Iyunim - Weekly insights on the Parasha with commentaries by Nehama Leibovitz, za"l
Lesson of the flood
Cassuto in his work From Noah to Abraham pp. 30-31, comments as follows on the story of the deluge as related in our sidra: The structure of the chapter is carefully worked out down to the last detail. The story is divided into two acts of six paragraphs each. The first part starting at the beginning of the sidra to chapter 7 verse 24, stage by stage, the workings of Divine justice, unleashing catastrophe on a world that has become filled with violence. The picture becomes progressively darker, until only one spark of light remains to illuminate the deathly gloom characterizing the sixth paragraph (7, 17-24). This is the ark which floated on the awesome waters that had covered everything, and which guarded within its bounds the hope of life in the future: And every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground,both man, and cattle, and reptile, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth and no one save Noah remained alive and they that were with him in the ark. The second act depicts for us the various successive stages of Divine mercy renewing life on earth. The light that had become reduced to nothing more than a tiny dot in a world of darkness now shines brighter and brighter, till it once again illuminates the whole of our canvas. Now we are shown a tranquil world adorned with the rainbow, reflecting its spectrum of colour through the clouds, as a sign of surety of life and peace for the coming generations.
The wrongdoing of the antedeluvians is alluded to in the last paragraphs of the previous sidra, illustrated in the continuous moral decline of the human race, from fratricide (Cain and Abel) to the glorification of battle and the sword in Lemech’s lyrical outburst, and the deeds of the “sons of God,” who “took themselves wives of all which they chose.” These latter were “strong-arm” men who, in the words of R. David Kimhi, “upheld the principle of might is right and there were none to deliver from their clutches.” This picture of moral disintegration becomes steadily blacker until it is stated at the end of the last sidra:
The moral crime of the generation of the flood is further described in somewhat different phrasing, in two sentences, at the beginning of our sidra:
In the opinion of our sages cited in Rashi, the first sentence refers to sexual corruption, whilst the second refers to social crimes. (hamas ) “violence” refers to “robbery” (gezel). In the Divine message to Noah wherein He reveals to him his dread decision to wipe out mankind, only the last type of offence is referred to:
Our sages were puzzled by the variation in the description of human behavior, prior to the deluge in verse 11 and the naming of the sin that led the Almighty to steal mankind’s fate in verse 13. Here is what our sages comment on this subject in the Talmud, Sanhedrin 108a:
The Midrash abounds in descriptions of the wickedness of the generation of the deluge, of the exhaustive list if inequities perpetrated by them. Nevertheless it is always stressed that of all their numerous transgressions, only that one specifically named, that of violence, sealed their fate and brought down Divine judgement on them:
The Midrash aptly sums up the corrupting nature of “violence which is capable of demoralising all that is good in human nature, and acts as an inexorable barrier between man and his Maker.
The words of the Neila prayer should still echo in our ears, permeated by its ever-current theme that “we cease from oppression of our hands.” An allusion to another concept that is the keynote of the Neila prayer is also detected in the sidra by our sages. This concept is referred to in Ezekiel (33, 11), pointing out that God does not desire the death of the wicked but rather their repentance. The Midrash weaves this theme into the fabric of the story of the building of the ark, and the miraculous deliverance of Noah and his company through its means.
Here is another version:
This again is the theme of Rashi in the next chapter (7, 12) when the Almighty gave the generation its last chance to repent: And the rain was upon the earth. “And the rain was upon the earth”: Further it states: “And the flood was... upon the earth (17)? When He caused it to descend with mercy, so that in the event of their repenting, the rain would be one of blessing. When they did not repent it turned into a deluge. The last warning did not avail and the flood came and wiped them out. Questions for Further Study:
Act 1 Act 11
Pay careful attention to the conclusion of these paragraphs. What is the significance of the similarity in phrasing that you find in the paragraphs concerned?
3. In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japhet...into the ark. The, and every beast after its kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after its kind, and every fowl after its kind, every bird of every sort. (7, 13-14) Why does the text diverge from the order of creation? (see 1, 20-25) and mention the fowl last?
“And the Lord shut him in...” -- protected him from them wrecking it. He encircled the Ark with bears and lions which slew them. (Rashi on Gen. 7, 13-16)
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