Fossil Fuels – Part 5

In the final installment of our blogs on fossil fuels, I want to note a couple of Biblical mentions of petroleum products. After the flood, the Bible explains how Noah’s descendants began to multiply. But instead of spreading out as God commanded, they congregated in a great city and began to construct the Tower of Babel. They built using bricks and asphalt (Genesis 11:3), a sticky, black, semi-solid form of petroleum. When Moses’ mother wanted to waterproof the little basket boat that she had made for her baby, she used tar. Apparently this was readily available from a local oil seep. One of the directors of Standard Oil Company read in Exodus 2:3 how this ark was “daubed with slime and pitch.” He sent the company geologist Charles Whitshott to determine if there was still oil in that region. The discovery of oil led to Standard having very successful oil well operations in Egypt. (Tan, Paul L., Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations, 1990, p. 191.)

Posted on September 2, 2021 by dwoetzel.