These words of Moses do not have an easy meaning, on account of the obscure notion of that word (articulus): for what “the articulus of the day” signifies in this place is not known to everyone. Lyra says that “articulus” signifies a distinct and manifest thing, and here signifies a time of day clear and conspicuous to all. So that the sense is: by God's command Noah entered the ark in clear daylight, so that others, seeing him enter so confidently, might understand that it was guarded by divine protection from those who had resolved to kill him by ambush, and so to prevent him from entering the ark. But Tostatus does not approve this interpretation, himself thinking that by the word “articulus” is signified a certain small and distinct thing, and that in this place is denoted by that word the small part of time by which night is separated from day, and that this is the daybreak or dawn. The meaning of those words, therefore, is this: that Noah, by God's command, entered the ark at the very dawn. And of this interpretation Tostatus commends as authors two most learned of the Rabbis, Abraham and Aven-Esra.¹

I observe that among Latin writers various significations of that word are in use. Properly, “articulus” among the Philosophers and Physicians is put for the joint or knot of a member of the body: for that by which one member is separated from another, and nevertheless coheres with it, is called an “articulus.” By metaphor, in the vine the knots from which the bud bursts forth are called “articuli.” Pliny likewise, at the end of his work, seems to have called the little hills and gently rising slopes the “articuli” of the mountains. Ovid, in the second book of the Pontic [Epistles], said “to reckon by articuli” for “to reckon by fingers.” The author of the [Rhetoric] to Herennius, in the fourth book, called the “articulus” a member of a period [a clause], which by the Greeks is called κῶλον (colon). And among the Grammarians those are called “articuli” which, in declining nouns, are prefixed for the sake of distinguishing gender — such as “hic, haec, hoc.” Finally, it is often put for a certain moment, and a timely and opportune time for doing something.²

Whence Cicero, in [the speech] for Quintius: “That he might bind the man, by his own conditions, in the very joint (articulus) of time.” And St. Jerome, in the epistle to Julian: “My son, your brother Ausonius, in the very articulus of [his] departure and in a point of time, thought it [worthwhile] to return,” etc. Therefore, for the Latins, the “articulus” of time signifies a point, and, as it were, an extremity of time, or that which, in time, is most opportune and most to be chosen for doing something. Noah, therefore, is said to have entered the ark “in the articulus of that day,” that is, at some fixed time of that day most opportune and most suitable for entering.³

But for that word “articulus,” in Hebrew it is “hesem,” from the verb “hasam,” which means “to strengthen”: so that, word for word, it is signified (as Oleaster expounds) that Noah entered “in the strength of that day,” that is, between morning and evening and near noon — for then the light is greater and stronger. Although he himself confesses that here nothing else is signified than that Noah entered on that same day: for thus the Septuagint rendered it, and thus from the Hebrew, word for word, Pagninus and others translated. Cajetan reads, according to the Hebrew verity: “In the property of that day”; and explains it in this manner: “That pronoun, ‘that,’ points to the day before mentioned — that is, the day before that day on which the flood occurred, which was the sixteenth day of that month (for on the seventeenth day the flood began). And what is said, ‘In the property of that day,’ signifies that he entered on that day alone, and not on that and on other days: as if he himself entered on that day, but on the preceding days had sent his household ahead.”⁴

But from the narrative of Moses a question arises: on what day Noah really entered the Ark. For I see three opinions about this. One is Cajetan's, who (as we just before recalled) thinks that he entered on the sixteenth day of the month, namely the day before that day on which the flood began. But this opinion has no support from the sacred writings or from any probable conjecture, but rests only on Cajetan's own opinion and judgment. The second opinion is that Noah entered the Ark on the very same day on which the flood began, as seems to be signified here clearly enough. For when Moses had said that on the seventeenth day of the second month the flood began, he subjoined: “In the articulus of that day Noah entered.” Chrysostom seems to have thought the same: “When,” he says, “the flood began, then, according to the command of the Lord, Noah entered the Ark with his family and with the animals.” Of the same opinion is Tostatus. But Moses said a little above that seven days before the beginning of the flood Noah entered the Ark — narrating this, namely, by anticipation, that is, mentioning earlier what happened later.⁵

The third opinion is that Noah entered seven days before the flood, that is, on the tenth day of that second month. For this Moses seems plainly to indicate, narrating at the opening of the seventh chapter that God said to Noah: “Go in thou, and all thy house, into the Ark: for yet, and after seven days, I will rain upon the earth,” etc.; and a little below: “And Noah went into the Ark; and when the seven days had passed, the waters of the flood inundated the earth.” And this opinion pleased St. Ambrose, which he explains and illustrates in clear words in the book On Noah and the Ark, chapter thirteen. Therefore, what is said here, “In the articulus of that day,” is to be taken as if said by recapitulation; and it ought to be referred not to the day on which the flood began, but to that day on which Noah had entered, which had been the seventh before the beginning of the flood, as Moses had said above. Or, if that phrase, “In the articulus of that day,” is referred to the day of the flood, that word “entered,” [being] of past tense, is to be interpreted (as some think) by the ver[b]…⁶

…by the verb of the pluperfect tense, “had entered.” So that this is the sense: At the beginning of that day on which the flood began, Noah had already entered seven days before. To me the first opinion seems to have no probability; the rest I judge probable — yet in such a way that I prefer the third. But why Noah entered the Ark seven days before the flood, three causes were set forth above in the opening of the first disputation.⁷