already been done and Noah was chosen to be saved because he was a righteous man. Hebrews 11:7 shows that Noah built the ark 'for the saving of his household'--not anyone else.

So while Noah was a 'preacher of righteousness' this may refer to his preaching righteousness before the matter of the flood ever came up. This may have contributed to his being chosen to be saved.

Is it even practical that Noah could have set out on a global mission to get people into the ark? He needed to use his time to build it.

Since the size of the ark had already been determined , it seems unlikely that God intended for other people to join Noah.MATTHEW 24:39

Matthew 24:39------ and they took no note until the flood came and swept them all away. . .NEW WORLD TRANS

Almost any Bible you pick up indicates that people were not expecting the flood----not that were ignoring noah's warning.

It is notewothy that the Kingdom Interlinear Bible published by Jehovah's Witnesses renders the Greek "not they knew" but the English "they took no note". Is there not a difference in not knowing something and taking no note of something you know?

Other Bibles say: were unaware--knew not--did not understand--knew nothing about what was happening--didn't know anything was happening--knew nothing about what would happen--didn't realize what was going to happen--did not know--they knew nothing

This fits in perfectly with the context and the point Jesus was making. His point was that his return would come as a surprise; not announced beforehand. This becomes apparent by considering Luke's account. Luke 17:28 says "likewise" and compares the days of Noah with the days of Lot------sudden unexpected destruction as they were eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting and building. There is no indication of a warning work before the destruction of Sodom.

Jesus said in vs 30 :"The same way it will be on that day when the Son of man is to be revealed"

Notice Kingdom song # 215ExtendingMercytoOthers

1. When Jehovah decreed that a deluge

Should destroy wicked men long ago,

Then to Noah he gave a commission:

‘Build an ark! Preach the word! Let men know!’

Now, did Noah reject that assignment,

Since he never had built arks before?

No, but he made good use of God’s mercy,

And he built and

he preached more and more.

Where in the Bible do we find this commission? Or that he 'preached more and more'?

S

Preston

Most unbelievers were using Lotus Notes, which is a pain in the ass to you when you are responding to memos...

- Preston

Did God really warn mankind before the Flood of Noah?

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