Noah and the Giant
Long ago, there was a man named Noah who was spoken to by God himself. God had told Noah that a great flood was coming to the earth and that he must build an ark in order to save a pair of each of the animals of the world. After years of preparation, the time of the flood was near and Noah had gathered pairs of all the animals of the earth except the unicorn. As the rain started to fall, a pair of giants the size of a mountains approached the Ark. Scared for the animals and the ark, Noah ran to meet the giants to see why they were approaching. "Why are you here, giants? " shouted Noah, "You are both tall enough to withstand the flood and would not fit on my ark anyways!" The male giant boomed a response "It is not the water we fear, as we will be taller than the flood. We fear that we will not be able to find food when the water wipes out the animals and plants. We wish to make a trade." "What trade?" Noah asked. "We see that you have failed to acquire a unicorn for your ark. If you will give us food during the flood we will bring you a unicorn and promise not to harm you, your people or your ark." Noah thought for a moment before agreeing to the trade.
A night passed and the waters slowly started to rise, and Noah thought that the giants had failed to find a unicorn. As soon as Noah started to close the doors of the ark he heard the booming voice of the giant, "Wait!, we have found for you the last unicorn, and our deal is complete." Noah thanked them for keeping their part of the deal and every day of the flood he gave the giants some of the food stored on the ark. When the flood had finally ended, Noah and the animals left the ark to find an empty land. Noah immediately started to plant new crops for the future but the giants were disappointing at the barren land. In anger, the male giant wrecked the progress that Noah had made, breaking his promise not to harm Noah's people or anything on the ark. Noah approached the giants and said "You have broken your promise and must be exiled for your sins, if you ever come back I will use the strength of God to kill you both." The giants ran far away, and struggled to find enough food to sustain them. Years went by and the giants shrunk from the size of mountains to the size of a very large human, and this is where Goliath the giant had his origins.
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| (Noah's Ark, credit to Edward Hicks) |
Author's Notes
In the original story, The Giant and the Flood, a single giant named Og approaches Noah with a unicorn since Noah could not find one. The unicorn was so giant that Noah had to attach a rope to it's horn and as it passed by a mountain the giant jumped on the unicorn so it could steal the unicorn's food as Noah threw it out to it. Noah made a deal with the giant, since the giant was strong enough to destroy the ark, that if he fed the giant then the giant must be his servant when the flood stopped. The giant, out of hunger, agreed to the bargain. After years of serving the humans, Og got tired of the work and tried to kill the humans. Since he broke the promise, Moses killed Og. In my version of the story, I felt that it would make more sense for the giant to live and be an ancestor of Goliath from the famous story, David and Goliath. Because of this, there needed to be two giants so that they could be exiled together and continue the giant bloodline. I also cut out some of the story that I did not think was necessary, like the dialogue where Moses is speaking with a bird, or when Og sacrifices animals to a grape vine.
Bibliography
The Giant and the Flood, Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends by Gertrude Landa.
Very interesting story. I enjoy the changes that you made more than the original and it how it ties into Goliath as well. It would only make sense for 2 giants to be around to make that happen. Only thing is I would really like to know a little more about what happened to the unicorn after the flood was over. Being as it was the main topic around the deal between the giants and Noah.
ReplyDeleteIn the story I considered having the giant bring a pair of unicorn, since that was the purpose of the ark. I decided against that though, seeing that there are clearly no unicorn existing. So ultimately, they went extinct.
DeleteI very much enjoyed reading your story Noah and the Giant. I thought it was interesting how you incorporated the giants into the story of Noah’s Ark. Further, I especially like the ending of how you tied these giants to the biblical character of Goliath the giant. I thought that was very clever and it was for sure a wow moment for me while I was reading the story. I also thought it was a great idea to also include a Unicorn into your story. However, once I was done reading the story I was still curious about the unicorn and what it’s fate was. For instance, now days there are no such things as unicorns so perhaps you could elaborate on what happens to the unicorns that were on the ark. What if when the giants become angry because they couldn’t find food after the flood they end up eating the last of the unicorns instead of tearing up Noah’s crops? This act would still result in Noah exiling them for their sins. Overall, I think you wrote a great story! Keep up the good work ☺
ReplyDeleteSarah,
ReplyDeleteSuch an interesting perspective! I like how you tied in traces of biblical history with traces of mythology. It is funny to picture a conversation between these giants and Noah, negotiating the terms of how to survive the flood. I almost think that had this been twisted in a slightly different way, we might have received a modern explanation for why we don't have unicorns anymore! Perhaps Noah could have had several unicorns on his ark, but the giants wanted a trade because the power of the unicorns would keep them alive during the flood. Regardless, I like your creativity in this story, and also how you used it as a reference point for the history of Goliath!