Nuh in the Qur'an and the Bible

Nuh (Noah) is one of the great prophets in Islam, sometimes called the “second Adam” because human life began again with him after the flood. The Qur'an mentions him in twenty-eight surahs; the Bible tells his story in Genesis, chapters 5 to 10. Writing from a Muslim perspective, the authors compare the two accounts of his character and his mission.

In the Qur'an, the paper shows, Nuh is above all a caller to tawhid, the worship of the One God. Passages such as 7:59–64 and 10:71–73 show him urging his people to worship Allah alone, answering their insults calmly, asking no reward from them and trusting Allah against their plots. The authors note that the opposition was led by the chiefs of his people, and draw lessons from his patience for preachers today. Genesis, they argue, says almost nothing about his preaching and concentrates on the ark and the flood.

The authors then point to tensions they see within the Genesis text. Noah is told in one place to take two of every animal and in another seven pairs of clean animals; one verse gives forty days of rain while another says the waters prevailed for 150 days; and the ark rests on the mountains of Ararat months before the mountain tops are seen. They contrast the statement that God “smelled a sweet savor” from Noah's offering with Qur'an 22:37, which says that neither the flesh nor the blood of a sacrifice reaches Allah, only taqwa (God-consciousness). They also argue that because Noah's companions were saved through faith and obedience, the story shows salvation without the Christian doctrine of atonement.

Finally, the paper rejects the Genesis passage in which Noah becomes drunk and uncovered after the flood, arguing that it cannot be true of a prophet, whom Islam holds to be protected from grave sin. In the Qur'an, by contrast, Nuh is a model of faith and humility, as when he asks Allah about his drowned son and at once seeks forgiveness. The authors conclude that the Qur'anic portrait is the more exalted and consistent one.