Parashat Noah

The second Portion of the Week, entitled simply “Noah” after its protagonist, is no doubt one of the major portions of the entire cycle. 

The awesomeness of last week’s portion’s notwithstanding – indeed, what could possibly rival the creation of the entire universe, human kind, the Adam & Eve and Cain & Able stories, all wrapped up in a single portion – this week’s portion may also be considered a “universe” of its own, offering potent insights and lessons that may well apply to us today. Among the issues discussed are the first righteous person, architecture and design of the first water-proof vessel, global warming, biology and evolution, urban planning, linguistics, the eternal covenant between God and men – but also drunkenness, nakedness, collective punishment – in short, the best and worst of mankind.

Thus, it would be justified to conclude that the second Portion of the Week has justly earned its coveted “location”—right after Genesis. I would like to say a few words about the nature of human beings as it reveals itself through the lens of this week’s two leading stories – The Flood, and the Tower of Babylon. In addition, and perhaps even more importantly, I would like to explore the text depiction of God Himself as “human,” at least in some ways. As always, I’d be happy to hear your comments.

I. The Flood and God’s "Heart"

Whenever I think about The Flood, I can’t escape thinking about the miraculous survival story of the first mariner, the first biologist, the first weatherman – a man truly above and beyond not only his own generation but all the generations of his time (as the text clearly informs us in the opening verse of our portion, Gen. 6:9: “Noah [was] a complete [and] righteous person in his generations” (but see Gen. 7:1, where God informs No’ah that he is righteous merely in this generation). Indeed, Noah has well earned the honor of being the first person to ever “walk with God.” (Gen. 6:9) But is the flood story really about Noah?

Let us turn for a moment to the few verses preceding this week’s portion, where the story actually begins (this, as we shall see, is a recurring theme with the portions of the week, as their allocation is a relatively new phenomena, and quite arbitrary). In those last verses of the first portion, God is said to realize – somewhat to His surprise – “that the man’s evil is aplenty, and that all man’s desires and thoughts of his heart are evil all day long.” (Gen. 6:5). Then the text goes on to describe – not for the first time – God’s internal thought-process while He ponders His next steps:

And the Lord regretted that He had made man on earth, and His heart was saddened. The Lord said, “I will eliminate from the earth the man whom I created – from man to beasts to creeping things, and birds of the sky; for I regret I made them. And the Lord was pleased with Noah.”

(Translation Note: the GWT translation receives high marks here for daring to reverse the linguistic order of the last verse, which begins in Hebrew with the words “And Noah…”; that opening seems to skew the other nine translations I reviewed; see http://bible.cc/genesis/6-8.htm.)

Before I get to God’s “heart,” which is mentioned in the passage, I want to present two questions about this very interesting – but often neglected – passage, which comes at the tail-end the greatest portion of all. First, while God only regrets the creation of mankind, He decides to eliminate all living things, not only humans. What is the reason for that? Were the animals, too, devising “bad” all day long? Second, what does Noah have to do with all that? Recall that God just decided, without too much (reported) hesitation, to wipe out the better part of His entire creation in six days, including the “crown jewel of the creation edifice,” mankind itself.  Why is it important, then, to mention that God was really “pleased” with one person, of which we know nothing at this point?

Let us turn back now to God’s “heart,” which is mentioned here for the first time. Once His “heart” is saddened, God decides to bring an end to mankind, a plan he executes with meticulous detail in next chapter – the story of the Flood. (Recall, however, that the story does have a relatively happy ending: Noah and his family are saved, and so are most of the living species.)

So does God really have a “heart”? Can He (or His heart) really be saddened? We’ll come back to that in a minute.

II. The Tower of Babel and God’s "Eyesight"

The second, but not less interesting, story of this week’s potion begins with the dramatic statement that “And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.” (Gen. 11:1). According to most famous version of the story, with which you are quite familiar, the people then conspired to build such a high tower that it would reach the heavens (where God presumably dwells), and God then frustrate their plan by creating many languages – confusing the people and ultimately dispersing them among all four corners of the earth.

But Prof. Yeshayahu Leibowitz, argues for the opposite view. In his mind, that original state of a single language for everyone was far from being an “ideal state.”  Rather, it actually depicts mental tyranny and uniformity of thought. Accordingly, he is of the opinion that the so-called “punishment” of creating many languages and dispersing mankind to all four corners of the earth was not a punishment at all; rather, it was a blessing that has brought us the plurality of languages, opinions (including dissenting opinions), and viewpoints – in short, it brought us the famous “marketplace of ideas” (Y. Leibowitz, Notes on the Weekly Torah Reading, 14-15 (1988) (Hebrew)).

What is worth noting, again, is the “humanization” of God in the story.

Gen. 11:5: And the Lord has descended to see the city and the tower that the sons of man have built. 

Why would God be required to “descend” in order to “see” the city? Can’t He simply see it from the heavens (or, assuming He is everywhere, from any point He chooses)? Does the text suggest that God is near-sighted, and needs to come closer to actually see? More broadly, how does God’s “vision” work at all?

III. Single Answer: Maimonides’  “Negative Theology”

Throughout the years, many a commentator tried to explain this “human” treatment of God by the biblical text. Does God really have eyes? Heart? Other organs? Does He “descend” in order to “see” things? Does He “feel sorry” for mankind?

The most comprehensive treatment of the subject was presented by the single most important Jewish thinker of all time, the Rambam (acronym for Rabi Moshe Ben Mimon; also known here as Maimonides). The Rambam, who was an Aristotelian philosopher in addition to being an accomplished physician, begins his analysis from the premise that we can only express and comprehend content through the limited medium of language. Even God’s act of creation ex-nihilo, with all its heavenly glory, can only be related to us through words – and nothing more. Thus, while it is clear that we cannot really understand or comprehend everything God does, the text has to relay to us, in one way or another, that God in fact operates in some way in a manner that we can comprehend. 

Accordingly, the text may only provide us with no more than a glimpse unto God’s glory and actions through the extremely limited medium of words. [The Rambam then went on to develop his theory Negative Theology, but I’ll stop here.]

In short, the Rambam explaines that God doesn’t really have a “heart” that is “saddened,” nor was He required to “descend” in order to “see” what was happening in Babel. Rather, these are linguistic tools, used by the text to try and convey to us, in very human terms, what God was about to do.

Still, despite the Rambam’s very elaborate theory, many today – and not only in Judaism – depict God as a peaceful-looking “grandpa,” with a white bird, who has a heart (which is sadden sometimes by the acts of men), and is required to “descend” in order to see things up close. Would you prefer such a God?

Shabbat Shalom,

Doron