Originally Posted by Tom Sawyer

I've always held to the opinion that all the Flood stories really had nothing to do with a flood at all. I think it was more people finding fossilized fish bones and the like lying around in fields and mountains and they quite correctly deduced that for those to get there, the area must have once been underwater. Not knowing anything about continental drift, but "knowing" that weather is caused by the Gods, they assumed that the Gods flooded the whole place at one point. It was probably an excellent scientific analysis, based on the knowledge they had at the time. That leaves them to figure out why the Gods did this and how the people and animals they see these days survived it. Put two and two together and you've got the story of Noah.

No regional flood is necessary and all the attempts to find the origins of the Flood stories sound more to me like attempts to hamfist some pretty shaky evidence into a pre-existing notion. So don't worry, the Qur'an is still completely wrong.

Originally Posted by JohNeo

The best answer I can come up with is that the ancient Hebrews (and many of their contemporaries) were obsessed with animal and human sacrifice. All of the sacrifice that had been done for thousands of years had not changed the nature of "god," so it was time to make another bold claim to justify the authority of god and his minions.

Those who founded Christianity perhaps thought that God in Flesh sacrificing himself would somehow be the noblest sacrifice. I think it's one other example of a theology that really wasn't thought out that well when it was introduced. I'm sure the creators didn't really think we'd be sitting here 2,000 years later debating it. Only two millenia of theologians piling apologetic shit on top of it could be enough to confuse people into overlooking its absurdity.

JohNeo