And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bore up the ark, and it was lifted up above the earth.
All Commentaries on Genesis 7:17 Go To Genesis 7
Maximus of Turin
AD 423
But let us see where this most sacred number of forty days had its beginning. We read first in the Old Testament that in the time of Noah, when criminal wickedness had seized the whole human race, torrents of water poured forth from the opened floodgates of heaven for just as many days. In a kind of mysterious image of Quadragesima, this inundation of the earth refers not so much to a flood as to baptism. This was clearly a baptism in which the wickedness of sinners was removed and Noah’s righteousness preserved. For this reason, then, the Lord has given us forty days now as well in imitation of that time, so that for this number of days, while the heavens are opened, a celestial rain of mercy might pour upon us and, with the flood, the water of the saving washing might enlighten us in baptism and—as was the case then—the wickedness of our sins might be quenched in us by the streams of water and the righteousness of our virtues preserved. For the very same thing is at issue with regard to Noah and in our own day: baptism is a flood to the sinner and a consecration to the faithful; by the Lord’s washing, righteousness is preserved and unrighteousness is destroyed.
