Chapter 6 begins with a curious account of the sons of God having children with the daughters of Earth. There are two main interpretations the “sons of God,” either they are followers of God having children with non-believers, or some sort of angels that came down and had offspring with humans. The results of these unions became heroes and renowned men of old.

I read some Greek mythology in High School. The half-human, half-god offspring were also called heroes like Hercules and Perseus. The Bible calls them Nephilim and other verses refer to them as giants. Lots of people have speculated on this, but either way the result was that God was not happy with the situation. 

God said his spirit would not contend with men living so long, and so he would limit their lifespan to 120 years. There are no humans in our modern world that have lived as long as the men in the last chapter. The oldest modern person is around 115 years old. 

Anyway, the offensive thing to God was the wickedness of men and their constant, evil activities. This gives some strength to the argument that real issue was bad people outnumbering the good, rather than angel-human hybrids. God said he was sorry he made people, and intended to blot them all out, but he found favor with Noah.

The Earth that God had formally declared as good, he now considered corrupt and evil. So God told Noah that he intended to end most of humanity, and instructed him to build a boat of gopher wood. We don’t know gopher wood is, whether it is a specific species of tree or a treatment of the wood in order to make a boat. Noah is supposed to cover the boat in pitch or tar to make it waterproof. He has to build separate rooms in the boat and make it 300 cubits long, which is about 150 meters or one-and-a-half football fields long for our American friends. He was also instructed to construct three decks, a roof and a side door. The purpose of this boat is to protect Noah, his wife, sons and sons’ wives, and two of every dry-land creature from a massive flood that God would be sending.

In addition to acquiring a male and female of every animal, Noah had to gather and store massive amounts of food to sustain every one. And so Noah becomes the original Doomsday prepper.