Og - The Giant Who Survived Noah's Flood

Most people think Og, king of Bashan, is a footnote. He shows up in two Torah verses, loses a battle, and disappears. The rabbis thought otherwise. In their telling, Og survived Noah's Flood, schemed his way into Abraham's household, ripped mountains from the earth, and met his end in one of the strangest battle scenes in all of Jewish literature.

Most people think Og, king of Bashan, is a footnote. He shows up in two Torah verses, loses a battle to Moses (Deuteronomy 3:1-11), and disappears. His iron bed measures nine cubits long and four cubits wide, roughly 13.5 feet by 6 feet (Deuteronomy 3:11). He is listed among the Rephaim, the race of giants. End of story. The rabbis of the Talmud and Midrash, however, took those bare facts and built one of the most outlandish biographical traditions in all of Jewish literature. In their telling, Og survived the Flood by riding on top of Noah's ark, lived for thousands of years, towered over mountains, and met his end in one of the strangest battle scenes ever imagined.

The traditions about Og are scattered across the Babylonian Talmud, Midrash Rabbah, Midrash Aggadah, and Legends of the Jews. Our database preserves several key texts, including The Giant Og and The Giants of Old from our collection. Taken together, they paint a portrait of a creature so massive, so ancient, and so absurd that the story sits somewhere between mythology and dark comedy.

How Og Survived the Flood

The Talmud, in Niddah 61a (Babylonian Talmud, redacted c. 500 CE), records the tradition that Og survived the great Flood that destroyed all other life on earth. One opinion holds that the floodwaters, which covered the highest mountains by 15 cubits (Genesis 7:20), barely reached Og's ankles. He was simply too tall to drown. He waded through the catastrophe while every other creature perished.

Another tradition, preserved in Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer chapter 23 (composed c. 8th-9th century CE) and elaborated in Ginzberg's The Inmates of the Ark, says Og sat on top of the ark. He was too large to fit inside. The ark was only 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high (Genesis 6:15), so Noah allowed him to ride on the roof. Noah drilled a hole in the side of the ark and passed food through it every day to keep Og alive. In return, Og swore an oath to serve Noah and his descendants as a slave.

The detail of the feeding hole is wonderful in its specificity. Here is Noah, responsible for preserving every species on earth during the worst catastrophe in history, and he is also running a daily meal service for a giant sitting on his roof. The rabbis saw no contradiction. Og was alive before the Flood, which means he belonged to the antediluvian generation, possibly even related to the Nephilim, the offspring of the angels who descended to earth and took human wives (Genesis 6:4). His survival was an anomaly, a leftover from the old world that persisted into the new one.

Og's Connection to Abraham

The Talmud, in Niddah 61a, identifies Og with the unnamed "fugitive" (palit) who came to tell Abraham that his nephew Lot had been captured (Genesis 14:13). This identification places Og in the time of Abraham, centuries after the Flood, and connects him to the patriarchal narrative. The Talmud adds a twist: Og's motives for bringing the news were not pure. He hoped Abraham would rush off to rescue Lot and be killed in the battle, allowing Og to marry Sarah.

This detail transforms Og from a simple giant into a character with cunning and desire. He is not just large. He is scheming. He survived the Flood, watched civilizations rise and fall, and was still pursuing his own agenda centuries later. The Midrash Aggadah (3,763 texts in our collection) preserves multiple traditions about Og's interactions with the patriarchs, portraying him as a persistent, looming presence in the background of Israelite history.

Some traditions say Og was circumcised by Abraham himself, a detail that explains why he survived so long. The merit of circumcision, even performed with impure motives, granted him extended life. Others identify Og as Eliezer, Abraham's servant, though this identification is disputed and most sources treat them as separate figures.

How Big Was Og?

The rabbinic descriptions of Og's size escalate to absurd dimensions. The Torah gives concrete measurements for his bed: 9 cubits by 4 cubits (Deuteronomy 3:11), which would make Og perhaps 12-15 feet tall if the bed was proportional. The rabbis found this inadequate.

Berakhot 54b (Babylonian Talmud) records the tradition about what happened when Og went to war against the Israelites. He looked at the Israelite camp, measured it at three parasangs (roughly 9 miles) across, and said: "I will go and uproot a mountain three parasangs wide and throw it upon them, and crush them all at once." So Og ripped an entire mountain out of the ground and lifted it over his head. A mountain nine miles wide. Over his head.

The Giant Og in our database describes his proportions using multiple rabbinic sources. Devarim Rabbah (compiled c. 9th-10th century CE) states that Og's ankle bone alone was 30 cubits, roughly 45 feet, in circumference. Bamidbar Rabbah (compiled c. 12th century CE) adds that when Og stood on a plain, his head was level with the clouds. The Talmud, summarizing these traditions, treats Og's size as a given. The question is never whether he was impossibly large, but what specific impossibly large things he did.

The Battle Between Moses and Og

The climax of Og's story is his confrontation with Moses, recorded in the Torah (Numbers 21:33-35, Deuteronomy 3:1-11) and massively expanded in rabbinic literature. Berakhot 54b tells the full story. Og ripped the mountain from the earth and held it above his head, intending to crush the entire Israelite camp in a single throw. But God sent ants, or in some versions a type of grasshopper, to bore into the mountain. They hollowed it out until the center collapsed around Og's neck like a collar. The mountain fell over his head and landed on his shoulders, and his teeth grew outward and locked into the rock so he could not remove it.

Moses, who according to the Talmud stood ten cubits tall (roughly 15 feet), took an axe ten cubits long, jumped ten cubits into the air, and struck Og on the ankle. That was the highest point Moses could reach. And it was enough. The blow killed Og, and the giant fell.

The mathematics of this scene are deliberately comic. Moses is 15 feet tall. He jumps 15 feet. He swings an axe with a 15-foot handle. Total reach: 45 feet, and he hits Og on the ankle. Og must therefore be at least 50-60 feet tall in this version, and that is the conservative reading. The scene combines genuine theological drama with physical comedy worthy of a tall tale tradition.

Why Was Moses Afraid of Og?

The Torah records that God specifically told Moses: "Do not fear him" (Deuteronomy 3:2). The rabbis asked: why would God need to say this? Moses had already defeated Sihon, king of the Amorites. He had led the Israelites through the Red Sea, received the Torah at Sinai, and survived 40 years in the wilderness. What was special about Og that required divine reassurance?

The answer, according to Niddah 61a and Berakhot 54b, is that Og had merit. He had served Abraham. Some traditions say he had been circumcised. He had survived the Flood, which meant God had specifically allowed him to live when all other beings of his kind were destroyed. Moses feared that this accumulated merit might protect Og in battle. Even God's chosen leader might not be able to overcome a being whom God Himself had preserved for millennia.

God's response, "Do not fear him, for I have delivered him into your hand," is not merely tactical encouragement. It is a theological declaration. Whatever merit Og had accumulated was now exhausted. His time was up. The last remnant of the pre-Flood world, the final giant of the old creation, would fall to the leader of the new one. The Giants of Old in our database places Og within the broader tradition of the Nephilim and Rephaim, the races of giants who once walked the earth and were systematically removed to make way for ordinary humanity.

Explore Giant and Flood Texts

Og's story connects the Flood narrative, the patriarchal period, and the conquest of Canaan into a single mythological thread spanning thousands of years. Our database contains over 18,000 ancient Jewish texts, with many exploring the traditions of giants, the Flood, and the antediluvian world. Start with The Giant Og and The Giants of Old from our collection. Read The Inmates of the Ark and The Flood from Legends of the Jews (2,650 texts). Search for Og, Nephilim and giants, or Noah and the Flood to explore the full scope of these traditions across the Talmud, Midrash, and beyond.