For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark.
Parallel translations
- WEB For as in those days which were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ship,
- KJV For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,
- NKJV For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,
- NASB For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,
- NLT In those days before the flood, the people were enjoying banquets and parties and weddings right up to the time Noah entered his boat.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Before the flood people ate, drank, and married, absorbed in daily life. They ignored the coming judgment.
Overview
Jesus highlights how Noah's contemporaries continued ordinary, even legitimate, activities while disregarding God's warning. Their sin was a settled indifference to the judgment Noah proclaimed. Such absorption in the present blinded them to what was coming. The lesson is to live each day mindful that the Lord will return and call all to account.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Luke 17:26–28Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man:
- Rom 13:13–14Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy.
- Luke 14:18–20But one after another they all began to make excuses. The first one said, ‘I have bought a field, and I need to go see it. Please excuse me.’
- Luke 12:45But suppose that servant says in his heart, ‘My master will be a long time in coming,’ and he begins to beat the menservants and maidservants, and to eat and drink and get drunk.
- Gen 6:2the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they took as wives whomever they chose.
- Matt 22:30In the resurrection, people will neither marry nor be given in marriage. Instead, they will be like the angels in heaven.
- Luke 12:19Then I will say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take it easy. Eat, drink, and be merry!”’
- Amos 6:3–6You dismiss the day of calamity and bring near a reign of violence.
- Isa 22:12–14On that day the Lord GOD of Hosts called for weeping and wailing, for shaven heads and the wearing of sackcloth.
- Luke 21:34But watch yourselves, or your hearts will be weighed down by dissipation, drunkenness, and the worries of life—and that day will spring upon you suddenly like a snare.
- 1 Cor 7:29–31What I am saying, brothers, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none;
- Ezek 16:49–50Now this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed, and complacent; they did not help the poor and needy.
- 1 Sam 30:16–17So he led David down, and there were the Amalekites spread out over all the land, eating, drinking, and celebrating the great amount of plunder they had taken from the land of the Philistines and the land of Judah.
- 1 Sam 25:36–38When Abigail returned to Nabal, there he was in the house, holding a feast fit for a king, in high spirits and very drunk. So she told him nothing until morning light.
- Gen 7:7And Noah and his wife, with his sons and their wives, entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Matthew presents Jesus as the promised King — son of David, son of Abraham — the new Moses and true Israel in whom every prophecy reaches 'that it might be fulfilled.'
How Matthew 24:38 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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