Surely everyone has heard of Noah’s Ark, but what is an ark?
Ark is an ancient English word, the meaning of which has been mostly forgotten. However, it’s often used in other Bibles to translate the Greek word kiboton. Yet nobody uses the word ark anymore, so few people know what one is.
Most people see pictures in children’s storybooks of a small boat crammed full of animals (usually with their heads pointing out the windows) and they think that an ‘ark’ is an old name for a boat. It’s not.
An ark is just a box or a chest.
If you carefully examine the measurements that God gave to Noah, you’ll see that He told Noah to build a long, three-story tall, wooden box – not a boat. It didn’t have to be a boat that could navigate, because all it had to do was float. Nor did the animals look out the window(s) – it didn’t have many windows, nor did it have an open top deck. Besides, the animals were kept in stalls.
Simply put, Noah’s Ark was not a boat, it was a big wooden box, or chest. Noah’s Box would sound rather strange, but it would be accurate.