Read Genesis 6:15

"The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits."

Length:            300 cubits
Width:              50 cubits
Height:             30 cubits

How long is a cubit?  The majority of bibles usually have a footnote that states something like: "a cubit is the length of a man's forearm measuring from a man's elbow to the tip of his fingers, or approximately 18 inches".  18 inches is of course 1.5 feet which is an easy number to calculate in a person's head.  Obviously different men have different lengths of their forearm.  So the length of a cubit was slightly different where ever you go.  You can find it called a cubit, standard cubit, royal cubit, etc.  The actual length varies several inches.  James Strong, the author of Strong's Exhaustive Concordance, actually traveled to the Bible lands and measured numerous buildings and sites that had ancient archeological records of their size recorded in cubits.  James Strong calculated the average cubit to be 21.75 inches long.  James Strong states there is some variance in the actual examples, but when you average them out, the average length of a cubit is 21.75 inches. 

For those believers not familiar with the works of James Strong, they should consider getting one of his Exhaustive Concordances.  It lists every word in the Bible and everywhere it is used.  In addition it has Hebrew / English and Greek / English dictionaries in the back.  His works are considered clean by almost all respected Bible scholars and we agree 100%.  His work is a trusted treasure for anyone studying the Bible.

So the actual measurements of the ark are not exactly known in feet. Several Christian organizations have adopted a range of 510 to 520 feet but reasonable calculations place it at a minimum of 450 feet and maximum of 544 feet.  That is a big ship either way.  We have included the two extremes of the possible cubit lengths to illustrate how large the ark could have been:

Size Comparison (to scale)


At church we took the youth out to the parking lot and had them make two rectangles of the sizes listed above.  It was a wonderful mental image for them to see in real life how big Noah's Ark actually was.  None of them before had considered the ark as being anything close to that huge.  We were lucky to have a parking lot big enough.



Also check out this link:

Has the Real Noah's Ark been Found?

(Clicking this link will open a new window with a new website (TheRealNoahsArk.org) which is also produced by CleanBible.com)

Graphics used here with permission but you may not use them without the respective owner's written permission.

© CleanBible.com, 2009 - 2024