The BBC Broke Her Because She’s a Jew
New radar scans claim Noah’s Ark is buried in the mountains of Turkey. A closer look at the evidence, and at the lesson Noah left behind.
There’s been a lot of excitement lately over claims that Noah’s Ark has finally been found. Is this proof that the biblical story is true? Or should we be a little cautious?
A team of researchers says it has proven that a mound in the mountains of eastern Turkey, near Mount Ararat, is Noah’s Ark. The group, Noah’s Ark Scans, was founded by an American researcher named Andrew Jones. They recently announced that a radar survey confirms the site is “not geological” and that “an extraordinary man-made structure lies beneath the surface.” According to the team, the radar shows corridors, compartments, and even several decks. They have drilled up to 18 meters deep and sent a robot camera down the hole. One press release reported that a drill bit shattered on what might be a layer of petrified wood. The headlines wrote themselves: “Noah’s Ark Found.”
It starts with the Torah, the Five Books of Moses. It tells of a massive flood and of Noah’s ark, which saved his family and the animal world so that life and civilization could begin again. When the waters receded, the ark came to rest “on the mountains of Ararat.”
In 1948, near the town of Doğubayazıt, about 29 kilometers south of Mount Ararat’s summit, heavy rains and earthquakes stripped the mud from a hillside. A Kurdish shepherd, Reşit Sarıhan, noticed something strange. In 1959, a Turkish army captain named İlhan Durupınar spotted the same formation in aerial photographs taken during a NATO mapping mission, and the site still carries his name. Geologically, it looks unusual: a long ridge of earth shaped like a ship’s hull. In 1960, LIFE magazine published the photograph, and people began to wonder whether this could be Noah’s famous boat.
The measurements added to the excitement. The formation came out to about 157 meters (515 feet) long, and some measurements put it at 164 meters. The Torah says the ark was 300 amot, or cubits, long. Scholars still debate the exact length of a cubit, but according to Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, a leading 20th-century authority on Jewish law, a cubit is 21.25 inches, about 54 centimeters. Three hundred of them comes to 162 meters, almost exactly what was found.
Then the debate began. In 1960, an American expedition led by George Vandeman and Arthur Brandenberger spent two days digging, and even used dynamite. They found only soil and rock. Most people concluded it wasn’t Noah’s Ark, and the site was largely forgotten.
In 1977, Ron Wyatt, an American amateur explorer with no training in archaeology, revived interest. He claimed to have found petrified wood, iron brackets, and even the ark’s anchor stones. He was joined by salvage expert David Fasold and geophysicist John Baumgardner, and their radar scans reportedly showed walls and bulkheads. But in 1987, a professional radar operator named Tom Fenner went back to the site and couldn’t reproduce those scans at all.
In 1988, Baumgardner, once a supporter of the site, drilled four holes into the formation with a Turkish geologist. They found mud and bedrock. No wood, and nothing resembling an ark. He concluded it was simply an unusual natural formation.
In 1996, geologist Lorence Collins co-authored a paper with David Fasold, previously one of the site’s biggest champions. They called it “Bogus Noah’s Ark” and exposed the whole thing as a hoax.
Still, the claims kept coming. In 2019, Andrew Jones’s team scanned the site again and reported angular structures beneath the surface, shapes you wouldn’t expect in a natural mound. In 2024, they reported finding about three times more organic matter, material that came from living organisms, in the soil than in the surrounding formations. This June, the Turkish government granted permits for the largest investigation the site has ever seen, led by Professor Cenker Atila, an archaeologist at Sivas Cumhuriyet University. The team began drilling, and a week or two ago came the latest announcement.
Many of you have asked what I think. Here it is: anything connected to the Bible calls for real caution. The same goes for anything connected to Israel, ancient or modern. Very few people come to these subjects neutral. The Bible, Israel, and the Torah stir up deep emotions. They challenge people’s identities in complicated ways, whether they’re religious, atheist, or anything in between. Almost everyone has a stake in the outcome, which means almost everyone is biased.
Almost everyone has a stake in the outcome, which means almost everyone is biased.
That doesn’t mean we can’t investigate. The scientific method can do its job. We just need to wait for the lab results, for peer-reviewed journals to publish the findings, and for the wider archaeological community to examine and critique them. Then we’ll know where things actually stand.
So far, none of this work has been peer reviewed. The lab results aren’t expected until early next year. Andrew Jones is a software developer, not an archaeologist, and he says so openly. He simply believes this is the ark. The radar engineer, Dr. Khosrow Bakhtar, says he is 100 percent sure the signals come from a single object, but, in his words, “a ship or spacecraft or what, I do not know.” And the university running the dig describes its goals far more modestly: to determine whether the shape is entirely geological, or whether it shows any evidence of human activity.
This pattern isn’t unique to this site. Over the next few weeks, I’m launching a series fact-checking the Torah. One thing I’ll show is how many sensational claims have been made over the last 150 to 200 years. Some people claimed they’d proven the Torah false. Others claimed they’d proven a particular story true. Again and again, on closer inspection, the claim fell apart. Sometimes they were looking at the wrong site. Sometimes a new discovery reversed the verdict entirely. People sincerely believed they had found proof one way or the other, only to see it overturned.
Archaeology is a genuinely difficult science. Unless an inscription turns up that tells you what a place was, you often can’t know for sure.
This could be an incredibly exciting find. If the researchers turn out to be right, if this really is a wooden, man-made structure from the time of Noah, a boat that carried animal life and came to rest on this mountain, it would be one of the most sensational discoveries in history. It would matter enormously to everyone who believes in the truth of the Torah, and to all of humanity, believers or not.
Intellectual honesty requires intellectual caution. I plan to withhold judgment until far more rigorous work is done and the scientific community has had a real chance to study the results.
But intellectual honesty requires intellectual caution. I plan to withhold judgment until far more rigorous work is done and the scientific community has had a real chance to study the results. Whatever the truth turns out to be, it will be contentious. Some will grab any straw to say this is Noah’s Ark. Others will grab any straw to say it can’t be, even if the evidence overwhelmingly points the other way. For me, the best approach is to wait and see.
Extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence. More importantly, the truth of the Torah doesn’t hinge on any archaeological find. The real message of Noah’s story isn’t sitting on a mountain in Turkey.
The first message is this: humanity can become horribly corrupt, almost beyond saving. But God never gives up. He always finds that last bit of good, saves humanity, and renews it, because God never abandons His creations. According to Kabbalah, Jewish mystical tradition, even the souls who died in the flood returned later in history, reincarnated so they could be repaired. It’s the same principle. Human beings are deeply imperfect, but God never gives up on us and always gives us another chance.
The second message is Noah himself. Noah must have been a social outcast. He refused to join in the depravity and immorality of his time, and everyone mocked him for it. The Talmud, the central text of Jewish law and tradition, records in tractate Sanhedrin that Noah rebuked his generation and they treated him with contempt. “Old man,” they said, “what is this ark for?” The Midrash, the ancient rabbinic commentary on the Bible, says he worked on it for decades. He planted cedar trees, then cut them down, while people called him “the contemptible old man.”
They surely didn’t mock only his piety. They would have found ways to accuse him of being immoral, too. That’s what people do. We’re very good at demonizing those who live godly lives, fixating on every flaw they have. Yet Noah had the strength and courage to say the whole world can be wrong.
Majorities don’t determine what’s true. They don’t determine what’s right or what’s wrong. Murder is wrong. Stealing is wrong. Rape is wrong. Adultery is wrong. Noah was saying: I would rather be mocked and vilified by the entire world, I would rather everyone tell me, “We can’t all be wrong, so it must be you,” than betray the inner voice of my soul, the voice of good that God placed inside each of us.
So the story of Noah is about God’s endless faith in humanity, and about the ability of human beings, sometimes only a small minority, to keep living godly lives from which a whole world can be reborn.
Just a few weeks ago, we celebrated Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, when God judges the world anew and we ask Him to remember it for good. In those prayers we don’t go back to the beginning of the Jewish people, or even to the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We go back to Noah: “And Noah, too, You remembered with love.” God remembered a human being who could stand against an entire world. In an era of tyranny, where might made right, while everyone mocked him, Noah could say, “I won’t violate what’s right. I won’t give in to social pressure.”
That began the story of humanity anew in an age full of tyrants and oppressors. Noah represented a new way of thinking, one that led to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the fathers and mothers of the nation of Israel, and eventually to the Torah. The Torah taught the value of every human life, justice for every citizen, limits on the power of kings, and peace, not war, as the ideal. To this day, the world wrestles with that vision.
So yes, a discovery here or there might help confirm a story that seems hard to believe. But the truth of the Torah lies in our national memory of the covenant our ancestors made with God. It lies in the way the Torah’s predictions came true: Israel’s exile, the persecution of the Jewish people, and their return to the land. And perhaps most of all, it lies in the meaning of the voice of God that the Torah carries, for the Jewish people and for all humanity, throughout history and especially today.
We’ll wait for the verdict on whether this mound in Turkey turns out to be Noah’s Ark. But the message Noah carried, the meaning of his ark and the voice of good it stood for, lives on in the Torah, in God’s calling, and in the soul of every one of us. In a world that so often feels like it’s drowning in a flood, Noah’s voice lives on in each of us, a beacon of good shining through the torrent. That’s where Noah and his ark truly rest.
May we all carry that voice forward, resist the madness of the world, and shine goodness no matter how unpopular it makes us. We’ll keep watching for more news about the ark and its archaeology. In the meantime, may we be blessed to bring the goodness of this story out into the world.
Hello. The pointed shape at one end of the geological fornation currently being tested with samples taken on Mt. Arrarat is the shape of a pointed bow of a boat. I think that probably more than anything else is the chief cause for the focus there in hopes of finding Noah' Ark, as that is the shape most pepplo have in mind for a boat. A pointed prow at one end of a vessel however is the shape of a vessel with a propulsion system. The Ark as described in the Bible did not have one.
excellent discussion re Noah and the ark
I didn't know that there are Jews who think that the story of Noah is a "true" story. It is a mythological narrative with a clear message.
The story begins with G-d decrying the wickedness of mankind. In the end, after the Flood, mankind is still wicked, in spite of G-d's best effort to cure mankind's wickedness: "the devisings of the human mind are evil from youth" (Genesis 8:22). To avoid being destroyed by our wickedness, mankind makes a covenant with G-d to follow his laws.
We are wicked therefore we need laws. If we were not wicked, we would not need laws. It's a profound Truth that I think about every time I observe an act of wickedness, or more importantly, whenever I contemplate behaving that way myself.
That is the Truth found in this story.
Respectfully,
Then, how do you interpret Genesis 8:22? Aren't we being told in plain language that our minds are evil? Don't we bear witness to our wickedness on a daily basis?
Yes, we want a relationship with G-d, but G-d wants a relationship with us? What does that even mean? Isn't it long past time to reject this anthropocentric view of the world?
Yes, there's an instinct for taking the easy way out. It's more instinctive to lay in bed than to get up.
G-d created us that way so we can experience great spiritual pleasure in the next world after 120 for our accomplishments in this world. If it were easy we wouldn't accomplish. The accomplishment is overcoming our nature (as you mentioned thinking things over before you act).
If you want to know if the Torah is true there's an easy way to find out:
Learn it.😃
Buy the Stone Chumash and read 1 page every day. (It's in English. )
After a year you can make an informed decision. 😀
And yes, G-d wants a relationship with us. He created the world to give pleasure. And the greatest possible pleasure is coming close to the Almighty.
There are books that explain this, all translated in English:
Duties of the Heart
The Way of G-d
The Kuzari
There's an amazing human being, Dr. Yehuda Pryce. He was a gang member, serving a 22 year sentence in jail. He discovered Judaism and totally turned his life around. He became a social worker and is helping many people.
His incredible accomplishments is in totally changing himself.
That's the accomplishment.
Also, our instincts can be changed through our learning and how we are raised.
How we raise our children.
Walmart checks your receipt as you leave.
But in Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods they don't check the receipts of the Jews.
Why? Orthodox Jewish teens are born so holy? They're so perfect?
No. But they are taught, from a young age, right and wrong.
There is a G-d. He loves us unconditionally. And He sees everything.
We are agreeing that good character is something that must be taught, and my original point was that this is the fundamental message of the Ark story. Our evil instincts cannot be washed away in a Flood.
The Noah story goes on to describe how this fundamental message was disseminated to the whole world. All societies rely on education to teach its individuals how to build stable communities. Even so, well-educated people of all backgrounds who know right from wrong still choose wrong (Bernie Madoff, for example).
That said, not all societies put as much emphasis on education as Judaism does. Contrary to what you may think, this is not a religious principle. If you look at the achievements of non-religious Jews you will see how pervasive this principle is in Jewish culture.
You make some great points.
I agree: evil instincts cannot be washed away in a flood.
The flood was about the people who made choices.
Murder, stealing, violating people, etc.
The point of the Almighty giving us life is for people to use their free choice to make good choices. If the entire world, minus 1 family, are self- destructing and destroying others, they're better off elsewhere (in the next world).
But the Almighty gave them 120 years to change their behavior. He had Noah build the ark for 1 century plus two decades. He wanted the people to ask what he's doing, freak out and change. But they didn't. They called him a crazy old man and told him when he steps into the ark they'll break it down and kill him. (Sound familiar?)
But Noah himself was held responsible as well. The Torah calls the floodwaters May Noach, the Waters of Noah.
He should have gone around to the people and tried to help them change.
Instead, he guarded himself and his family in holiness, letting the rest of the world drown.
And he should have prayed for them to change.
In fact, when he and his family emerged safe and the reality of the destroyed world hit him, he planted a vineyard and got drunk. It was very depressing.
But in spite of mistakes, he was an incredibly holy man who saved the future world of humans and animals. 😀
He and his 3 sons didn't sleep during the year in the ark. They were constantly caring for the animals, the last animals on the planet.
Abraham later met Noah's son Shem who described to him how they cared for the animals with tremendous, constant chesed (kindness) all year in the ark.
Abraham learnt from this to keep an open home and extend tremendous kindness to people. (The animals were fine by then.)
To your first point about Genesis 8:21, you’re asking an important question. Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki, who lived during the 11th century) explains that the evil in this verse is referring to the yetzer hara, evil inclination, that we're born with. It is the part of us that tells us to do the wrong thing. But its function is to enable freewill so that we choose to be good even when it’s hard for us. In short, we are a soul, a pure and holy soul. We are not our evil inclination, even when its voice does a convincing job of sounding like me. (Obviously that doesn’t absolve me from accountability. When I mess up I must take responsibility for my negative action that I, as a soul, decided to do).
Regarding G-d wanting a relationship with us, there is the book called Derech Hashem, written by Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzato (known by the acronym the Ramchal) circa 1735. Inside, it explains in part 1 chapter 2 (loosely translated) that G-d brought us into existence for the purpose of bestowing good. G-d wants to give us the greatest good. What is the greatest good? Closeness to G-d. How do I acquire closeness to G-d? As a Jew, that means emulating Him- in a process of self perfection- through keeping the Torah and the mitzvos.
We'll see
This is brilliant. I would add that if proved to be a ship of the correct period, that doesn’t prove it’s Noah’s ark. Our proof for that is in the Torah.
Speculation - speculation - speculation - the rabbi is right on this issue. However - We - can assist - & ask the SOURCE OF TRUTH - "G-D" - to BLESS - or BLOCK - all the work being done on the site - so that - IRREFUTABLE PROOF- can prove all claims YAY - or NAY!
I have a question? In me Bible in Genesis 8:20-22 it says Noah built an altar and sacrificed animals to G-d. Where did Noah get the wood? Immediately after the flood there were no trees of size necessary for building homes, carts, pens, etc. The wood of the Ark would have been a necessity for survival in those first few weeks, months, maybe even year after the flood. I am confused. Can anyone explain, please.
Perhaps from the natural habitat of the animals that Noah brought into the ark with him.
He brought in small trees to the ark.
An altar (mizbeach) was never made of wood, only stone (or in the Mishkan/Tabernacle made of copper.) Stones did survive the Flood. Houses in the ancient Middle East were also usually built from stones. For firewood and other uses, they could very well have cut off pieces of the Ark after it was no longer needed. We are talking about only 8 people needing wood and a very large amount of wood used in the Ark. As Yael pointed out, Noach also planted trees. (It's possible that miraculous Divine assistance was involved in the rehabilitation of the Earth after the Mabul. The Midrash teaches that the grapevine Noach planted gave fruit that same day.
"ft would matter enormously to everyone who believes in the truth of the Torah, and to all of humanity, believers or not."
Belief (Emuna, loyalty) in Gd cannot be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, and it shouldn't. That would make it a script, a formula with nothing personal at stake and involved.
Our commitment to Torah (Divine instructions for life) and our trust in its teachings come from the Divine revelation to millions at Mount Sinai, transmitted from one generation to the next. Prophecies unfolding before our eyes strengthen what we already trust. Science has to be accountable to Torah.
This is an enormously important point that Rabbi Rowe actually almost said straight out, but it could have been missed. For as long as God wants Mankind to have free will it will be impossible for any discovery to change that. Even if they find an Ark with the exact measurements and layout complete with a captain's uniform with a name tag that says "Noach" someone will find some way to say that it randomly evolved from a bacteria... or it was planted there by aliens... or it's the Jews fault... Emunah is not and cannot be contingent on any outside factors. Someone sincerely looking for Hashem can find Him everywhere and every day. Some people will insist on not finding Him even if the truth hits them in the face. According to Judaism there always has to be free choice either way.
Whether locating the Ark is fact or fantasy, the timeless message in this article rings true; thank you, Rabbi.
Judicious.