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How did Noah prevent fresh water fish from dying when salt water inundated inland waterways during the claimed floods? I'm not sure which Christian doctrines take the literalist position but what is their explanation for this aspect of the claim?

Affable Geek
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rpeg
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    This has never occurred to me. I like this question. – Ampers Feb 08 '12 at 22:53
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    who says he had to "preserve" them? Just curious :) – warren Feb 08 '12 at 23:22
  • @warren I might be mistaken but isn't the claim that Noah got every animal to save them for after the supposed flood? – rpeg Feb 08 '12 at 23:28
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    I think some are getting hung up on the point of how Noah preserved fresh water fish. I think the heart of the question is: How did fresh water fish survive the flood?, regardless of whether Noah played any role. Am I correct, @rpeg? – Flimzy Feb 09 '12 at 00:43
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    Same way we do up nort with a little bit of lye, your fish'll last a lot longer than 40 days and 40 nights. – Peter Turner Feb 09 '12 at 14:15
  • @rpeg my question was specifically about how saved those fish but I understand some people are arguing that Noah didn't actually save those fish at all. Which raises the question of whether or not these fish evolved over time and whether this evolution contradicts some Christian doctrine. – rpeg Feb 09 '12 at 21:10
  • I have never thought of this question before, i love this forum, its opening my eyes to things that never crossed my mind ! – Jess Mar 04 '12 at 05:47
  • This is a bad question because Noah wasn't instructed to preserve the lives of any sea creatures. If it was simply changed to how did God preserve them, then it would be a good question. – curiousdannii Jun 03 '14 at 16:26
  • Or better yet, why didn't "God" preserve all the animals instead of just fish, according to your suggestion. – rpeg Jun 03 '14 at 19:04

3 Answers3

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I realize that what I'm about to put forward is not conclusively proven, but it is possible. It's specifically answering from the perspective of young-earth creationists, which isn't the only view out there. (But it is the one you specified you wanted in your question.)

Noah didn't have to save the fish.

Your question makes two assumptions that seem reasonable, but aren't really axiomatic.

  1. That the oceans were salt water at the time of the flood,
  2. That the fish at the time were already adapted to either fresh water or salt water.

It is entirely possible that at that early stage in earth's history (assuming a young-earth time-line) that the oceans were fresh water, or nearly fresh water. If this were so, there would have been no dichotomy between fresh and saltwater fish.

The oceans gain their salinity because material from land is constantly eroding into the oceans. Both sea water and fresh water evaporate, but all water eventually ends up in the oceans. the reason the oceans are more salty than fresh water is that the minerals can't travel back upstream, so when the water evaporates, the salinity increases. (more here if you want it)

Even secular scientists are saying that most salt-water fish evolved from fresh water fish. Even the young-earth creationists wouldn't argue that. We see it as a minor variation within the Biblical "kinds" Turning from a freshwater fish to a saltwater fish is a minor change compared to the transformation from a dinosaur (primarily reptile from what we understand) to a bird, for example.

One popular YEC view is that likely, at the time of the flood, most sea life was able to live in both ocean water and fresh water because the salinity of the ocean was much less than. During the flood, large amounts of materials would have been deposited rapidly, and as the flood waters receded, the ocean would have been much more salty shortly after the flood than it was before from that fact alone. Over the remaining years, the oceans have become more salty at a slower rate.

A similar argument can be found here.

And another here, with a story about someone who experimented an was able to get salt and fresh-water fish living together in the same tank. There's no reference on the story, but it's certainly possible to try it yourself if you'd like to experiment.

This article Fish in the Flood has this to add:

As a matter of fact, most of them didn’t survive. Over 95 percent of all fossils are marine creatures. They died and are fossilized by the trillions. Many are buried in great fossil graveyards, tightly packed together, choked with sediments, buried before they had time to decay. Obviously, they didn’t live in the environment in which they died. They were transported by rapidly moving water and then buried in sedimentary deposits.

Ken Graham
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David Stratton
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    Excellent answer. I wish I could give you a +2. – Jas 3.1 Jul 06 '12 at 02:57
  • One extra assumption is this: He assumes that God did nothing to save some species. Indeed, Noah had most of the responsibility for them but, the way I see it, what Noah did was partially symbolic: his work around the ark was a call for repentance to anti-theists of the time and the animals he saved using that work reminds humanity its relation to animals: they animals only exist FOR us, we have authority on them, but at the same time we owe them protection (especially since all bads happening to them come from our decisions). That's the glory of Noah's history. – NoOne Sep 07 '15 at 21:46
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Noah was command to take every animal that walks on the face of the earth - not those that "swim in the deep."

From Genesis 6:19 - 20, via the Amplified Bible.

And of every living thing of all flesh [found on land], you shall bring two of every sort into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. Of fowls and birds according to their kinds, of beasts according to their kinds, of every creeping thing of the ground according to its kind--two of every sort shall come in with you, that they may be kept alive.

Genesis 6:17 is equally clear that is only flesh that lives on the earth that shall perish:

For behold, I, even I, will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy and make putrid all flesh under the heavens in which are the breath and spirit of life; everything that is on the land shall die.

The Hebrew Interlinear can be found here.

As such, Noah would neither be commanded to protect sea life (since God was wiping clean "the face of the earth" and not "the waters under the earth) nor would he need any special containers for fish. They were protected.[1]

Interestingly, Genesis 6:20 also says that Noah didn't have to search for the animals, rather they came to him.

The point, however, is that marine life is not "all living creatures on the earth," and as such need not fit on the ark.

Okay, as pointed out in a comment however, there is still a question about how fresh-water fish would survive the flood outside of the ark.

A flood that covers the face of the earth is necessarily going to mix salt water and fresh. How would fresh water survive? Two hypothesis come to mind:

  1. God miraculously keeps the waters separate. Note that in Genesis he commanded the waters to separate from the land causing the firmanent, so this wouldn't be a stretch.

  2. Remember that the flood came both from underground and above. As Genesis 7:11 says:

    on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened

It could be that the fresh and salt water was kept in some kind of balance.

Am I stretching here? Yes. It was a miracle! But the basic point is still satisfied. Noah needn't have done a thing - God himself attended to the needs of marine life.

It should also be noted that many Christians believe the flood to be a local (and not global) event. Indeed, I have seen documentaries suggest that the flood occurred when the Bosporous opened up and flooded the Black Sea. They point to archeological evidence of civilizations at the bottom of the Black. That said, these people are not the "literalists" asked for in the question, so the point need not be pressed here either.

Community
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Affable Geek
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  • Oh okay. So the claim is that Noah only preserves/saves animals that are above ground? Were fresh water fish created after the floods? – rpeg Feb 08 '12 at 23:31
  • Sorry, you missed a later edit :) God only promised to destroy all life on the earth, i.e. on soil - not those in the seas – Affable Geek Feb 08 '12 at 23:38
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    Ah, wait - I see your quandry - a flood (presumably saltwater) would overrun fresh water... One can make silly hypothesis like preserving fresh water lakes in the same way that Lake Vostok was preserved under a glacier, but no, I don't want to go there... I will say that the "fountains of the deep" were opened up, and could have been fresh or salt water... – Affable Geek Feb 08 '12 at 23:40
  • I think this is the answer. Noah didn't do anything to preserve the fish/animals in the seas/lakes. He only took two of each land animal and flying animal on the ark. – styfle Feb 08 '12 at 23:59
  • @rpeg Nothing would suggest that fresh water fish were created after the flood. – Affable Geek Feb 09 '12 at 15:55
  • @AffableGeek: Who said fresh water fish were created before the flood? I guess that would be a different question (evolution and what have you). – styfle Feb 10 '12 at 01:47
  • Rpeg had asked that question, then deleted the comment – Affable Geek Feb 10 '12 at 05:00
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    Was there even salt water before the flood? –  Feb 10 '12 at 21:47
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To clarify, a number of literalists that I've spoken to about this subject cite "miracle" as their explanation. This is exactly the point that I'm trying to make in the last paragraph.

IMO, the question here extends far far beyond just fish; for example, you destroy all the plants and all the habitats, and all the insert / etc life that goes with it; you have no food (vegetable or meat) to sustain people or animals disembarking. Remember that a lot of the animals getting off the boat eat other animals, are specialized at that, and would need more than a few to raise young. Any time they eat, they drive another species extinct, and probably doom themselves if they are specialists. So they have the fun job of sitting in the fetid mud surrounded by debris and rotting carcasses, little food, little hope; floods do not sweep things clean; they leave foulness. Let alone the issues of the energy (often from other animals) necessary for the journey back to a climate where it can actually survive for more than a day (which, by foot and paw, could be many months)

My point? (yes, I do actually have one that is relevant): as a result of the issues of the life disembarking from the ark, it seems necessary to adopt one of two positions:

  • the rules of life were already suspended to such a large extent (in order to ensure survival of, well, everything that survived) that it is meaningless to ponder about things like how that worked for fish; as a: it isn't recorded, and we would have to invent the reasoning; b: it is immaterial - without supernatural intervention, most of the remaining animal life is going to be dead shortly anyway (also remembering the supernatural intervention required to bring the animals, and the floods); and of course c: genetic diversity is thrown out of the window
  • or; it didn't happen as per the tale in the Bible (which to some means: similar divine events, but with Genesis not the exact re-telling, and to others means: any such global/local flood that underpins the story was non-divine in nature)

Each is entitled to their view of what happened; all I'm saying is: if you choose the literal Bible flood account: then it demands multiple additional (beyond that recorded in Genesis) supernatural events, not just the floods and the arrival of the animals. It is inconsistent to try to find a rational/natural explanation for the survival of (say) fish in the midst of supernatural events.

Marc Gravell
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  • Your assumption is that the world we live in is the exact same thing that the world then. I'm not sure that this position would even work in an evolution framework. Some studies show that canivore could live on vegetarian diet, http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2009/06/02/vegetarian-animals – David Laberge Feb 09 '12 at 11:27
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    @David I don't understand your opening line - yes, I am explicitly assuming the same world, otherwise the need to explain anything is next to nil. That just shifts the bar even further into the red-zone. Your article is talking about a very small of animals, with access to nutritional alternatives. In the wild: not so much. In a post-apocalyptic flood disaster zone (i.e. the entire world), not at all. Don't forget that you've destroyed the vegetation, and indeed the soil, too. If the earth emerges sweet, clean and vegetated, then again you're into "more supernatural" zone; no point... – Marc Gravell Feb 09 '12 at 12:45
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    ...trying to rationalise anything at that point. – Marc Gravell Feb 09 '12 at 12:45
  • I think your answer would be perfectly valid if he had asked "how did the freshwater fish survive", but instead he asked "How do the Literalists support this claim". I think your answer is "good" for a different question (even if I don't believe it), and you raise points I've wondered about myself but I think it's completely irrelevant for this particular question. (I don't think it's bad enough to deserve a down-vote, though. Down-voting because of disagreements in philosophy should be avoided IMO) – David Stratton Feb 09 '12 at 13:32
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    @David see, I think it does relate to the literalist part of the question, in that it highlights that if you take the literal interpretation, there are so many supernatural requirements (both explicit and implicit) that it is non-sensical to look for much explanation. Indeed, a number of literalists I've spoken to on the subject do indeed use "miracle" as their explanation, which is exactly the point I was making. And if you don't take the strictly literal approach (no matter whether you are religious or secular), you are in my second bullet. No philosophy arguments necessary ;p – Marc Gravell Feb 09 '12 at 13:41
  • @David I've clarified that (i.e. the viewpoint of the literalists I've spoken to about this) in the answer. – Marc Gravell Feb 09 '12 at 13:45
  • -1 Your answer carries the tone of a person with extensive experience in observing and surviving catastrophic global floods, but you don't cite a single source to support any of it. Poor form - for science or Christianity.SE – Jas 3.1 Jul 06 '12 at 03:00
  • @Jas3.1 which bit, exactly? The bit where I point out that floods cause devestation? or the bit where I point out that animals need to eat? which of these are you objecting to? – Marc Gravell Jul 06 '12 at 05:41
  • @MarcGravell Your response to my comment is what we call a "straw man". Anyway, everything in your answer which "demands a supernatural event" has actually had perfectly plausible natural explanations proposed. The problem is you're not actually asking the YEC's to clarify any of these points, and you're not actually listening to their explanations - you're just presupposing your own world view, and of course, any YEC argument (taken individually) will seem absurd through those lenses. Regardless, I think an answer which criticizes Scripture with no references is bad form on this site. – Jas 3.1 Jul 06 '12 at 07:25
  • Aside from that fact that you haven't noted a denomination that actually teaches this dichotomy; I think you'd find this to be a the answer given by many Catholic priests. And that's relevant. Because although Catholicism isn't in itself literalistic, the Church doesn't prohibit literalistic interpretations, provided they don't directly conflict with reality. (+1) – svidgen Jul 09 '13 at 15:24
  • @Marc, According to the scriptural account, Noah and crew were on the ark with the animals for just over a full year. I think the water stayed at full levels for about five months, then began to recede. By the seventh month, the first mountaintops were becoming visible. By the ninth month, Noah sent the raven and dove on a reconnaisance flight (only the dove returned). A few days later when he sent the dove again, it returned with an olive leaf, and then a week later it didn't return at all. So by the ninth month, there were at least small olive trees growing in the vicinity... – RSW Aug 08 '13 at 14:01
  • Then two months later, in the eleventh month, Noah removed the cover from the ark to check things out, but the ground was still too muddy where they were at. Finally, after another month, they were able to get off. I always assumed that the new ground would have been extremely fertile, and since the biblical account noted the growth of vegetation nearby since month nine (the small olive trees), and since the highest ground nearby had been visible even earlier since month seven, I just assumed there would have been plenty of vegetation for the animals to eat (moreso as they traveled higher). – RSW Aug 08 '13 at 14:02