ESSAY
Look to the Birds
POSTED
October 12, 2021

The Bible reader that is mindful of patterns, is aware of the creation markers of Noah’s flood. The Earth is deformed and is made into a ball of water, which then is made new with new promises and obligations to the New Adam (Noah) and his offspring. One of the curious parts of the flood account comes in Genesis 8:6-12 when the raven and dove are sent out. I was raised in a literalistic Baptist church so I was always told the raven went first because it is more crafty and survivable, and the dove is sent secondly because the dove is more delicate and would return to Noah. There may be some helpful ornithology here, but it’s hardly taking into consideration the patterns God uses in creation and how He uses animals. How, then, are the dove and the raven participating in the new creation? Why this sequence? What does it mean?

Ravens are a ubiquitous bird, and are indeed known for their cunning even their ability to speak. They are carrion birds, and so the raven could have been feeding on dead carcasses on the earth during Noah’s wait to leave the ark1. Noah also has two of every kind of animal, which would include eagles, gulls, no doubt vultures which could all perform the same duties (Gen 7:15). There must be something specific about the raven that the Lord ordained it’s use at this point in the flood sequence. We can look at the usage of ravens throughout scripture to see what and how the Bible says about them. In Leviticus and Deuteronomy they are listed with the unclean animals (because they eat death), in 1 Kings they feed Elijah during a drought, they pluck out the eyes of mockers in Proverbs, and they posses cursed lands in Isaiah2.

The short account in 1 Kings 17:1-6 provides some helpful supplements. Elijah has just told of a drought to come and the Lord sends him out by a river. He stays by the river and drinks from it while ravens bring him bread. This is an interesting riff on Job 38:51 and Luke 12:24 where the Lord says He provides for the raven so we ought not fret about our provision. The ravens are also attached to a time of judgment (flood and drought). The judgment of the drought is bringing death, and ravens as unclean animals are beasts that touch the curse of death. In both situations the ravens preside over the receding of waters.

What of previously established patterns in creation? When God creates time, it is set according to evening and morning. Dark then light. There is an etymological relationship between “raven” and “evening”. The Hebrew for evening in Genesis chapter 1 is “e’reb” and the Hebrew for raven is “oreb”3. They behave similarly to a pun or a strong rhyme. Noah “sends out” the raven from the ark once the ark comes to rest on land after the 40 days of waiting4. We have connections to the ark as a type of Christ, as a type of God’s presence on Earth elsewhere in scripture, (1 Pt 3:20-21). From the ark, just as in the first creation, comes in the initiation of the new creation clock. First evening, then morning (Gen 1:5)?

The action of the raven fills out this connection of the raven as a type of evening. The ESV has a poor translation of the verb “וָשׁ֔וֹב  ” into “to and fro”. The verb implies the raven is just maneuvering about never to be seen again. The translation from Everett Fox is more helpful as he renders the verb, “returning”[5]. The verb has a meaning, “to turn back, return, go back to where you came from” [6]. This rendering is more helpful as it shows us a pattern of returns and departures. Each day the raven (evening) would go out from the ark, and return to “end/start” the day.

The dove is not as clean a case as the raven. For starters the dove is only released 3 times. The etymology doesn’t give a great deal of insight either. While dove and day are constructed of similar Hebrew letters, there is no strong root connection as with raven and evening that would imply the sorts of puns our Lord delights in5. There is a great deal elsewhere in the Bible about doves that we can pull into our study.

In Song of Solomon 2:12-14 the dove is a symbol of beauty, of life after a storm residing in a rock. Rock dwelling doves is picked up again in Jeremiah 48:28 rocks are a place the dove finds safety. There are also the usages of dove to represent the Holy Spirit at Christ’s baptism. Going back to 1 Peter 3:20-22 tells us that baptism carries the weight of the flood, and Christ is our ark. We can start seeing pieces come together. All who are baptized into Christ are made new creations (Rom 6:3-4). In Christ walls of hostility are brought down, and he is our sabbath rest (Eph 2:14, Heb 4). The dove as a white bird, may be importing some “day” into the new creation after the flood, or it may be doing something more weighty.

Noah sends the dove out after the raven the first time and she returns empty handed. Noah is then said to wait “another seven days” in verse 10. The same phrase is used before the third departure in verse 12. We have to understand that the dove was sent out the first time on the seventh day after the raven (evening) first went out. The dove is establishing sabbath rest in the new creation. The raven is the unclean bird (the bird of the curse, labor, death) the dove is a clean bird (a bird of life and blessing), a liturgically fit bird, thus the light bird is establishing a liturgical pattern. The dove makes three trips, one she returns empty, two she returns with an olive branch, third she does not return. On the dove’s first return we are told she could find “no resting place for her foot”6. The dove did not have sabbath available on the first set of seven days. The dove finally finding rest on the third seven, completes the resurrection motif. Ressurection comes on the thirds, Jonah from the belly of the whale, to Jesus from the belly of the earth. After the water judgment the righteous can emerge from death and inherit their rest. The hope escalates with the return of the olive branch, showing peace with God has come and he is preparing a home for Noah and the beasts to rest in.

The pattern of the dark bird and white bird, evening, morning, work and rest, give us reason to be wondrous observers of our God’s creation. He has not established beasts, birds, and numbers just for arbitrary background characters to have something to do. Rather, the birds also demonstrate the patterns come from above, the heavens. God gives birds as types of angelic hosts in our most immediate heaven. His care for them is only superseded by His care for us. If the Lord was so delighted by his birds to use them as mediators of his new creation pattern, then how much more so has he bestowed us with the authority to uphold and honor such patterns. We ought to delight in the gift of God’s poetry and be captivated by the beauty and depth of His Word. Don’t be so quick to read the pragmatic purpose of beasts in scripture and leave it alone. Don’t dismiss God’s graces.


Matt Corey, along with his wife and their three children live in Maine. He is a pastor in the CREC, a teacher at Mirus Academy, a writer, and musician.


  1. Bromiley, Geoffrey William. The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Vol. 4, W.B. Eerdmans, 1974. ↩︎
  2. Bagster. Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. Bagster, 1974.
    [Interlinear Bible]-Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages, biblehub.com/. ↩︎
  3. Strong, James. Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance: with Greek and Hebrew Dictionary. Manna Publishers. ↩︎
  4. Zodhiates, Spiros, and John R. Kohlenberger. The Hebrew-Greek Key Study Bible: New International Version. AMG Pub., 1996. ↩︎
  5. Strong, James. Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance: with Greek and Hebrew Dictionary. Manna Publishers. ↩︎
  6. [5,8] : Fox, Everett. The Five Books of Moses (The Schocken Bible. V. 1). New York Schocken Books, 1995.
    [all scripture references] : The Holy Bible: English Standard Version, Containing the Old and New Testaments. Crossway Books, 2014.
    ↩︎
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