Do you believe the Flood was a historical event?

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Farsight001 said:
As for me, I say there was a large, regional flood in the middle east that would have appeared to cover the whole world to someone who lived thousands of years ago, which there is geologic evidence for, but not a truly global flood.
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Well yeah, but when someone says they would be happy seeing a whale’s bones on a mountainside they need to be more specific, and excluded geological events;)
 
I believe that the Flood really happened in which the story is based on but the story itself is a response to other similar stories that wer circulating at the time like the Epic of Gilgamesh. The story is meant to make a theological point and prefigure Baptism, not to relay historical details.
 
triumphguy said:
Well yeah, but when someone says they would be happy seeing a whale’s bones on a mountainside they need to be more specific, and excluded geological events;)
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I was half joking. I believe the flood happened. But I also believe in the miracle of the sun. I dont know the extent of the flood but I think Noah was spared and it is part of our salvation story.
 
I believe that the Flood was an historical event, and that Noah and the Ark existed. However, certain elements in the Flood story are figurative: the extent of the flood (covering the whole world), the extent of the destruction, the presence on the Ark of all animals, and perhaps a few other elements of the story.

There are a number of different scientists (not creationists) who have proposed historical events that constitute a great Flood, though not one that covers all land or kills all people and animals:

Ryan and Pitman’s Black Sea Deluge theory
Teller’s Postglacial Flood theory
the Tollmann’s Youngest Big Impact theory
Bruce Masse’s Flood Comet Impact theory

The Flood story does not have to be either entirely literal or entirely figurative. My view is that it contains some literal historical elements and some figurative elements.
 
The flood could very well be symbolic.I doubt in this life we will ever know for sure either way and in the next life (either heaven or hell) will we really care?

However I voted it was an historical event.
 
LumenGent said:
I’m sorry you feel this way, but there is nothing in my intention nor my post which offends anybody in any shape or form.
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Yes there is. You insulted the intelligence and integrity of geologists and astronomers and insinuated that they were squirmy and shifty in regards to answering scientific questions. That’s the very definition of an insult.
 
jochoa said:
I definitely appreciate the perspective of Dr. Hovind on the subject of the Great Flood, as well as Creation. Here is a link to a video in which he shares his concepts → youtube.com/watch?v=DAvH2Q2SkRo&feature=g-hist
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He’s not a doctor and he is currently in prison for FRAUD. He is also vehmently anti-Catholic. He is, simply, a deceptive and untrustworthy man. His explanations of the flood, in addition, violate not just geological concepts, but physics itself and the very laws of nature that govern our universe hundreds of times over. Nothing about that man’s perspective on the subject should be appreciated in any way. The guy is not even a real doctor. His “school” had 4 students, 1 staff member, no textbooks, no class schedule, and it took him 6 weeks to go from undergrad to doctorate.
 
triumphguy said:
We have seashells in our mountainsides.

burgess-shale.bc.ca/
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fossil sea shells. Way too old to be part of the flood roughly 4-6 thousand years ago and as geologists have known for well more than a century, a result of uplift of land when tectonic plates collide. We really would need an as of yet unfossilized whale carcass.
 
I thought God put fossils in the mountains to confuse us? So why couldn’t they be 5000 years old and made to look like they are eons old?

No, I’m not serious! I’m joking…
 
LumenGent said:
Seeking an answer from Geologists is tantamount to gaining one about the Big bang from Astronomers. The fact of the matter is that Science can’t provide us with any explanation. Also keep in mind that whatever science proposes, will be largely fueled by an atheistic sentiment.
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Tell that to the Catholic Priest Georges Lemaître who developed the theory of the big bang…

(sorry to derail the thread)

Back to the flood, what Farsight was saying about the flood was pretty much what was discussed in my geology electives, and I agree with that as well.
 
Matthew 24:37-39

As it was in Noah’s day, so will it be when the Son of man comes. For in those days before the Flood people were eating, drinking, taking wives, taking husbands, right up to the day Noah went into the ark, and they suspected nothing till the Flood came and swept them all away. This is what it will be like when the Son of man comes.

🙂
 
Farsight001 said:
Yes, I’m serious. And seeing as how the Church Fathers, however good and wise, were not infallible and as we all know made errors in their teachings, they are not the Church. I asked if the Church made it official, not for the personal opinions of Church Fathers.
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The Church has stated many times that when the Church Fathers were unanimous or in consensus concerning scripture, them we are required to believe what they taught. And they taught unanimously that the flood was an historical event.
Farsight001 said:
In addition, having read several Church Fathers, I can say that I have found no such literalistic statements as you imply.
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Sorry but I don’t believe that. You need to show me a list of Church Fathers who taught that the flood was not an historical event.
Farsight001 said:
Not that it matters, again, of course, because I was talking about the Church in an official capacity declaring it historical.
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It does matter and the Church HAS spoken in an official capacity declaring the flood to have been an historical event
 
Yes, I believe the Flood was a historical event.

Maybe not every detail of the story was factual (parts of the language could be figurative). Maybe not the whole world, but the known world was only destroyed? All of this is possible with God.

We do know that Noah was a just man, and God saw this. God decided to destroy all living people and creatures except for Noah, his family, and the pairs of living creatures that he brought on board with him before the rain fell for 40 days and 40 nights.

 
A_G said:
Yes, I believe the Flood was a historical event.

Maybe not every detail of the story was factual (parts of the language could be figurative). Maybe not the whole world, but the known world was only destroyed? All of this is possible with God.

We do know that Noah was a just man, and God saw this. God decided to destroy all living people and creatures except for Noah, his family, and the pairs of living creatures that he brought on board with him before the rain fell for 40 days and 40 nights.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/23/Noahs_Ark.jpg/690px-Noahs_Ark.jpg
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The stories  of "Noah and the Flood" and the story of "Jonah and the Whale" are  two stories that I absolutely love.  What are the scientific facts behind these stories?  My reaction is quite simply.  "Why should we even care?"
The truths in these stories are their messages. Until Christ came to Earth to tell us the stories of the “Prodigal Son”, “The Lost Sheep”, “The Good Samaratan” and others, the ancient beauty of these stories were unsurpassed. Do we ask if the prodigal son really existed? No of course we don’t. Yet we understand that the story is true.
 
Aelred_Minor said:
I voted that it is symbolic, though to me it’s a very puzzling subject, and I’m not very confident about what little understanding I think I have about it. Certainly there seems to be no physical evidence for a world-wide flood, though it’s possible to imagine very complex scenarios in which the physical evidence and the idea of an actual world-wide flood could be reconciled.

Also, it might not be a true either/or. The story of the Fall found in Genesis seems to be highly symbolic, and yet it also seems represent an actual event at the start of human history.
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Yes, it was historical. The Fall in Genesis was historical. Our first parents sinned, bringing Original Sin to each person born since then.

Peace,
Ed
 
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