Passage

Genesis 7.15

Book: Genesis · NASB95

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV

13. In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark; 14. they, and every beast after its kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, every bird of every sort.

15. And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh wherein is the breath of life.

And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God commanded him: and Jehovah shut him in. 17. And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lifted up above the earth. (Genesis 7:13-17, ASV)

WEB

13. In the same day Noah, and Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them, entered into the ship, 14. they, and every animal after its kind, all the livestock after their kind, every creeping thing that creeps on the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, every bird of every sort.

15. Pairs from all flesh with the breath of life in them went into the ship to Noah.

Those who went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God commanded him; then Yahweh shut him in. 17. The flood was forty days on the earth. The waters increased, and lifted up the ship, and it was lifted up above the earth. (Genesis 7:13-17, WEB)

KJV

13. In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark; 14. They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort. ^{sort: Heb. wing}

15. And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life.

And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him: and the LORD shut him in. 17. And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth. (Genesis 7:13-17, KJV)

YLT

13. In this self-same day went in Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, sons of Noah, and Noah's wife and the three wives of his sons with them, unto the ark; 14. they, and every living creature after its kind, and every beast after its kind, and every creeping thing that is creeping on the earth after its kind, and every fowl after its kind, every bird, every wing.

15. And they come in unto Noah, unto the ark, two by two of all the flesh in which [is] a living spirit;

and they that are coming in, male and female of all flesh, have come in as God hath commanded him, and Jehovah doth close [it] for him. 17. And the deluge is forty days on the earth, and the waters multiply, and lift up the ark, and it is raised up from off the earth; (Genesis 7:13-17, YLT)

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Setting

Speaker: the narrator of Genesis
Audience: Israel, and every later reader of the Torah
Location: the antediluvian world, at the ark
Time period: Noah's six hundredth year, the day the Flood began

Theological reading

And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh wherein is the breath of life. The phrase breath of life (ruach chayyim) appears in 6:17 for what the Flood will destroy and here for what the ark will preserve. The same category of creatures stands on both sides of the door.

That is the logic of the ark. Judgment and rescue are not applied to different kinds of being. Every creature with breath is under the sentence of 6:17, and representatives of every such creature are carried through it. The difference is not in the creatures but in where they are when the waters come.

The next verse closes the scene: and Jehovah shut him in (7:16). Noah built the ark and entered it, but the door is shut by God. Jesus uses the picture of a shut door in the parable of the ten virgins (Matthew 25:10), and Luke records his warning that the days of the Son of man will be as the days of Noah, when the flood came, and destroyed them all (Luke 17:27).

Key words

Theologically-loaded Greek or Hebrew words in this verse may have entries in the lexicon. Curated to roughly 100 contested terms across the corpus, not every word.

H1320 - basar, basar, Strong's H1320
H7307 - ruach, ruach, Strong's H7307
H2416 - chay, chay, Strong's H2416

Quoted in

Lexicon:

H7307 - ruach

Notes

Your annotations.

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.