Genesis 9:1-7
God blesses humanity with renewed purpose while establishing the sanctity of life and accountability under His authority.
1 God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, and replenish the earth.
2 The fear of you and the dread of you will be on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of the sky. Everything that moves along the ground, and all the fish of the sea, are delivered into your hand.
3 Every moving thing that lives will be food for you. As I gave you the green herb, I have given everything to you.
4 But flesh with its life, that is, its blood, you shall not eat.
5 I will surely require accounting for your life’s blood. At the hand of every animal I will require it. At the hand of man, even at the hand of every man’s brother, I will require the life of man.
6 Whoever sheds man’s blood, his blood will be shed by man, for God made man in his own image.
7 Be fruitful and multiply. Increase abundantly in the earth, and multiply in it.”
God blesses humanity with renewed purpose while establishing the sanctity of life and accountability under His authority.
To record God’s blessing upon Noah and his sons, restate the mandate for multiplication, define humanity’s dominion over animals, and establish the sanctity of human life with accountability for bloodshed.
God Blesses Noah, Establishes His Covenant, and Displays Both Common Grace and Ongoing Human Sin
After the flood God graciously reorders human life through blessing and covenant, yet the persistence of sin in Noah’s own household shows that preservation and external renewal do not remove the deep corruption of the human heart.