9:2 are they delivered. In essence the primeval commission to mankind (the so-called “dominion mandate”) is here reiterated to Noah and his descendants, though with some emendations. Man is still to be in dominion over all other creatures and over the earth itself, even though Satan’s usurpation of that dominion must continually be recognized and rectified, with God’s enablement. Man’s relation to the animals (except perhaps for the domestic animals not mentioned here) has been changed by God’s imposition on them of literally the “terror” of man. Their newly-developed carnivorous appetites and other abilities inimical to close contact with man, combined with their more rapid multiplication, might otherwise have resulted in man’s extermination.

9:3 meat for you. For the first time, human beings are given divine permission to eat animal flesh. Initially, they were to have been vegetarians (Genesis 1:29). The reason for this change was due to the greater need for animal protein in man’s diet in view of the nutrient-impoverished soils of the post-diluvian world and the much more rigorous climatic conditions. A second reason may have been to emphasize the great gulf between man and the animals. Evolutionary and polytheistic philosophies, then as now, had seriously blurred that distinction (note Romans 1:21-25).