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K. Bangert
much of the evidence. (Haarmann 2003) Christian and Siegfried Schoppe have even
connected the Black Sea Flood to Plato’s Atlantis Saga (Schoppe and Schoppe 2004).
The scenario was also supported by two Indian geographers (Roy and Mukhopadhyay
2014). And various media have reported on these findings (for an example, see Axel
Bojanowski 2010).
What remains a matter of conjecture though is whether the Black Sea Flood
constitutes the historical basis for the biblical flood narrative. What speaks in favor
of this connection are the flood stories that sprang up around the Black Sea. While it is
true that flood stories have been discovered all around the world, the most prominent
and detailed ones, however, were found in the vicinity of the Black Sea, such as the
biblical narrative, the Gilgamesh Epic or the Greek Deucalion legend. If we assume
that indeed there was a near-miraculous rescue story of one family having luckily
survived the Black Sea Flood on a houseboat that eventually landed on the eastern
shores of today’s Black Sea, then it takes no phantasy to assume that this story was
told all around the Near East and even beyond.
This brings us to the question of whether the biblical flood was a worldwide event
or a regional occurrence. While there can be no doubt that those who transmitted
Noah’s story and included it in the Genesis account considered the flood to be worldwide, it is also true that no serious geologist alive today would speak of any evidence
for a worldwide flood. Nevertheless: What are we to make of the numerous flood
stories that have sprung up all around the world? There are some 500 of them. Biblicists claim that the mere existence of these flood stories prove beyond a reasonable
doubt that there must have been a worldwide flood.
What these biblical literalists overlook, though, is that each of the worldwide
flood stories tells of a handful of survivors: either a married couple, a pair of siblings
or one large family. If indeed there was a worldwide flood and there were surviving
families all around the world, then this would obviously belie the biblical narrative
according to which only one single family survived—namely Noah’s family in the
Near East. The only alternative explanation, then, for the many flood stories with
numerous survivors would be to assume that the story of the rescued family actually
travelled from one place to all corners of the earth, thereby being transformed and
adapted to the respective local environment (for instance, the mountain upon which
the boat or the raft was supposed to have landed, usually assumed the name of a
local mountain). If that is the case, then the numerous flood stories are anything but
a proof for a worldwide flood. A review of the literature on the world’s flood stories
suggests that these accounts are likely to have travelled from the Near East to the
rest of the world (cf. Isaak 1996–2002) (For an extensive discussion of the effects
of the Black Sea Flood and its cultural, linguistic and theological implication for the
interpretation of the biblical flood story, see Bangert 2015, pp. 60–136).
K. Bangert
much of the evidence. (Haarmann 2003) Christian and Siegfried Schoppe have even
connected the Black Sea Flood to Plato’s Atlantis Saga (Schoppe and Schoppe 2004).
The scenario was also supported by two Indian geographers (Roy and Mukhopadhyay
2014). And various media have reported on these findings (for an example, see Axel
Bojanowski 2010).
What remains a matter of conjecture though is whether the Black Sea Flood
constitutes the historical basis for the biblical flood narrative. What speaks in favor
of this connection are the flood stories that sprang up around the Black Sea. While it is
true that flood stories have been discovered all around the world, the most prominent
and detailed ones, however, were found in the vicinity of the Black Sea, such as the
biblical narrative, the Gilgamesh Epic or the Greek Deucalion legend. If we assume
that indeed there was a near-miraculous rescue story of one family having luckily
survived the Black Sea Flood on a houseboat that eventually landed on the eastern
shores of today’s Black Sea, then it takes no phantasy to assume that this story was
told all around the Near East and even beyond.
This brings us to the question of whether the biblical flood was a worldwide event
or a regional occurrence. While there can be no doubt that those who transmitted
Noah’s story and included it in the Genesis account considered the flood to be worldwide, it is also true that no serious geologist alive today would speak of any evidence
for a worldwide flood. Nevertheless: What are we to make of the numerous flood
stories that have sprung up all around the world? There are some 500 of them. Biblicists claim that the mere existence of these flood stories prove beyond a reasonable
doubt that there must have been a worldwide flood.
What these biblical literalists overlook, though, is that each of the worldwide
flood stories tells of a handful of survivors: either a married couple, a pair of siblings
or one large family. If indeed there was a worldwide flood and there were surviving
families all around the world, then this would obviously belie the biblical narrative
according to which only one single family survived—namely Noah’s family in the
Near East. The only alternative explanation, then, for the many flood stories with
numerous survivors would be to assume that the story of the rescued family actually
travelled from one place to all corners of the earth, thereby being transformed and
adapted to the respective local environment (for instance, the mountain upon which
the boat or the raft was supposed to have landed, usually assumed the name of a
local mountain). If that is the case, then the numerous flood stories are anything but
a proof for a worldwide flood. A review of the literature on the world’s flood stories
suggests that these accounts are likely to have travelled from the Near East to the
rest of the world (cf. Isaak 1996–2002) (For an extensive discussion of the effects
of the Black Sea Flood and its cultural, linguistic and theological implication for the
interpretation of the biblical flood story, see Bangert 2015, pp. 60–136).