Geology Reference
In-Depth Information
There is no indication that, since man appeared upon the earth, any universal and simultaneous inundation of so
extraordinary a character as to overwhelm the highest mountain peaks has ever occurred… . The narrative of the
Flood records to us some terrible but local cataclysm which overtook the original seat of the Semitic race. 6
The global distribution of flood stories could be attributed to the fact that floods were com-
mon disasters all over the world.
As theologians like Ryle reconsidered traditional views, scholars began digging into the
origin of flood myths and uncovered hundreds from around the globe. Most featured a hero
who, like Noah, rode out the flood and repopulated the world. But there were enough dif-
ferences in detail between the stories to foster debate over their origins and the question of
whether they recorded a common, global disaster.
A landmark compilation of global flood traditions was included in French archaeologist
François Lenormant's The Beginnings of History , published in 1883, which described such
stories from all around the world, except Africa. He nonetheless held that most flood tradi-
tions arose from a common prehistoric event and that the Hebrew and Mesopotamian stor-
ies were identical before Abraham left for the Promised Land. According to Lenormant,
India's story of Manu also came from Mesopotamia, and the Greek story of Deucalion's
flood mixed the original ancient story with memories of more recent local floods. Stressing
the similarities among these flood traditions, Lenormant concluded that “the Biblical De-
luge, far from being a myth, was an actual and historic fact, which overwhelmed at the very
least the ancestors of the three races of Aryans or Indo-Europeans, semites or Syro-Ara-
bians, and Chamites or Kushites.” 7 North American flood stories were different enough
from the biblical story to preclude their having been introduced by Christian missionaries.
And the Fijian flood story sounded suspiciously like a local tidal wave (what we now call a
tsunami). Although the world's flood stories were rooted in fact, they didn't all arise from
the same flood.
Expanding on Lenormant's study to compile a comprehensive collection of deluge tradi-
tions, Scottish anthropologist James Frazer's 1918 Folk-lore in the Old Testament detailed
hundreds more stories of great floods. In case after case, peculiar local details appeared to
be rooted in natural phenomena—a rising sea caused the flood in stories from the Pacific
Search WWH ::




Custom Search