My Recommendation: Qumran Interpretation of the Genesis Flood

Jeremy D. Lyon, Qumran Interpretation of the Genesis Flood (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2015) focuses on four key Qumran fragmentary manuscripts with significant contributions to the study of the Genesis Flood: the Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen), a commentary on Genesis (4Q252), an admonition based on the Flood (4Q370), and a paraphrase of Genesis and Exodus (4Q422). Lyon set his sights on performing a literary analysis of these four texts in order to understand the various ways in which the Qumran scribes or their community interpreted the biblical account of the Flood of Noah’s time. The goal of this work involves “developing a more comprehensive Qumran Flood theology” (11).

Findings from these manuscripts involve interpreting the 120 years of Genesis 6:3, the cause(s) of the Flood, the Flood’s chronology, those who perished in the Flood, the ark’s landing, the Flood’s purpose, the Flood as judgment, the Flood as a reversal and renewal of creation, the Flood as a restoration of Eden and anticipation of the land of promise, and the Flood as an archetype of eschatological judgment.

In 2014, Dr. Lyon joined Logos Research Associates as a Research Associate. Since August 2014, he has been Associate Professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Truett-McConnell University.  In the near future Pickwick Publications (an imprint of Wipf & Stock) will publish Lyon’s second volume, Qumran Interpretation of Genesis 1 Creation.

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