What is gopher wood?

The wood with which Noah built the Ark. For so large a vessel it must have been a strong wood, but 'gopher' is the Hebrew word and it is not known to what it refers. Gen. 6:14.

The vessel constructed by the command of God, by which Noah and his household and some of every living creature of the earth were saved when the world was destroyed by the flood. Precise instructions were given by God as to the construction of the ark. It was to be made of 'gopher' wood, a kind known at the time, but which cannot now be identified with certainty; and it was to be pitched within and without with pitch, or bitumen, to make it water-tight.

Go’pher - Coverer: pitch-wood

The ark is built of gopher-wood. We know not this "gopher," but the resemblance is remarkably close to the "copher" or "pitch" named afterward, and the resemblance has been noticed by many. On account of it the gopher has been of old believed to be the cypress, and might well have furnished the "pitch" also for the vessel's seams. The type would thus correspond more fully to the antitype, for there need be no doubt but that the gopher, like the shittim-wood of the tabernacle-ark, refers to Christ, while "copher" is the word used elsewhere for "atonement." That the tree should be cut down to provide a refuge from the waters of judgment was not enough, the seams must be pitched with the pitch the tree supplied. And so death, as mere death, even though Christ's, would not have been enough to put the soul in security that fled to Him for refuge. The only blood, as the apostle teaches, that could be carried into the presence of God for sin, was the blood of a victim burned without the camp. The place of distance due to the sinner and the unclean had to be taken by the Holy One of God, in order to our salvation.

To Noah's life, as a type, the third chapter of the first epistle of Peter is the key. His bringing through the flood is there declared to be a type of "salvation," but salvation of a fuller kind than ordinarily is reckoned such. The figure is a simple one enough to follow in the main, and will itself guide us if we cleave closely to it. For, plainly, the ark is Christ, and the flood it saves through is the judgment of the whole world, which perished in it, while those preserved are brought through to a new world which emerges from the waters, and where the sweet savour of accepted sacrifice secures a perpetuity of blessing. It is the third stage of new life as apprehended by the soul, resurrection therefore, as bringing in the place of which it is said, "If any man be in Christ, [it is a] new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new;" - words which remarkably correspond to Noah's position as come through the flood, making allowance for that essential inferiority of type to antitype which we have often had to refer to as a necessary principle for true interpretation. Noah is evidently not the type of a sinner, taken up as such, nor could he be, to stand in the place he does in these biographies. He is a just man, a Cornelius rather, a type of those who, quickened and converted though they be - " fearing God and working righteousness " - need yet to know the salvation which the gospel brings. In the world around, corruption is total and universal. The judgment of the whole is pronounced, with one way of escape, and only one, left open to the man of faith. The ark is built of gopher-wood. We know not this "gopher," but the resemblance is remarkably close to the "copher" or "pitch" named afterward, and the resemblance has been noticed by many. On account of it the gopher has been of old believed to be the cypress, and might well have furnished the "pitch" also for the vessel's seams. The type would thus correspond more fully to the antitype, for there need be no doubt but that the gopher, like the shittim-wood of the tabernacle-ark, refers to Christ, while "copher" is the word used elsewhere for "atonement." That the tree should be cut down to provide a refuge from the waters of judgment was not enough, the seams must be pitched with the pitch the tree supplied. And so death, as mere death, even though Christ's, would not have been enough to put the soul in security that fled to Him for refuge. The only blood, as the apostle teaches, that could be carried into the presence of God for sin, was the blood of a victim burned without the camp. The place of distance due to the sinner and the unclean had to be taken by the Holy One of God, in order to our salvation. In such an ark we, with Noah, may make "nests" (for so, instead of "rooms, the margin more literally reads). The love that has provided all gives more than security; the house of refuge is not mere bare walls; amid the very storm of judgment the heart that craves may find its lodgment where more than a father's care, more than a mother's tenderness, are found.

The gopher-wood, the material of the ark, I can say little of, but it speaks of death (the tree cut down), as that by which alone death could be met for us. The "pitch" is copher, near akin, as it would seem, to gopher, not bitumen. (or at least there is no proof of this), but, as would seem most probable, a resin from the gopher-wood itself; identical, too, with the word "atonement" in one of its forms.* Here, it seems to me, is the first hint we find in Scripture of something beyond death which is implied in and needed for atonement. Not the gopher-wood alone would have kept out the waters of judgment. Not death alone lay upon men, and for true substitution not death alone needed to be borne. It is indeed the wages of sin; but not, as some would have it, the full wages. So, if death be judgment, as for man it is, it is "after death the judgment;" which is not a repetition of the first death either, though it be the second: for the first death is not repeated. "It is appointed unto men ONCE to die, but after this the judgment."

Yet a refuge was to be provided by the grace of God for those who realized their need of His grace. God instructed Noah to make a large ark of gopher wood, six times as long as it was wide, and with three decks, built with rooms, not only for people, but for animals also, covered with pitch inside and out (v. 14). One door is mentioned, which may seem inadequate for so large a ship, but it is typical of the fact that Christ alone is the door of salvation for mankind. It may be that the window “finished — to a cubit from the top” was an opening that encircled the whole ark, thus giving full ventilation, but capable of being closed. Of course there may have been other ventilation also, for we are not told the full details of the construction of this great vessel.

Yet a refuge was to be provided by the grace of God for those who realized their need of His grace. God instructed Noah to make a large ark of gopher wood, six times as long as it was wide, and with three decks, built with rooms, not only for people, but for animals also, covered with pitch inside and out (v.14). One door is mentioned, which may seem inadequate for so large a ship, but it is typical of the fact that Christ alone is the door of salvation for mankind. It may be that the window "finished -- to a cubit from the top" was an opening that encircled the whole ark, thus giving full ventilation, but capable of being closed. Of course there may have been other ventilation also, for we are not told the full details of the construction of this great vessel.

The Lord, in this way, provided Noah with an answer to His own righteous and purposed judgment that was coming on the world before the Flood. "Make thee an ark of gopher-wood," said God to him. Noah did so, believing the word both of judgment and of deliverance, and he was safe.

Travelling down the course of time we reach the flood; and here again the need of a covering when God's judgment is poured forth was very evident. In the ark Noah and his family were covered. Gopher wood was all around them, and not a crack was left, for the instructions were to "pitch it within and without with pitch" (Gen. 6:14). Significantly enough the very word used in the Hebrew for "pitch" is one closely related to the word for "covering" or "atonement." The covering in Noah's case was complete. Yet even so he did not recommence his career on the cleansed earth apart from sacrifices of blood (see Gen. 8:20).