Noah

Noah shows up at a pretty bleak moment in the Bible's story. Humanity had become so corrupt and violent that God essentially said, "I regret making these people." But Noah was different. The Bible describes him as "righteous" and says he "walked with God" — a phrase that's only used for a handful of people in all of Scripture.

God told Noah to build a massive ark — roughly 450 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 45 feet tall. That's about the size of a modern cargo ship. Noah had never seen a flood. Many scholars believe it hadn't even rained yet at that point. But he built it anyway, and it took him somewhere around 100 years to finish. Imagine the looks he got from his neighbors. The guy was basically the world's most committed DIY project manager.

When the ark was done, God brought pairs of every kind of animal to Noah, plus seven pairs of certain clean animals. Noah, his wife, his three sons (Shem, Ham, and Japheth), and their wives boarded the ark. Then it rained for 40 days and 40 nights, and floodwaters covered the earth for about 150 days total. Everything outside the ark perished.

After the waters receded, Noah sent out a raven and then a dove to check for dry land. When the dove came back with an olive branch, Noah knew the earth was recovering. Once everyone finally disembarked, Noah built an altar and offered a sacrifice to God. In response, God made a covenant — a promise — to never flood the entire earth again, and He set the rainbow as the sign of that promise.

Noah's story doesn't end perfectly, though. He planted a vineyard, got drunk, and an awkward incident with his son Ham led to a curse on Ham's son Canaan. It's a reminder that even the most faithful people in the Bible are portrayed honestly, flaws and all. Noah lived to be 950 years old, and his story has echoed through virtually every culture on earth — flood narratives appear in civilizations from Mesopotamia to the Americas.