Genesis 7:4

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“...and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.”

Sociology, Science, Biology, History, Medical Science, Psychology, Anthropology

Numerology, Precipitation ^{(137) (138) (139) (140) (141) (142) (143)}

Forty days 

This period became afterwards sacred, and was considered a proper space for humiliation. Moses fasted forty days, Deuteronomy 9:9,11; so did Elijah, 1 Kings 19:8; so did our Lord, Matthew 4:2. Forty days’ respite were given to the Ninevites that they might repent, Jonah 3:4; and thrice forty (one hundred and twenty) years were given to the old world for the same gracious purpose, Genesis 6:3. The forty days of Lent, in commemoration of our Lord’s fasting, have a reference to the same thing; as each of these seems to be deduced from this primitive judgment.

This was not an ordinary but an extraordinary rain, in which the power and providence of God were eminently concerned, both with respect to the continuance of it, and the quantity of water that fell. Every living substance that God made was destroyed from off the face of the earth: not every substance that has a vegetative life, as plants, herbs, and trees, which were not destroyed, see Genesis 8:11, but every substance that has animal life, as fowls, cattle, creeping things, and men.

Side note of interest (from Job 28:25):

To make the weight, etc. 

God has given an atmosphere to the earth, which, possessing a certain degree of gravity perfectly suited to the necessities of all animals, vegetables, and fluids, should be the cause, in His hands, of preserving animal and vegetable life; for by it the blood circulates in the veins of animals, and the juices in the tubes of vegetables. Without this atmospheric pressure there could be no respiration; and the elasticity of the particles of air in animal and vegetable bodies, would rupture the vessels in which they are contained, and destroy both kinds of life. Psalm 135:7; Isaiah 40:12.

He weigheth 

He has exactly proportioned the aqueous surface of the earth to the terrene parts, for the purpose of evaporation, etc.