NOAH, WITH

HIS SONS, HIS WIFE, AND HIS SON'S WIVES, WENT INTO THE ARK

BECAUSE OF THE WATERS OF THE FLOOD. OF THE CLEAN ANIMALS, OF THE ANIMALS THAT

ARE NOT CLEAN, OF THE BIRDS, AND OF EVERYTHING THAT CREEPS ON THE GROUND, TWO

EACH, MALE AND FEMALE, CAME TO NOAH INTO THE ARK,

AS GOD HAD COMMANDED NOAH.

(Bereishit 7:7-9)

THEY CAME TO NOAH, INTO THE ARK,

TWO OF ALL FLESH IN WHICH THERE WAS BREATH OF LIFE.

(Ibid.

ibid. 15)

Two of each shall come to you to stay alive

– He informed him that they would come, two of each, on their own; he

would not have to hunt them in the mountains and on the islands. Then he would

later bring them into the ark. And He specified that they come male and female.

This was the general rule. Afterwards, He commanded that Noah take of every

clean animal seven of each; in this case He did not say that they would come on

their own, but that Noah should take them, for those who come to be saved and

to preserve their seed come on their own, but He did not decree that those who

come in order to be offered as sacrifices come on their own to be slaughtered,

but Noah took them, for the command of seven of each was so that Noah be

able to use them for sacrifices.

(RaMBaN, Bereishit 6:20)

Noah… went into the ark because of the

waters of the Flood – Rabbi Yohanan said: Noah lacked

perfect faith, for had the waters not reached his ankles he would never have

entered the ark.

Two of each came to Noah – Falsehood came

and wanted to enter. Noah said to him: You may not enter, unless you wed a

spouse. Falsehood went and sought a wife. He met Curse, and she said to

him: From where do you come? He told her: From Noah – I wanted to enter the

ark, but he refused to admit me unless I had a wife. She replied: And what will

you give me? He said to her: I stipulate with you that all which I accumulate

you may take. She listened to him, and the two entered the ark. When they

exited the ark, Falsehood went out and accumulated, and Curse kept taking each

thing as it arrived. Falsehood came and said to her: Where is everything that I

accumulated? She replied: Was this not our condition, that all which you

accumulate, I take? He had no answer. Therefore it is written He hatches

evil, conceives mischief, and gives birth to fraud (Psalms 7:15). The parable says: Falsehood begets – but Curse

takes all.

(Yalkut Shimoni, Noah, 56)

"If Noah had been in Abraham's generation, he

would not have been considered of any importance."

Shefer Stollman

Noah's story

unfolds in the parasha named after him. Its verses

and their accompanying midrashim

allow us to inspect his deeds closely. He is called righteous [tzaddik] twice: first in the parasha's

opening verse: Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generations;

later, the Creator Himself referred to him in this way, when he was called to

come to the ark: And the Lord said to Noah, "Come you and all your

this generation.

However, this

idyllic depiction of Noah as the tzaddik par

excellence is thrown into question by the disagreement reported in

Sanhedrin 109b regarding his being righteous in his generations (Bereishit 6:9). Rashi leaves out the names of the disputants when he cites

it is his commentary: "Some of our Sages interpret it favorably: How much

more so if he had lived in a generation of righteous people, he would have been

even more righteous. Others interpret it derogatorily: In comparison with his

generation he was righteous, but if he had been in Abraham's

generation, he would

not have been considered of any importance" (Judaica Press translation).

The sharp

formulation, "If he had been in Abraham's generation, he would not have

been considered of any importance," does not appear in any of the earlier sources

known to us. Tractate Sanhedrin does report a disagreement between Rabbi Yohanan and Resh Lakish regarding the significance of the word bedorotav [in his generations]. R. Yohanan says: "In his generations, but not in

other generations." Resh Lakish

was much more charitable. He said: "In his generations – all the

more so in other generations." Midrash Rabbah contains another version: "In his

generations; R. Yehudah and R. Nehemiah

generations he was a tzaddik, but if he had

been in the generation of Moses or in the generation of Samuel, he would not have

been a tzaddik. Their statements make no

specific reference to Abraham's generation, and the words "would not have

been considered of any importance" appear to express Rashi's

own personal conclusion alone.

We are left to

guess at Rashi's own position in this controversy on

the basis of his further comments. When Rashi treats

the second verse in which Noah is referred to as a tzaddik

(Bereishit 7:1)

(this time without the additional appellation, blameless) he cites Bereishit Rabbah: "From here

presence, and all of them when not in his presence." However, just a few

verses later we read and Noah and his sons and his wife and his son's wives

came with him to the ark before the waters of the flood and Rashi tells us: "Noah was among those of little faith.

He believed and yet did not believe that the flood would come; he did not enter

the ark until pressed upon by the waters." This is really R. Yohanan's opinion (Yalkut Shimoni, Bereishit 7:57),

which already stated that Noah was a tzaddik "in

his generations, but not in other generations."

From here we

can deduce that even though Rashi failed to mention

the parties to the disagreement by name, he tends to side with R. Yohanan in his controversy with Resh

Lakish. However, the stress that Rashi

places upon the notion that if Noah "had been in Abraham's generation, he

would not have been considered of any importance" – an idea that cannot be

found elsewhere – requires explanation.

I believe that

the Sages are telling us about two kinds of tzaddikim.

One type of tzaddik defends his generation,

i.e. when even one such tzaddik exists, the

Holy One blessed be He will not bring down catastrophe upon the world, no

matter how bad things get. Through the power of his prayers and personality,

such a tzaddik annuls the divine judgment. On

the other hand, there is a kind of tzaddik who

not only fails to prevent catastrophe – the very presence of someone like him

in the world allows the Creator to flood the world, since God has at his

disposal a tzaddik from whom a new world can be

built.

Noah belongs

to the category of tzaddikim who are unable to

prevent the flood. Noah did not pray for all of humanity and he did not argue

with his Creator regarding His attribute of judgment. He was only able to save

himself and his family. His role was fulfilled when the Creator told him: and

to the ark, you, and your sons, and your wife, and your sons' wives with you.

In contrast to

Noah, there are tzaddikim by whose merit the

world can continue to exist even if the situation deteriorates to the point

where the Creator wishes to return everything to a state of chaos. Our father

Abraham belonged to the category of tzaddikim

whose presence in the world protects the existence of all humanity. The Holy

One blessed be He's relationship to him is expressed through the dialogue that

took place between them before the destruction of Sodom

and Gomorrah.

According to

the above, if Noah had lived in Abraham's generation, the latter's influence

would have prevented the Creator from flooding the world. In that case, Noah

would have been left without a job! He would not have been asked to build the

ark or to gather all species of animals into it. This is what Rashi teaches us from his understanding of the disagreement

between the Amoraim: "If he had been in Abraham's

generation, he would not have been considered of any importance." That is

to say, that if Abraham lived in his age, Noah would have remained, as we would

say today, a "zero," without purpose or function. That is why Rashi thought it irrelevant whether Rashi

was a tzaddik only in his own generation or in

other generations as well.

An incident

involving Rabbi Hanina ben Dosa sheds light upon the whole subject. The Gemara in Berakhot 61b brings Rav's dictum that this world was created for completely wicked people, while the world to come was created for the

perfectly righteous. A biblical figure, Ahab ben Omri, is cited as an example of a completely wicked person.

However, the Gemarah does not cite a biblical figure such

as Noah or Abraham to exemplify the perfectly righteous; instead, it mentions

one of the early Tannaim, R. Hanina

ben Dosa.

One might ask:

if a biblical figure was chosen to represent absolute evil, why couldn't an

absolutely good character be found in Scripture?

The choice of

R. Hanina ben Dosa as a example of a perfectly

righteous person comes to teach us something regarding the special type of tzaddik by whose merit the world evades destruction.

This is what is said of him in Ta'anit 24b: "R. Yehudah said in the name of Rav:

Each and every day a bat kol [divine voice]

goes forth, saying: "The entire world is sustained for the sake of My son Hanina, and My son Hanina makes

do from one Shabbat eve to the next with just one kav

of carob…"

Amazingly,

when the Sages wanted to describe R. Hanina ben Dosa's special righteousness,

they chose to recall a very amusing incident: "R. Hanina ben Dosa

was walking down the road and it started raining. He said to Him: Master of the

Universe, the whole world is comfortable but Hanina

suffers. The rain stopped. When he got home, he said to Him: Master of the

Universe, all the world suffers, but Hanina is

comfortable. The rain returned."

The Sages were

amazed by this tzaddik's power and they asked what

point there was to the prayer for rain offered by the High Priest on Yom

Kippur, in which he asked that "the prayers of wayfarers [that it not

rain] not be accepted before you" if a tzaddik

like R. Hanina ben Dosa possesses the power and the merit to stop the rain

while he travels?

The

wonder-story of the "perfect tzaddik,"

R. Hanina ben Dosa, allows us to identify the difference between a tzaddik of Noah's caliber and a tzaddik

of Abraham's caliber. The complete story of R. Hanina

ben Dosa contains three

elements that mark the perfect tzaddik: a

personality through whose merit the entire world is sustained; a person who

makes due with little (a kav of carobs); the

ability to stop the rain, despite the prayer offered by the High Priest on Yom

Kippur.

Noah lacked

all of these aspects. He was not a complete tzaddik.

His merit did not guarantee the world's preservation, but rather made possible

its destruction. He lacked the power to counter the Creator's will and stop the

rain (the flood). When he left the ark, he did not make due with modest

sustenance, as it is written: Noah, the tiller of the earth, was the first

himself within his tent.

Because of

this, if had been in Abraham's generation, he would not have been considered of

any importance.

Sheffer Stolman is an ordained rabbi and received an MA in

education in the USA. He has served for many years in hasbara

positions in the Jewish Agency.

For

in the image of God He made man.      

How were the Ten Commandments given?

Five on one tablet, five on the

other. It is

written I am the Lord your God – and across from it You

shall not murder – the Bible tells us that whoever sheds blood, is

considered by Scripture to have detracted from the image.

This may be compared to a king of flesh and blood who entered the country and erected icons, and had

statues made and coins minted. After a while, the icons were overturned, the

statues were broken and the coins invalidated, and they detracted from the

image of the king. So it is with one who has shed blood, Scripture considers it

as if he had detracted from the image, as is written, Whosoever spills the

blood of man etc., and it is written for in the image of God He made man.

(Yalkut Shimoni, Shemot 20, 299)

A Tower

with its Head in the Heavens as a Project that Ignores Human Beings

There were

seven steps to the tower from the east, and seven from the west. The bricks

were brought up on one side, and [the workers] descended on the other.

If a man

fell and died, no one paid attention to him, but if a single brick fell, they

would sit down and weep, saying, "Woe unto us! When will another one be

brought up in its stead?"

(Pirkei DeRabbi

Eliezer, 24)

Tribal

Morality Contradicts Absolute Morality

If they

complete the tower, they will come to think that they must forcibly prevent

people who disagree with this opinion, and that involves murder and robbery, which

completely corrupt society. The fact that they are currently in agreement will

not help. Thus the Prophet Jeremiah cried out, how skillfully you plan your

poor – you did not catch them breaking in (2:33-4),

which means that they were unified in his day and would boast that they enjoyed

love and peace more than any other people, but the prophet disagreed, for on

their garments was found the blood of innocents – not because they had

committed any theft or such, but because they did not belong to their group. So

the groups came to murder, and there is no boast of peace in that, rather only

if they had been careful not to do evil against those not in their group.

(Ha-Amek Davar and Harhev Davar, Bereishit 11:6)

One Language? One

Set of Words?

When they expressed this intention (and let us

make ourselves a name), God fully understood their intention and knew well that

their end would be the opposite of what they thought. On the contrary, there

exists the possibility of a unified nation. When? When a people is dispersed

and scattered, with no one having dealings with his fellow – then can it be one

people. But should they gather together in one place in order to escape from

international conflicts, they will then fall into an even greater war, one

man's sword against his fellow, because assembly of the wicked is bad for them,

and because they said Let us make for ourselves a name, everyone will

want to rule over his fellow and be higher than him, for this is common among

groups who do everything for the sake self-aggrandizement, so therefore it is

better to disperse them and prevent them from executing this building project.

(Kli Yakar on Noah)

It appears to me that this decree (to disperse

the Generation of the Scattering) was not a punishment, but rather a tremendous

improvement on mankind's behalf. The primary significance of the Tower

of Babel narrative lies not in the

attempt to erect the tower, but in the preceding words: All the earth – revived

post Deluge mankind – was of one language and the same words. After

the construction failure, many languages evolved, and consequently, different

'words', different ideas. It seems to me that the basis of the mistake, or sin,

of the Generation of the Scattering, was not in the building of the city and

the tower, but in the movement to maintain, via these artificial means, the

situation of one language and one set of words – of centralization,

which we, in modern terms, call totalitarianism.

(From He'arot le'Parshiyot ha'Shavua by Prof. Yeshayahu Leibowitz, z"l, pp.14-15)

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