Did Noah's Flood Occur in the Lake Van Basin?

See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/338435463 DID NOAH'S FLOOD OCCUR IN THE LAKE VAN BASIN? Conference Paper · January 2020 CITATIONS READS 0 491 1 author: Ilham Gadjimuradov Baku State University 9 PUBLICATIONS 1 CITATION SEE PROFILE Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects: Ethnology of Caucasus View project Geoarchaeology of Lake Van Basin View project All content following this page was uploaded by Ilham Gadjimuradov on 07 January 2020. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file. INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON MYTHOLOGY 2-5 May 2019 / Ardahan-Turkey ULUSLARARASI MİTOLOJİ SEMPOZYUMU 2-5 Mayıs 2019 / Ardahan-TÜRKİYE PROCEEDINGS BOOK MYTHOLOGYSYMPOSIUM.COM BİLDİRİ KİTABI ARDAHAN.EDU.TR/ISOM DID NOAH’S FLOOD OCCUR IN THE LAKE VAN BASIN? Ilham GADJIMURADOV1 Abstract: The biblical account of Noah’s Flood in the Old Testament states that the ark landed on the Mountains of Ararat. Elsewhere in the Bible there are references to a Land of Ararat north of Assyria. This suggests that the legend of the Flood may have been set in the area of the ancient Kingdom of Urartu around Lake Van. The Lake Van region is an important area for geomythology. Since the Pleistocene the adjacent volcanoes were an important source of obsidian, and early metallurgy developed in the region. In the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze age since 7000 years BP the climate became favorable for human settlements, agriculture and livestock rearing. Lake Van is set in a tectonically active area along a subduction zone. Earthquakes occur along major faults, and Nemrut Volcano was active in the Holocene. Volcanic eruptions would have been witnessed by people living in the area and may have inspired ancient legends. People migrating from and travelling through the region could have spread these legends to adjacent areas in Mesopotamia and the Levant. Lake Van is a closed basin, and the lake level is influenced by climatic and tectonic processes. Short lived catastrophic rises in lake level of Lake Van may have occurred since the beginning of the Chalcolithic linked to exceptionally heavy rainfall related to volcanic eruptions, or to tsunamis created by earthquakes or by pyroclastic flows entering the lake. One of these catastrophic events before the Middle Bronze Age may have given rise to the legend of Noah’s Flood. Future geoarchaeological research is required to clarify the changes in lake level of Lake Van during the Holocene and locate ancient settlements below the current lake level. These surveys could be integrated with de- tailed interdisciplinary studies of Holocene volcanic and tectonic activity and climate changeKeywords: to better understand the fluctuations of the lake level. Noah´s Flood, Ararat, Urartu, Lake Van, young volcanoes, lake level 1 Geologist, M.A. Bonn, Germany. [email protected] 490 INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM on MYTHOLOGY 2 - 5 may 2019 / ARDAHAN UNIVERSITY 1. Introduction A problem common to all of the various theories about the Flood is that none of them provide a credible explanation for the very rapid rise in water level that would have been necessary to destroy an entire civilization in the manner depicted in the Old Testament. In the mind of a geologist, the flood stories that have come down to us in writings that originated in the ancient Near East suggest that they could be related to a catastrophic event that took place in an enclosed volcanic area. In general, it can be said that the volcanic phenomena described in the Old Testament have not yet received much attention from persons engaged in Biblical research. There is a description of the volcanic eruption that destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:24). God is reported to have appeared to the Jews during their Exodus in the form of a pillar of smoke during the day and a pillar of fire during the night to guide them (Exodus 13:21-22). God is said to have descended down in fire onto Mount Sinai while smoke billowed up from it as if from a furnace and the whole mountain trembled violently (Exodus 19:16-19). These and numerous other passages in the Bible depicting fiery phenomena on mountains leave no doubt that what the authors of these texts were describing was originally based on reports by persons who had witnessed volcanic activity. However, no one has ever come up with a logical explanation as to where this volcanic activity could have taken place. There aren’t any young volcanoes in Egypt, in southern Mesopotamia, and in the Levant, where Old Testament stories are usually thought to have taken place. For this reason, references to volcanic phenomena in the Old Testament have often been interpreted2. The Term as Ararat allegories. in the Biblical Flood Story and Kingdom of Urartu mountains of Ararat The Old Testament tells us that Noah’s Ark came to rest in the when the flood waters receded (Genesis 8:4). This mountain range in the Land of Ararat was later confused with Mount Ararat in northeasternMasis Turkey,Ağrı on Dağıthe border to present-day Agirî Armenia. The latter mountain has very different-sounding namesArarat in the regional languages ( in Armenian, in Turkish, Çiyayê in Kurdish). It was not until sometimeArarat in the Middle Ages that began to be used as a designation for this particular mountain (Petrosyan 2016:68-80). By con- trast, the term in the Flood story, as elsewhere in the Bible, refers to a kingdom Kingdomlocated north of Urartu of Assyria (Jeremiah 51:27, 2 Kings 19:37, Isaiah 37:38). This, in Urartuturn, is a referenceArarat to what is known to ancient his- torians as the with its center at Lake Van (Fig. 1). The different spellings of and are a result of the fact that only 491 DID NOAH’S FLOOD OCCUR IN THE LAKE VAN BASIN? rrt the consonants of words are written out in Semitic languages (in this case only ) and that the vocalization of a given word can vary. In the Islamic tradition Mount UrartuJudi is believed to have been the mountainUrartu Noah’s Ark came to rest on (Surah 11:44). It is located south of Lake Van, not far from the heartland of . The first known mention of dates back to the 9th century BCE, when it was described as being an independent state and an adversary of Assyria. A key characteristic of this region is the pres- ence of a number of young volcanoes which continued to be active on into historical times and could have played an important role in the shaping of mythological3. Noah´s Flood and and religious Lake traditions.Van in Eastern Anatolia The area around Lake Van is a focal point of tectonic activity. The East- ern Anatolian volcanic axis passes through here along fault lines that ex- tend from Mount Nemrut (2935 m) to Mount Süphan (4434 m) under the western and northwestern shores of Lake Van andVan from Gölü there northeastGola- Wanêwards via Mount TendürekWana Lič (3538 m) and ThospitisMount Ararat Lacus (5165 m) to Tran- scaucasia (Schweizer 1975). Lake Van (Turkish , Kurdish , Armenian , Greek/Latin ) is 1650 meters above sea level, alkaline, saline, and up to 450 meters deep. It sits in a tectonically active zone at the intersection of the Eurasian, Anatolian, and Arabian plates (Fig. 2). It was created in the valley of the rivers Bendimahi and Zilan as a result of the fact that their outflow towards the Tigris and Euphrates was blocked off by lava flows from Mount Nemrut (Maxson 1936, p. 49-57). There is no other region in the Near East where there are so many young volcanoes concentrated in a relatively small area. Massive eruptions have occurred here in the current post-glacial period and, in part, in historical times. Pertinent passages in the Flood narrative make more sense when we realize that they have a volcanic background. During the Flood water came not only in the form of rain from above but also burst forth from below (Genesis 7: 11-12; Surah 54:11-12). It could be a reflection of gey- sers and hot springs generally associated with young volcanic areas such as those seen in Yellowstone National Park and in Iceland. Heavy rainfall is a phenomenon that can occur as a result of volcanic eruptions. The eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia in 1815 had a strong influence on global weather conditions, causing what was described at the time as “endless rain” in various parts of the world (Stothers 1984:1191-1198). Also of interest here are references to hot and boiling water in versions of the Flood story foundoven in boiling extra-Biblical over Hebrew sources (Talmud, Rosh Hashanah 12a). The corresponding part of the flood narration in the Quran speaks of an (Surah 11:40). This, once again, is 492 INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM on MYTHOLOGY 2 - 5 may 2019 / ARDAHAN UNIVERSITY an indication that the Flood occurred in a volcanic area. There is a large lake in the crater of Mount Nemrut, Lake Nemrut. In a volcanic eruption, the water in this lake could be heated and then end up flowing down into Lake Van in the form of lahars (flows of hot slurry), which would signif- icantly increase the water level there within a short period of time. The melting of snow in the mountains and heavy rainfall due to volcanic activity should be taken into account as factors in a related flood event. The fact that Lake Van does not have a drainage outlet would be a contribut- ing factor to a rapid rise of the water level in any flood scenario.

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