God's instructions to Noah (Genesis 6:13-22)

This is the longest continuous speech thus far in the book of Genesis.  It contains God's instructions to Noah to escape the oncoming flood.

God tells Noah to:

1.  Build an ark of cypress wood
God gives Noah specific details about the dimensions (300 x 50 x 30, cubits).  It also should include a skylight at the top and a door on the side.

2.  Collect animals
A male and female of every kind.  We later see Noah collected seven of every clean and unclean animal.

3.  Collect food
Some of every type to serve as food Noah and his family and the animals.  Collecting plants would allow all terrestrial plant life to survive the food.

Taking the story as it is laid out, an open question is -- how much God would help Noah in doing all of this?  After all, God is about to do a major supernatural event.  Noah is asked to an awful lot.

I think it is usually assumed that God helped Noah at least with the collection of animals.  Animals are not corralled or herded without a herdsmen or someone directing their activity.  Likewise, how would Noah know which animals is every kind unless God tells him so.

More realistically, and I think tends to be overlooked in depictions of Noah's Ark, some animals would need their character changed.  Some would be dangerous to either Noah or other animals.  For instance, it would not help the survival of zebras if lions ate all of them while on the ark.

Likewise, collecting enough food for them is a major undertaking, let alone collect the cypress wood necessary for the ark.

Noah could reasonably either (1) be a lumberjack and collect the wood, (2) build the ark, (3) collect animals, (4) grow voluminous amounts of food, or (5) collect the food harvests, but probably could not do all five simultaneously.

In depictions of the story that I have seen, God gives Noah the lumber and Noah is the shipbuilder.  Likewise, God sends the animals, two by two, to Noah.  Plants are usually overlooked in depictions, but God would have to do the same.


Undoing Creation and Re-creation
What is about to happen is simultaneously an doing of creation and its re-creation.

God is about to change the boundary of earth, sea, and sky, which were set in Days Two and Three of Creation Week.  This change in the boundaries will unleash waters and kill animals, plants, and humanity, undoing the creation of life on Days Three, Five and Six.

We also will see a re-creation.  In order for the animals to live happily together on the ark, they must be returned to the condition they had in the Garden of Eden.  In other words, the ark itself must be a vegetarian community, at least for the animals.  So, assuming assuming that happens, then creation is happening a second time, and whatever tainted nature the animals had due to man's corruption is being undone.

Of course, we will see a new population of people, just like with Adam and Eve.  God is starting humanity over with Noah.