With “Noah,” a name that sounds similar to the word נָחַם, nacham, it is not immediately clear what Lamech is suggesting. Words derived from this root are translated, variously, be sorry, console, comfort, change mind, and even repent. Probably the best exegesis is to be found by examining the explanation Lamech gives, a prophesy that has its fulfillment in the next chapter. The explanation is: Noah “shall comfort us [? nacham] concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed.” Noah is not being blamed, in the narrative, for the flood; indeed, he, through his faithful and upright walk with the Lord, will play a key role in the preservation of mankind. Yet it is the two curses upon the land, the curses of Adam and Cain, that led to great toil; the curse also is closely associated with “every imagination of the thoughts of [man’s] heart [being] only evil continually.” (6:5) Noah’s actions ensure that the curse is not total; it is not enough to wipe out humanity. So Noah will not make us repent, change our minds, or make us sorry, but indeed he might well console or comfort those remaining, and those in Heaven; and he will help God to change his mind about the curse. See what God says after the Flood: “And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.” (Gen 8:21) So God will change his mind—he will thus “repent” of the earlier curse—and so perhaps the name of Noah indicates the “repentance” of God in that sense. Moreover, he and his line will comfort the world by remaining, more or less, the righteous “sons of God” (6:2). They will in time issue in the greatest of comfort, namely, in the Seed—he who will “crush” the head of the serpent (3:15), who will be Moses’ “Prophet from the midst of thee” (Deut 18:15), later to be called the Anointed, that is, the Messiah, a title rendered in Greek Christos, and in English Christ.