Making
Something of Nothing
Parshas Noach
Posted on October 21, 2020 (5781) By Rabbi
Shlomo Jarcaig | Series: Kol
HaKollel | Level: Beginner
“These are the offspring
of Noah – Noah was a righteous man, perfect in his generation; Noah walked with
G-d.” (Beraishis/Genesis 6:9) Why does Noah’s spiritual greatness need to be
qualified by the relative “in his generation”? Rashi, quoting Medrash Rabbah
(Beraishis 30:9) offers two perspectives. It can be understood as praise, for
if he was righteous in this wicked generation, how much more so if he had been
in a generation with righteous people. There is also the negative implication,
that he was only righteous relative to the sinners of his generation; but had
he lived in the era of our forefather Avraham, he would have been considered
“nothing” of significance.
Granted that, from the
second perspective, Noah was not of the same spiritual stature as Avraham, but
why does Medrash Rabbah reduce Noah to “nothing”? And why the specificity of
Avraham’s era? Moshe was the greatest of prophets (see Devarim/Deuteronomy
34:10); why not compare Noah to him?
Rabbi Shimon Schwab
(1908-1995; student of the great Mirrer Yeshiva and Rabbi of congregations in
pre-war Germany and Baltimore, he is renowned for his leadership of the
German-Jewish community in Washington Heights, Manhattan from 1958 through the
end of the 20th century) explains that Noah’s righteousness was unique to
his own generation.
Noah lived for 600 years
prior to the flood, the last 120 of which he knew of the flood’s impending
arrival. Throughout this entire era he did not influence even one person to
repent and follow G-d’s ways. No one beyond his immediate family had any
interest in entering the ark. What was the corruption of Noah’s generation that
mandated such Divine destruction as the flood? They were extremely self-centered. G-d’s
decree against them was sealed because they systematically engaged in theft
from one another, but the thefts were always of legally trivial amounts that
were not punishable under the law. They were totally engrossed in material
acquisition and selfishly pursued their goals relentlessly.
Unfortunately, Noah was
not completely untainted by the pervading attitude of his time. While he was
righteous and dedicated his life to spiritual growth and developing a
relationship with the Divine, he focused was on his own spirituality. Compared
to our forefather Avraham, who developed an intense relationship with G-d but
also taught thousands of others his monotheistic belief and the importance of
emulating G-d’s kindness in our interactions with others, Noah’s righteousness
was “nothing”.
Today’s society and its
values confront us with many spiritual challenges. The immorality and hedonism
that are the ingrained values and goals of those around us crown us as
“righteous” for simply not succumbing, for successfully locking out those
corrupt characteristics. But true righteousness – emulating the Divine by
helping others to grow in their spirituality – changes the world around us for
the better as our connection to the Divine grows ever stronger, relegating the
notion of simply standing strong to seem like “nothing” at all.
Have a Good Shabbos!
Copyright © 2003
by Rabbi Shlomo Jarcaig and Torah.org
Parshas Noach
Posted on October 26, 2022 (5783) By Rabbi
Naftali Reich | Series: Legacy | Level: Beginner
There is nothing
miraculous about a rainbow. Its colorful beauty derives from a simple natural
phenomenon called refraction. Little droplets of water suspended in the air
near a waterfall or after a rainfall capture and bend rays of sunlight in
varying degrees. The result is a colorful prism effect.
In this week’s Torah
portion, however, we find the rainbow in a rather unusual role. The entire
civilization of the world becomes corrupt, and Hashem decides to destroy it
with a Great Flood. The heavens above and the abyss below crack open, and solid
torrents of water spew forth and inundate all the settlements of civilization.
Only Noah, his family and an ark full of animals and birds survive the deluge.
In the aftermath, Hashem vows never again to send a Flood to wipe out
civilization. And he gives a sign. The rainbow!
Why the rainbow? What is
so remarkable about the rainbow that it should become the symbol of the continuity
of civilization?
If we look carefully at
the chronicles of the generations before the Flood and after, we notice a very
sharp drop in human longevity. Before the Flood, the average life span seems to
have been well into the hundreds of years, and the quality of life was excellent;
good health and prosperity were the norm. After the Flood, however, life
expectancy declined, and by Abraham’s time, it seems to have been about one
hundred years. Why?
The commentators explain
that before the Flood the role of humanity was to serve as the passive
receptacle of divine beneficence. People were not required to make any effort.
All they had to do was accept what was given to them. The result was a great
flow of spirituality and divine vitality which blessed humanity with
extraordinary longevity, health and prosperity. But at the same time, it made
for a static society. People did not have the need or the ability to create or
improvise or pursue new horizons and modes of thought. Therefore, when society
was corrupted and the flow of divine grace was interrupted, humanity did not
have the ability to renew itself and thereby avoid destruction.
After the Flood, however,
a new dynamic took effect. Henceforth, humanity had both the need and the
ability to take an active role in channeling divine grace from Above. The need
to participate reduced the flow of divine grace and resulted in a diminished
quality of life. But at the same time, people could be creative and adapt, and
therefore, there was always the potential for self-renewal. Even if society
should become corrupted, it would always be able to find its way back to the
Almighty.
The rainbow is the symbol
of this active participation. The little droplets of water accept the light
rays that stream down from the sky, and they focus and channel the light in
such a way as to reveal the plethora of brilliant colors intrinsic to every ray
of sunlight. The rainbow is the paradigm for the new role of humanity which
would ensure the continued existence of civilization.
A young man returned to visit the
sage with whom he had studied for many years. He had been one of the sage’s
most brilliant disciples yet he was failure in life. Another young disciple,
who had not been nearly as brilliant, however, had gone on to great triumphs
and successes.
“Why has he done better
than I have?” the young man asked. “After all, I was clearly more talented.”
“Indeed you were,” said
the sage. “You absorbed every word I spoke and understood it thoroughly. But
you never developed the ability to think on your own. Therefore, once you left
me you were lost. The other fellow, however, though not as brilliant as you,
learned to take what I taught and adapt it. That is a formula for success.”
In our own lives, we can
transform our very existence if we would only view ourselves as the active
participants in directing the flow of divine beneficence into the world. We are
all endowed with special qualities and strengths which can be used for the
good, if only we would acknowledge and develop them. In the end, we will surely
discover that the privilege of acting as a conduit for divine beneficence is
the most enriching grace of all.
Text Copyright © 2011 by
Rabbi Naftali Reich and Torah.org.
Rabbi Reich is on the
faculty of the
Ohr Somayach Tanenbaum Education Center.
Parshas Noach
Posted on October 6, 2021 (5782) By Rabbi Berel
Wein | Series: Rabbi
Wein | Level: Beginner
The ten generations
described in the Torah, from Adam until Noach, produced only chaos and eventual
destruction. There were a few individuals, such as Chanoch, who were moral and
positive people. However, they had little, if any, influence on the general
society in which they lived, and not even one person who would follow them and
their moral behavior.
Our world, and all our
societies are, to a great extent, copycat structures of those days. The general
excuse for all immoral behavior from childhood is the expression “everyone is
doing it”. Somehow, this excuse, that everyone is doing it, removes
responsibility from any individual who engages in any immoral activity. Thus,
there develops a chain of almost never-ending failure, excuses, and willingness
to accept bad behavior as a societal norm.
The ten generations that
led up to the coming of the Great Flood sank into this morass of evil without
realizing it. They were merely repeating the actions of the generations before
them, and what they saw was everyone else behaving in a similar fashion. Evil
and immoral behavior are very easily accepted in general and mass society. This
notion explains Nazism in Germany and Stalinism in the Soviet Union. It also
helps describe much of what is transpiring in Western society today.
The slow erosion of
morality, good behavior and godly faith is a constant challenge to all
societies, and if no one stands up against it, those societies are eventually
doomed to their own self-destruction.
In the eyes of Jewish
scholarship and tradition, Noach is found wanting, not so much for his own
personal failings after the Flood, but, rather, for his inability to stand
against the evil in his society. He builds an ark and warns against the
impending disaster that is about to befall the human race. However, he is
unable to identify evil for what it is, and to declare a viable alternative for
human beings to adopt and follow. There is a feeling of hopelessness that seems
to envelop him and his actions, and he fails in building a new world because of
the belief that “everyone does it” is a sufficient excuse for bad behavior and
human immorality.
It is because of this
that Midrash and Jewish tradition generally view Noach and his righteousness
with a fair degree of skepticism. His planting of the vineyard as his first
project after emerging from the ark is an example of the acceptance of the idea
that if everyone does it, then, somehow, it can be justified and even lauded.
It is almost painful to read in the Torah how Noach fails to remake the world
after the Flood in a better image and a more positive vein.
The Torah illustrates for
us that great people can have great failings, and that lost opportunities will
always come back to haunt us and frustrate human progress. We are all the
descendants of Noach, and his character traits exist within our personal DNA
even millennia later. We will have to wait for the arrival of Abraham and Sarah
to put us on a better and more upward trajectory of belief and behavior.
Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Berel Wein
