When closely examining the story of the Biblical flood, it is essential to point out that there are many other flood stories in Ancient Near Eastern cultures. In fact, there are actually up to sixty-eight different cultures with stories of a great flood! In addition, it is also important for the examiner to see how each flood story affects and influences one another. For example, it is evident that the Babylonian culture heavily influenced the writer of the Biblical flood story, which was made hundreds of years after the making of the Babylonian story. One of the greatest examples of this is in “The Epic of Gilgamesh”, a Babylonian story that includes a story of a man called Utnapishtim, a man some would like to say is similar to the character
…show more content…
However, there are quite a few things in the film that are interpretations of the author and not exactly direct adaptations. For example, in the Noah movie, the Watchers play a prominent part in the narrative and are some of the beings that help Noah and his family board the Ark. In the Biblical Noah story, the Watchers are only mentioned in a brief section and are never mentioned again, meaning that they never play that important of a role in the original version. Another difference between the movie and the Biblical story is how each of Noah’s sons took a wife with them into the ark. In the movie, only Shem has a wife (Ila) and his brothers Ham and Japheth don’t have wives. This is another important detail left out of the movie, which leads to a series of events that end similarly to the Biblical story, but also differ in a few ways. At its core, the Noah movie is very similar to the source material, but in relation to both the obscure and important details the movie is based on, it either changes or modifies them to an …show more content…
As stated in the article “Background Info on the Flood Stories”, the author states that “each story has unique elements, and the differences from the Biblical story are often more striking than the similarities”. For example, in the Atrahasis Epic, one of the gods in the story punishes humanity because of the amount of noise(tumult is the word used) that they make, showing how the gods in these texts are different compared to the Judeo-Christian god in the Bible, who floods the world to cleanse it of sin and corruption. In The Epic of Gilgamesh, the god Enlil destroys the city where Utnapishtim is living in(reason isn’t specified). Utnapishtim is able to survive and is made into an immortal being. Again, in the article“Background Info on the Flood Stories”, the author talks about how each of these stories have a different religious interpretation than the Biblical flood story. This especially since the people involved(Noah, Utnapishtim, and Atrahasis) in the flood don’t all have the same characteristics after the story of the flood. For example, Noah and his family are left to repopulate the Earth, and Utnapishtim and his wife are made into immortal beings. As the author says, this just shows how different the cultures of these two peoples are.
In the end, to better understand the Biblical flood story in the book of Genesis, one has to understand
However, there are quite a few things in the film that are interpretations of the author and not exactly direct adaptations. For example, in the Noah movie, the Watchers play a prominent part in the narrative and are some of the beings that help Noah and his family board the Ark. In the Biblical Noah story, the Watchers are only mentioned in a brief section and are never mentioned again, meaning that they never play that important of a role in the original version. Another difference between the movie and the Biblical story is how each of Noah’s sons took a wife with them into the ark. In the movie, only Shem has a wife (Ila) and his brothers Ham and Japheth don’t have wives. This is another important detail left out of the movie, which leads to a series of events that end similarly to the Biblical story, but also differ in a few ways. At its core, the Noah movie is very similar to the source material, but in relation to both the obscure and important details the movie is based on, it either changes or modifies them to an …show more content…
As stated in the article “Background Info on the Flood Stories”, the author states that “each story has unique elements, and the differences from the Biblical story are often more striking than the similarities”. For example, in the Atrahasis Epic, one of the gods in the story punishes humanity because of the amount of noise(tumult is the word used) that they make, showing how the gods in these texts are different compared to the Judeo-Christian god in the Bible, who floods the world to cleanse it of sin and corruption. In The Epic of Gilgamesh, the god Enlil destroys the city where Utnapishtim is living in(reason isn’t specified). Utnapishtim is able to survive and is made into an immortal being. Again, in the article“Background Info on the Flood Stories”, the author talks about how each of these stories have a different religious interpretation than the Biblical flood story. This especially since the people involved(Noah, Utnapishtim, and Atrahasis) in the flood don’t all have the same characteristics after the story of the flood. For example, Noah and his family are left to repopulate the Earth, and Utnapishtim and his wife are made into immortal beings. As the author says, this just shows how different the cultures of these two peoples are.
In the end, to better understand the Biblical flood story in the book of Genesis, one has to understand