Q: #44. Did it rain before the flood?
A: The answer appears to be no. The reason why we believe this is based on (Gen 2:5-6) which says, “and every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. (6) But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.”
In addition, in (Gen 9:12-17), we have God making a covenant promise with Noah that He would never again bring a flood to destroy the whole earth. The sign of this promise was a rainbow in the clouds. It seems logical to assume that if it had rained before the flood, they would have seen a rainbow in the clouds previously.
Can you imagine the ridicule Noah would have received for building an ark on dry land? And, when God said in (Gen 7:4) “I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights,” Noah must have been saying, “What is this rain stuff?”
For answers related to this topic, see:
Did man eat meat before the flood?
What do rainbows symbolize in the Bible?
Were there insects on Noah’s Ark?
Could Noah’s Ark really hold all of those animals?
How many children did Noah have?