Biblical Views: Noah, Enoch and the Flood: The Bible Meets Hollywood

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There’s been a lot of buzz lately about Noah—not the Biblical patriarch, but the new $125 million Hollywood epic Noah, featuring Russell Crowe as Noah and Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah. It’s an action-packed movie with a slew of special effects, including the flood, meteor showers, gory battles and giant six-armed rock-angels called the Watchers. It’s great eye-candy, with some surprising twists.

Even before its release, the movie raised controversy. Some conservative Christian groups have complained that the movie’s approach is not an accurate depiction of the Biblical story. The movie certainly does take liberties with Genesis and even includes an environmental subtext. Noah, says the director, was “the first environmentalist.” I assume this is because he saved a boatload of animals from extinction. But the movie also uses the flood as a symbolic warning of the imminent destruction of the earth due to human violence against the environment. In this sense the movie reinterprets the flood story. The flood is not just a past event; it carries secret significance as a harbinger of the future global apocalypse.

The movie’s critics say that it is irresponsible to interpret the flood story in a way that deviates from Genesis. According to a recent survey about the movie, evangelical Christians are “unsatisfied with a Bible-themed movie which strays from the Biblical message.”

Some of this is just the usual culture war, which pits cultural conservatives against liberal Hollywood. But I think there’s a deeper issue here that the critics are missing: The flood story has always involved conflicting interpretations. The modern controversy is, in this respect, a recapitulation of previous moments in the life of the Genesis Flood story. Let me explain.

First, the Genesis Flood story consists of two different interpretations of the flood. BAR readers will recognize the names of two of the Pentateuchal sources: the Yahwist (J) and the Priestly source (P).^a Genesis 6–9 is a compilation of two accounts of the flood, from J and P. These two stories disagree with each other in numerous details—including the name of God (Yahweh vs. Elohim), the duration of the flood (40 days vs. 150 days) and the number of animals on the ark (one pair of each unclean animal plus seven pairs of each clean animal vs. a pair of each animal). Even the reason for the flood is different in the two sources. Whereas in J the problem is human evil, in P the problem is violence that has corrupted the earth. So Genesis contains slightly different concepts of the flood. There is no single “Biblical message” here; it was always plural.

But there’s an even more profound way in which the message of the Biblical Flood gets complicated. There are many early interpretations that depart in some respects from Genesis but which found a home in Judaism and Christianity. Probably the most influential is the Book of Enoch, its earliest parts dating to the third century B.C.E. This book, which didn’t make it into the Bible, features a remarkable reinterpretation of the flood. Enoch—who is Noah’s great-great-grandfather—announces the coming of a great destruction, which will wipe out all the evil of the world. This great destruction is the flood. But the flood is also a prophetic symbol of the apocalyptic end time when God will finally destroy all the wicked. Enoch proclaims in his vision:

Behold, He comes with the myriads of his holy ones

to execute judgment on all,

and to destroy the wicked,

and to convict all humanity

for all the wicked deeds that they have done,

and the proud and hard words that wicked sinners spoke against Him.¹

The apocryphal Book of Enoch reimagines the flood as the prophetic symbol of the future apocalypse when God will destroy the wicked and reward the faithful. It is a nonbiblical interpretation of the flood, which conflicts with the Genesis story since Genesis says that God will never again destroy humankind because of their wickedness (Genesis 8:22). But for Enoch, the flood carries secret significance as a harbinger of the future global 067apocalypse—just like in the movie!

The New Testament quotes Enoch’s prophecy even though it is not a canonical book. The passage above is found in the Letter of Jude 14–15 and attributed to “Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam.” This means that the apocalyptic reimagining of the flood in the Book of Enoch is a part of Christianity, even though it deviates from the story of the flood in Genesis.

Is this an interpretation of the flood that modern Christians should abhor? Of course not—it’s in the New Testament. Does this have implications for modern reinterpretations of the flood? Well, I think so. We shouldn’t reject interpretations of the flood just because they deviate from Genesis. Such interpretations are in the lifeblood of both Judaism and Christianity. Enoch is a strange book, but it was highly regarded by many Jews and Christians, including the compilers of the New Testament. Stories that deviate from the Bible are still part of the Bible—and have always been a part of Biblical religions. So people who revere the Bible can’t dismiss them without pulling up the floor beneath their feet.

So is the new flood movie unbiblical? Well, yes and no. In some important ways it is doing what Jews and Christians have always done—interpret the Bible in ways that resonate with concerns in the present. Is it unbiblical to say that the flood is a symbolic harbinger of the future apocalypse? Well, you be the judge—but don’t forget that the life of Genesis has taken many curious turns, both inside and outside the Bible.

By the way, those giant Watchers in the new flood movie? They’re also from the Book of Enoch and are mentioned in the New Testament (Jude 6). The life of the flood story does not end with Genesis. It’s just the beginning.²

There’s been a lot of buzz lately about Noah—not the Biblical patriarch, but the new $125 million Hollywood epic Noah, featuring Russell Crowe as Noah and Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah. It’s an action-packed movie with a slew of special effects, including the flood, meteor showers, gory battles and giant six-armed rock-angels called the Watchers. It’s great eye-candy, with some surprising twists. Even before its release, the movie raised controversy. Some conservative Christian groups have complained that the movie’s approach is not an accurate depiction of the Biblical story. The movie certainly does take liberties with Genesis and even includes […]