His story appears in the Hebrew Bible (Book of Genesis, chapters 5–9), the Quran and Baha'i writings, and extracanonically.

Noah then labors faithfully to build the Ark at God's command, ultimately saving not only his own family, but mankind itself and all land animals, from extinction during the Flood.

Scholars suggest that the biblical account was influenced by earlier Mesopotamian traditions, with notable parallels in plot elements and structure.

[7] The narrative discusses the evil of mankind that moved God to destroy the world by way of the flood, the preparation of the ark for certain animals, Noah, and his family, and God's guarantee (the Noahic Covenant) for the continued existence of life under the promise that he would never send another flood.

God accepted the sacrifice, and made a covenant with Noah, and through him with all mankind, that he would not waste the earth or destroy man by another deluge.

[10] Noah, as the last of the extremely long-lived Antediluvian patriarchs, died 350 years after the flood, at the age of 950, when Terah was 128.

[14] John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, and a Church Father, wrote in the 4th century that Noah's behavior is defensible: as the first human to taste wine, he would not know its effects: "Through ignorance and inexperience of the proper amount to drink, fell into a drunken stupor".

[16] In Jewish tradition and rabbinic literature on Noah, rabbis blame Satan for the intoxicating properties of the wine.

In the field of psychological biblical criticism, J. H. Ellens and W. G. Rollins have analysed the unconventional behavior that occurs between Noah and Ham as revolving around sexuality and the exposure of genitalia as compared with other Hebrew Bible texts, such as Habakkuk 2:15[23] and Lamentations 4:21.

[33] However, if we take the merged text of Genesis as a single account, we can construct the following family tree, which has come down in this form into the Jewish and Christian traditions.

The attempt by the 5th-century editor to accommodate two independent and sometimes conflicting sources accounts for the confusion over such matters as how many of each animal Noah took, and how long the flood lasted.

[36] In addition to the main story in Genesis, the Hebrew Bible (Christian Old Testament) also refers to Noah in the First Book of Chronicles, Isaiah and Ezekiel.

Noah became the subject of much elaboration in the literature of later Abrahamic religions, including Islam (Surahs 71, 7, 11, 54, and 21 of the Quran) and the Baháʼí Faith (Kitáb-i-Íqán and Gems of Divine Mysteries).

[37][38] The Book of Jubilees refers to Noah and says that he was taught the arts of healing by an angel so that his children could overcome "the offspring of the Watchers".

This led some commentators to offer the figure of Noah as "the righteous man in a fur coat," who ensured his own comfort while ignoring his neighbour.

[44] Others, such as the medieval commentator Rashi, held on the contrary that the building of the Ark was stretched over 120 years, deliberately in order to give sinners time to repent.

"This one will comfort us (in Hebrew– yeNaĦamenu יְנַחֲמֵנו) in our work and in the toil of our hands, which come from the ground that the Lord had cursed"[45] Some interpret this as meaning Noah heralded a new era of prosperity, when there was an easing (in Hebrew, naħah נחה) of the curse from Adam's time, when the Earth produced thorns and thistles even where men sowed wheat.

St Augustine of Hippo (354–430), demonstrated in The City of God that the dimensions of the Ark corresponded to the dimensions of the human body, which corresponds to the body of Christ; the equation of Ark and Church is still found in the Anglican rite of baptism, which asks God, "who of thy great mercy didst save Noah," to receive into the Church the infant about to be baptised.

[55] An important Gnostic text, the Apocryphon of John, reports that the chief archon caused the flood because he desired to destroy the world he had made, but the First Thought informed Noah of the chief archon's plans, and Noah informed the remainder of humanity.

"[56] The Druze regard Noah as the second spokesman (natiq) after Adam, who helped transmit the foundational teachings of monotheism (tawhid) intended for the larger audience.

The Quran narrates that Noah received a revelation to build an Ark, after his people refused to believe in his message and hear the warning.

[60][61] The Baháʼí scripture Kitáb-i-Íqán endorses the Islamic belief that Noah had a large number of companions, either 40 or 72, besides his family on the Ark, and that he taught for 950 (symbolic) years before the flood.

The few variations include the number of days of the deluge, the order of the birds, and the name of the mountain on which the ark rests.

The Encyclopædia Britannica says "These mythologies are the source of such features of the biblical Flood story as the building and provisioning of the ark, its flotation, and the subsidence of the waters, as well as the part played by the human protagonist.

The people most likely to have fulfilled this role are the Hurrians, whose territory included the city of Harran, where the Patriarch Abraham had his roots.

The discovery of artifacts associated with Aga and Enmebaragesi of Kish, two other kings named in the stories, has lent credibility to the historical existence of Gilgamesh.

Chen writes that Old Babylonian copies tend to show a separate pre-flood tradition which is apart from the King List.

Chen provides evidence that the sections of the Sumerian King List that mention references to the flood were all later additions added during the Old Babylonian Period through later updates and edits.

Like Noah, Deucalion is warned of the flood (by Zeus and Poseidon); he builds an ark and staffs it with creatures – and when he completes his voyage, gives thanks and takes advice from the gods on how to repopulate the Earth.

[79][80] The motif of a weather deity who headed the pantheon causing the great flood and then the trickster who created men from clay saving man is also present in Sumerian Mythology, as Enlil, instead of Zeus, causes the flood, and Enki, rather than Prometheus, saves man.