Noah (Ν ῶ ε)
A number of didactic references to Noah are found in the Epistles. (1) He appears in the roll of ‘the elders,’ or men of OT times, who had witness borne to them on account of their faith (Hebrews 11:2). ‘By faith Noah, being divinely instructed (χρηματισθείς) concerning things not yet seen, with reverential care (ε ὐ λαβηθείς) prepared an ark to save his household’ (v. 7). by his faith (δι ʼ ἧ ς, which cannot refer to ‘ark’) he virtually condemned (κατέκρινεν) the careless world, for his belief in the Divine warning threw other men’s lack of faith into strong relief, and his godly life demonstrated what theirs ought to have been and failed to be. He thus became ‘heir of the righteousness which is according to, or in consequence of, faith’ (τ ῆ ς κατ ὰ πίστιν δικαιοσύνης, a phrase which is thoroughly Pauline in significance though not quite in diction). Philo (cited by H. Alford, The Greek Testament 5, iv. [1875] 213) notes that Noah is ‘the first in the holy scriptures who is expressly called righteous’ (δίκαιος); but, while the patriarch is so designated at the very beginning of his history (Genesis 6:9; cf. Wis 10:4), the idea of the writer of Hebrews is rather that he became (ἐ γένετο) righteous by giving due heed to the Divine warning and building the ark in faith.
(2) 1 Peter (3:20) allegorizes, in the Alexandrian manner, the story of ‘the days of Noah, in which the ark was being prepared, wherein eight souls were saved through water’ (διεσώθησαν δι ʼ ὕ δατος). Here ‘through’ may conceivably be instrumental, suggesting merely that the water bore up the ark and so saved its inmates; but this exegesis gives the imagination no striking symbol, or type, of that deliverance by baptism (immersion) to which allusion is made in the following verse. ‘Through’ is therefore rather to be taken as local, Noah and his family being conceived as escaping, when the flood has already begun, through the water into the safety of the ark. Though this conception is not based upon the narrative in Genesis, it is attested in the Rabbinical literature (F. Spitta, Christi Predigt an die Geister, 1890, p. 51).
(3) 2 Peter (2:5) says that God spared not the ancient world, but preserved Noah with seven others, a preacher of righteousness (δικαιοσύνης κήρυκα). This designation suggests another addition to the sacred narrative, a haggâdâ to which there are many Rabbinical allusions, e.g. Bereshith Rabba, xxx. 6. Josephus (Ant. I. iii. 1) refers to this tradition: ‘But Noah was very uneasy at what they [his contemporaries] did; and, being displeased at their conduct, persuaded them to change their disposition and their actions for the better’; and Clement (ad Cor. vii. 6, ix. 4), ‘Noah preached repentance, and as many as hearkened unto him were saved’; ‘Noah, having been found faithful, preached, by his ministry, regeneration unto the world.’ Cf. Theoph. Antioch. ad Autolycum, iii. 19, 129; Visio Pauli, l. 1, and other passages collected in Spitta’s Der zweite Brief des Petrus und der Brief des Judas, 1885, p. 146. The Christian Sibyllines give a complete Sermon of Noah’s (Sib. Orac. i. 128 ff.).
James Strahan.