1So God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth.
2And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be on every beast of the earth, on every bird of the air, on all that move on the earth, and on all the fish of the sea. They are given into your hand.
3Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.
4But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood.
5Surely for your lifeblood I will demand a reckoning; from the hand of every beast I will require it, and from the hand of man. From the hand of every man’s brother I will require the life of man.
6“Whoever sheds man’s blood,
By man his blood shall be shed;
For in the image of God
He made man.
7And as for you, be fruitful and multiply;
Bring forth abundantly in the earth
And multiply in it.”
8Then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying:
9“And as for Me, behold, I establish My covenant with you and with your 9:9 Lit. seeddescendants after you,
10and with every living creature that is with you: the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you, of all that go out of the ark, every beast of the earth.
11Thus I establish My covenant with you: Never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood; never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.”
12And God said: “This is the sign of the covenant which I make between Me and you, and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:
13I set My rainbow in the cloud, and it shall be for the sign of the covenant between Me and the earth.
14It shall be, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the rainbow shall be seen in the cloud;
15and I will remember My covenant which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh; the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh.
16The rainbow shall be in the cloud, and I will look on it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.”
17And God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant which I have established between Me and all flesh that is on the earth.”
Noah and His Sons
18Now the sons of Noah who went out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And Ham was the father of Canaan.
19These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was populated.
20And Noah began to be a farmer, and he planted a vineyard.
21Then he drank of the wine and was drunk, and became uncovered in his tent.
22And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brothers outside.
23But Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it on both their shoulders, and went backward and covered the nakedness of their father. Their faces were 9:23 Lit. backwardsturned away, and they did not see their father’s nakedness.
“Cursed be Canaan;
A servant of servants
He shall be to his brethren.”
26And he said:
“Blessed be the Lord,
The God of Shem,
And may Canaan be his servant.
27May God enlarge Japheth,
And may he dwell in the tents of Shem;
And may Canaan be his servant.”
New King James Version®, Copyright© 1982, Thomas Nelson. All rights reserved.
