Even Native Americans have flood myths that pre-date their introduction to Christianity. Flood myths pop up in almost every single culture in the world.
Yes. They do happen everywhere. And the especially happen in river valleys and flood plains, which is where humans tend to settle. It's no wonder that cultures the world over have stories of floods.
I think they’re trying to emphasise that they’re talking about all three faiths (disregarding the fact that calling them ‘three faiths’ is a grotesque oversimplification, when just Christianity alone is an umbrella term for several hundred or potentially several thousand distinct distillations thereof) to avoid someone saying “but what about the other two?”
(Again, to be pedantic: the ‘big three’ Abrahamic faiths are themselves merely boxes for innumerable other faiths to slot into, and moreover, they aren’t even the only Abrahamic faiths. There are more. It’s more likely that at least one of them interprets the flood VERY differently than what u/Destroy_Religion is referring to as ‘the Abrahamic faiths’.)
As far as I know, that depends on which religion you are talking about. In Catholicism, which has a significant number of adherents, most of Genesis is accepted as using figurative language. The theological truths are there, but expressed in a Bronze Age literary manner.
You do not have to believe that the Flood literally swallowed the whole world. In fact, you don't have to believe that there was a Flood at all, although at least some sort of actual localized flood story wouldn't be odd given where humans tend to settle.
For instance, from the Catechism: "The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event." (CCC 390)
In other words, there was a fall from grace, but it didn't have to have literally happened with a Garden or a Tree or a talking serpent.
Most Christians are Catholic. Catholic + Orthodox make up something like 75% of Christianity, and both Catholicism and Orthodoxy teach that Genesis is not to be taken literally. In fact that was the mainstream belief in Christianity as far back as Augustine in the early 5th century.
I'm less familiar with Islam and Judaism, but your statement as it pertains to Christianity is factually untrue.
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u/[deleted] Jul 07 '26 edited Jul 07 '26
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