s of
all classes.

39. Among this rabble of decadent men who had departed from the piety
and virtues of their ancestors, godly Noah lived in the greatest
contempt and hatred of everybody. How could he approve the corruption
of such degenerate progeny? And they themselves were most impatient of
reproof. While, therefore, his example shone and gleamed, and his
holiness filled the whole earth, the world became worse from day to
day, and the greater the sanctity and chastity of Noah, the more the
world reveled in lust. This is the beginning; it invariably introduces
ruin.

40. When God arouses holy men, full of the Holy Spirit, to instruct
and reprove the world, the world, impatient of sound doctrine, falls
with much greater zeal into sin and plies it with much greater
persistency. This was the situation at the beginning of the world, and
now, at the end of the world, we realize it is still the case.

II. GOD'S JUDGMENT AND GRIEF OVER THE FIRST WORLD; NOAH AND HIS
PREACHING.

A. GOD'S JUDGMENT AND LAMENTATION OVER THE OLD WORLD.

1. The words of the lamentation.

a. Interpreters have shamefully perverted these words 41.

b. The Jewish interpretation, which Jerome follows 42.

c. The Jews' interpretation refuted 42-43.

d. The interpretation of Rabbi Solomon 44.

e. The interpretation of others, especially of Origen 45.

* Why Augustine was especially pleased with the doctrine of
the Manicheans 45.

f. Rabbi David's explanation 46.

* The false idea of the Jews and some Christian interpreters
that the true sense of Scripture is learned from grammar.

(1) Thus ideas most foreign to the sense of Scripture are
defended 46-47.

(2) This method is false and led the Jews into many
fantasies 47.

g. The source of Rabbi David's awkward interpretation of
these words 48.

* Why Luther has so much to say about the false
interpretation of Scripture 49.

* What is necessary to interpret Scripture 50.

h. The true sense of these words 51.

* Scripture definition of "to judge" 51.

2. The author of this judgment and lamentation 51-53.

* Man's conduct upon hearing God's Word preached 54.

3. From what kind of a heart does such judgment and lamentation