Genesis 7:17-18

17, 18. Forty days That is, as we understand it, for forty days the rain burst from the “lattices of heaven,” and the waters rushed from the great deep upon the subsiding land . At last they lifted up the ark from off the earth, so that it went upon the face of the waters. Repetitions like those in Genesis 7:17-19 (comp . also Genesis 7:12, and Genesis 7:20-23) favour the theory that the narrative is a compilation from different documents; but the compiler may as well have been Moses or one of his contemporaries as any writer living a thousand years later.