Genesis 6:17

And behold, I will bring floodwaters upon the earth to destroy every creature under the heavens that has the breath of life. Everything on the earth will perish.

Berean Standard Bible

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Study note

Setting — God addresses Noah directly, positioned between the ark's construction orders (v. 16) and the covenant promise (v. 18). This is the declaration of what the ark is being built to survive.

The words — הַמַּבּוּל (hamabbûl), "the flood," is a rare Hebrew noun used only a handful of times in the Old Testament, marking this as a unique, named event rather than a generic rain. The emphatic הִנְנִי (hinnēnî), "behold, I," foregrounds the speaker's personal agency.

The thread — Genesis 7:4 supplies the mechanism (rain, forty days and nights) and the phrase "wipe from the face of the earth," while Genesis 7:21 records the result. 2 Peter 2:5 reinterprets the event as judgment on "ungodly people" with Noah preserved as "a preacher of righteousness."

Why it lands — The scope is total: "everything on the earth will perish," qualified only by the phrase "that has the breath of life." The reader is asked to hold the full weight of a universal judgment without softening it into a metaphor or a warning about weather.

Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.

The Hebrew words

King James Version

And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.

Cross-references

Genesis 7:4 For seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living thing I have made.”
2 Peter 2:5 if He did not spare the ancient world when He brought the flood on its ungodly people, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, among the eight;
Genesis 7:21 And every living thing that moved upon the earth perished—birds, livestock, animals, every creature that swarms upon the earth, and all mankind.
Psalms 107:34 and fruitful land into fields of salt, because of the wickedness of its dwellers.
Hebrews 11:7 By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in godly fear built an ark to save his family. By faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
1 Peter 3:20 who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In the ark a few people, only eight souls, were saved through water.
Psalms 29:10 The LORD sits enthroned over the flood; the LORD is enthroned as King forever.
Amos 9:6 He builds His upper rooms in the heavens and founds His vault upon the earth. He summons the waters of the sea and pours them over the face of the earth. The LORD is His name.
Genesis 6:7 So the LORD said, “I will blot out man, whom I have created, from the face of the earth—every man and beast and crawling creature and bird of the air—for I am grieved that I have made them.”
Genesis 6:13 Then God said to Noah, “The end of all living creatures has come before Me, because through them the earth is full of violence. Now behold, I will destroy both them and the earth.