The Search For Noah’s Ark -- By: John D. Morris

Journal: Bible and Spade (First Run)
Volume: BSP 03:3 (Summer 1974)
Article: The Search For Noah’s Ark
Author: John D. Morris


The Search For Noah’s Ark

John D. Morris

[John Morris, Field Research Scientist for the Institute for Creation Research, received his B.S. degree in civil engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in 1968. He is author of Adventure on Ararat and lectures extensively throughout the country on the progress and implications of the search for Noah’s Ark.]

Much research has been done in the past 30 years to determine whether the Ark still exists, high up in a stationary ice pack on Mount Ararat in Turkey. It seems unlikely that on a volcanic mountain, in an earthquake-prone region, surrounded by a moving glacier, that any portion of the vessel could have survived for 5,000 or so years. But the evidence suggests that it has. Listed below are a number of the more significant accounts of its presence. Though no one of these is conclusive in itself, the large number of them is significant.

(1) Ancient historians such as Josephus, of the Jews, and Berosus, the Greek historian who wrote about the Babylonians, mention in their writings that the Ark was still in existence at the time of their writing.

(2) Medieval historians and travelers, such as Marco Polo, likewise point out that, according to the Armenians, the Ark was still at that time preserved in the mountain where it had grounded.

(3) The early 19th century was a time of conflict between those who believed that the earth developed in a uniform manner and those who believed that it developed by means of catastrophic events. Much of the Opposition to the growing evolutionary sentiment was based on the history of the great Flood. In about 1856, a team of three skeptical scientists journeyed to Ararat for the specific purpose of demonstrating once and for all there was no Ark there: however, their Armenian guides led them up the mountain directly to the Ark. In their anger, they threatened death to the guides if they ever told anyone about it.

Many years later, one of the guides, by then known as Jeremiah the Pilgrim, related the story to friends in America shortly before he died. At about the same time, one of the atheistic scientists also told the story in a deathbed confession, which was reported in many of the newspapers at the time, but soon forgotten.

(4) Sir James Bryce, a noted British scholar and traveler of the mid-nineteenth century, conducted extensive library research on Ararat and was convinced the Ark was preserved there. Finally, he himself ascended to the summit of the mountain in 1876 and found, at the 13,000 foot level, a large piece of hand-tooled wood, which...

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