“As for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your offspring after you, and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the livestock, and every animal of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ship, even every animal of the earth. I will establish my covenant with you: All flesh will not be cut off any more by the waters of the flood. There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.”
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Genesis 9:9-11 sits inside this longer paragraph.
God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying, “As for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your offspring after you, and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the livestock, and every animal of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ship, even every animal of the earth. I will establish my covenant with you: All flesh will not be cut off any more by the waters of the flood. There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.” God said, “This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: I set my rainbow in the cloud, and it will be a sign of a covenant between me and the earth. When I bring a cloud over the earth, that the rainbow will be seen in the cloud, I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh, and the waters will no more become a flood to destroy all flesh. The rainbow will be in the cloud. I will look at it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” God said to Noah, “This is the token of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”
Parallel Translations
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“As for me, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your offspring after you,
and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the livestock, and every animal of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ship, even every animal of the earth.
I will establish my covenant with you: All flesh will not be cut off any more by the waters of the flood. There will never again be a flood to destroy the earth.”
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And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.
And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
Show all 3 translations
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'As for Me, behold, I establish My covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
and with every living creature that is with you, the fowl, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that go out of the ark, even every beast of the earth.
And I will establish My covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of the flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.'
Examined in Scripture Analysis
Contradictions (1)
Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.
Cross-references (21)
- Isaiah 54:9 (v11) “For this is like the waters of Noah to me; for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah will no more go over the earth, so I have sworn…
- Genesis 8:21-22 (v11) Yahweh smelled the pleasant aroma. Yahweh said in his heart, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake because the…
- Genesis 6:18 (v9) But I will establish my covenant with you. You shall come into the ship, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you.
- Isaiah 54:9-10 (v9) “For this is like the waters of Noah to me; for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah will no more go over the earth, so I have sworn…
- 2 Peter 3:7 (v11) But the heavens that exist now and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and…
Show all 21 cross-references
- Genesis 7:21-23 (v11) All flesh died that moved on the earth, including birds, livestock, animals, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, and every man.…
- Romans 1:3 (v9) concerning his Son, who was born of the offspring of David according to the flesh,
- Genesis 9:11 (v9) I will establish my covenant with you: All flesh will not be cut off any more by the waters of the flood. There will never again be a flood…
- Genesis 9:17 (v9) God said to Noah, “This is the token of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”
- Genesis 17:7-8 (v9) I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to…
- Psalms 145:9 (v10) Yahweh is good to all. His tender mercies are over all his works.
- 2 Peter 3:11 (v11) Therefore since all these things will be destroyed like this, what kind of people ought you to be in holy living and godliness,
- Genesis 8:1 (v10) God remembered Noah, all the animals, and all the livestock that were with him in the ship; and God made a wind to pass over the earth. The…
- Genesis 9:15-16 (v10) I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh, and the waters will no more become a flood…
- Genesis 22:17 (v9) that I will bless you greatly, and I will multiply your offspring greatly like the stars of the heavens, and like the sand which is on the…
- Job 38:1-41 (v10) Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind, “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man, for…
- Job 41:1-34 (v10) “Can you draw out Leviathan with a fish hook, or press down his tongue with a cord? Can you put a rope into his nose, or pierce his jaw…
- Psalms 36:5-6 (v10) Your loving kindness, Yahweh, is in the heavens. Your faithfulness reaches to the skies. Your righteousness is like the mountains of God.…
- Jeremiah 33:20 (v9) “Yahweh says: ‘If you can break my covenant of the day and my covenant of the night, so that there will not be day and night in their time;
- Jonah 4:11 (v10) Shouldn’t I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can’t discern between…
- Jeremiah 31:35-36 (v9) Yahweh, who gives the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, who stirs up the sea,…
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (14 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On v10 10. And with every living creature. Although the favor…
10. And with every living creature. Although the favor which the Lord promises extends also to animals, yet it is not in vain that he addresses himself only to men, who, by the sense of faith, are able to perceive this benefit. We enjoy the heaven and the air in common with the beasts, and draw the same vital breath; but it is no common privilege, that God directs his word to us; whence we may learn with what paternal love he pursues us. And here three distinct steps are to be traced. First, God, as in a matter of present concern, makes a covenant with Noah and his family, lest they should be afraid of a deluge for themselves. Secondly, he transmits his covenant to posterity, not only that, as by continual succession, the effect may reach to other ages; but that they who should afterwards be born might also apprehend this testimony by faith, and might conclude that the same thing which had been promised to the sons of Noah, was promised unto them. Thirdly, he declares that he will be propitious also to brute animals, so that the effect of the covenant towards them, might be the preservation of their lives only, without imparting to them sense and intelligence. Hence the ignorance of the Anabaptists may be refuted, who deny that the covenant of God is common to infants, because they are destitute of present faith. As if, truly, when God promises salvation to a thousand generations, the fathers were not intermediate parties between God and their children, whose office it is to deliver to their children (so to speak) from hand to hand the promise received from God. But as many as withdraw their life from this protection of God (since the greater part of men either despise or ridicule this divine covenant) deserve, by this single act of ingratitude, to be immersed in eternal fire. For although this be an earthly promise, yet God designs the faith of his people to be exercised, in order that they may be assured that a certain abode will, by his special goodness, be provided for them on earth, until they shall be gathered together in heaven.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On v9 To assure you that the world shall be no…
To assure you that the world shall be no more destroyed by a flood.
The children which are not yet born, are comprehended in God’s covenant made with their fathers.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv9–11 Gen 9:9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant…
Gen 9:9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
Ver. 9. And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you.] This covenant God had made with them before the flood; but here he renews it for their further confirmation: for he knows our infirmities, and therefore seals again. This covenant is said to be made with an oath, {Isa 54:9} yet we find no such thing here expressed, because God’s bare word is as sure as an oath. So God is said to have sworn to Abraham, that which he said to him only. {Exo 32:13, with Gen 12:7}
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv9–11 i.e. My promise, for the beasts included in this…
i.e. My promise, for the beasts included in this covenant, Gen 9:10, are not capable of a covenant properly so called. And the word
covenant is oft used for a simple promise, as we shall see hereafter.
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With your seed, i.e. your posterity, as that word is frequently taken, as Gen 12:7; Exo 28:43, &c.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv9–11 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you,....…
And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you,.... Not the covenant of grace in Christ, but of the preservation of the creatures in common, a promise that they should not be destroyed any more by a flood; to which promise it seems an oath was annexed, as appears from Isa 54:9 which passage refers to this covenant, as Aben Ezra on the place observes; and both to raise attention to what is here affirmed, and to show the certainty of it, the word "behold" is prefixed to it; nor is it amiss what Jarchi observes, that this follows upon the direction and exhortation to procreation of children, and is an encouragement to it; since it is assured that posterity should be no more cut off in the manner it had been; for this covenant was made and established not only with Noah, and his sons, but with all their succeeding offspring, as follows:
and with your seed after you; with all their posterity to the end of the world; so that this covenant was made with all the world, and all the individuals in it, from Noah's time to the end of it; for from him and his sons sprung the whole race of men that peopled the world, and still continue to inhabit it; hence here is nothing in it peculiar to the seed of believers.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv9, 11 We have here the general establishment of God's covenant…
We have here the general establishment of God's covenant with this new world, and the extent of that covenant.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv9, 11 Gen 9:9. Behold, I establish my covenant, &c. —…
Gen 9:9. Behold, I establish my covenant, &c. — We have here the general establishment of God’s covenant with this new world, and the extent of that covenant.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On v10 Soul...in birds, &c. The covenant of God is made…
Soul...in birds, &c. The covenant of God is made with animals, only in as much as they are subservient to man. (Du Hamel) --- The Egyptians adored most of them; and many oriental nations, and even philosophers, pretended they had intelligent souls, and could speak a rational language, which some of them would have the people believe they could understand. (Calmet) --- This was the case of those great impostors Apollonius of Tyena, Mahomet, &c. (Haydock) --- Moses shews sufficiently that beasts were neither divinities nor rational. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On v10 10. With every living creature — The covenant is…
10. With every living creature — The covenant is made, first, with all creatures which went forth from the ark, and then, with all flesh; “with every living creature… from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.” In the words which relate the establishment of the covenant with the animal creation, Keil remarks, “The prepositions are accumulated, first, ב, embracing the whole, then the partitive, מן, restricting the enumeration to those which went out of the ark, and, lastly, ל, with regard to extending it again to every individual.”
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–11 8–17b. The Covenant with Noah
8–17b. The Covenant with Noah
9. I, behold, I] Cf. Gen_6:17, “I, behold, I do bring the flood of waters.” The same personal emphasis is expressed in proclaiming the mercy of the covenant as previously in the sentence of doom.
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establish my covenant] See Gen_6:18. The Pentateuch mentions three covenants between God and man: (1) with Noah, and its token is the rainbow; (2) with Abraham, 15 and 17, and its token is circumcision, chap. 17; (3) with the people of Israel at Mt Sinai, and its tokens are “the blood of the covenant,” the Tabernacle, and the Levitical system (Exodus 24, 25.).
In a covenant between God and man, God makes the promise and lays down the conditions. Man accepts the terms unconditionally, while God “establishes,” or ratifies, them.
There is no equality of relationship as in a covenant agreement between men. Man is pledged to obedience on the strength of God’s promise of blessing. An outward sign is the “sacrament” of the relation.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On v9 (9) I, behold, I establish my covenant . .…
(9) I, behold, I establish my covenant . . . The covenant between God and man is thus solemnly introduced as Elohim’s personal act. No covenant is mentioned as existing between Elohim and the antediluvian world; but distinctly now there is a step onward in all respects, and man, in the renovated earth after the flood, is brought nearer to God by being admitted into covenant with Him. And not only is man included in the covenant, but, first, those animals which had been with Noah in the ark; and, secondly, those which had not been admitted there. For the words of Gen_9:10 are: “From all that go out of the ark unto every beast of the earth” (the larger world). To such straits are those reduced who hold to the theory of a universal deluge, that Kalisch argues that it means the fish, as if fishes would be destroyed by a second flood any more than they were by the first. Plainly, the words imply the existence of a larger world-sphere than that in connection with Noah, and give the assurance that not only those now providentially preserved, but the animals everywhere, shall never again be in danger of a similar extinction.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv9–11 And I, behold, I establish literally, am causing to…
And I, behold, I establish literally, am causing to rise up or stand; ajnisthmi (LXX)my covenant (cf. Gen_6:18) with you, and with your seed after you. Ie. the covenant contemplated all subsequent posterity in its provisions, and, along with the human family, the entire animal creation.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v11 General Information:
General Information:
God continues speaking to Noah and his sons.
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I hereby confirm my covenant with you
"By saying this, I make my covenant with you." See how similar words are translated in Genesis 6:18.
all flesh
Possible meanings for what "all flesh" represents are 1) all human beings or 2) all physical beings, including humans and animal. See how this is translated in Genesis 6:12. (See: Synecdoche)
Never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth
"There will never again be a flood that destroys the earth." There would be floods, but they would not destroy the whole earth.
sign
This means a reminder of something that was promised.
covenant ... for all future generations
The covenant applies to Noah and his family and also to all generations that follow.
translationWords
covenant
flesh
flood
generation
sign
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv9, 11 9:9-10 God had promised this covenant before the flood…
9:9-10 God had promised this covenant before the flood (6:18). Its scope extends beyond humanity to include the earth and all animals.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.