Bar-Ilan University's Parashat Hashavua Study
Center
Parashat Noah 5771/ October 9, 2010
Lectures on the weekly Torah reading by the faculty of Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan,
Israel. A project of the Faculty of Jewish Studies, Paul and Helene Shulman Basic Jewish
Studies Center, and the Office of the Campus Rabbi. Published on the Internet under the
sponsorship of Bar-Ilan University's International Center for Jewish Identity. Prepared for
Internet Publication by the Computer Center Staff at Bar-Ilan University. Inquiries and
comments to: Dr. Isaac Gottlieb, Department of Bible, gottlii@mail.biu.ac.il
What Can We Learn from the Genesis Narratives?
Dr. Joseph Priel
Center for Basic Jewish Studies
The stories of Creation and the beginning of mankind are one of the basic buildingblocks of Jewish education. We are raised on these tales from an early age, and we
pass them on to next generation. But when these stories are closely examined, we see
that this educational edifice is quite problematic: primordial Man did not manage to
obey the one prohibition given him; his eldest son, born of the first woman, murdered
his only brother; Enosh introduced pagan worship into the world, according to the
prevalent view among the Sages; the entire world sinned and was wiped out in the
flood; the sons of Noah did not learn their lesson from being delivered and, according
to several commentators, castrated their father; finally, in the narrative at the end of
this week’s reading, mankind was so deranged they thought they could build a tower
that reached up to the heavens.
Do these things befit the beginning of the Creator’s annals of mankind? Do such
stories make a person eager to be closer to the Creator and His Teaching? What
wisdom did Judaism see in beginning with such a series of stories? The Sages noted
this difficulty, and instructed teachers not to begin their Bible instruction with
Genesis, rather with Leviticus (Tanhuma 96.14):
Rabbi Assi said: Why does the curriculum for young schoolchildren begin
with Leviticus? Because all the sacrifices are written there, and since the
children are still pure and have not yet tasted sin and transgression, therefore
the Holy One, blessed be He, said they should first begin with the order of
sacrifices, so that the pure children occupy themselves with the subject of pure
deeds.
From this we can learn the contra-positive: if Leviticus deals with “pure deeds,”
perhaps Genesis does not. In practice, however, only in a few schools of the Haredi
sector does Bible instruction begin with Leviticus, and even there the children begin
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to study Genesis at a relatively tender age. Thus, we must examine what hides behind
these stories and how we are to cope with studying them. Below we present a brief
analysis of six of the narratives.
1. The Garden of Eden and the sin of eating from the tree of knowledge
(Genesis, ch. 3)
In this story we learn how small primordial man was, i.e., how small we, the human
race, are. In the Garden of Eden man lived simply, effortlessly. He had to cope only
with one thing: the prohibition against eating from the tree of knowledge. In the end
(as we might expect) he did not measure up. Looking deeper into the story, we see
that it is actually about ourselves. All of us, like primordial man, have tremendous
curiosity and limited ability to cope with prohibitions. With this story the Torah
begins since it is "the beginning of wisdom": what is the strength of man?
2. Cain and Abel (Genesis 4:1-16)
This story begins clearly, with the rejection of Cain’s offering, but continues
obscurely: “Cain said to his brother Abel … and when they were in the field, Cain set
upon his brother Abel and killed him” (Gen 4:8). What had Cain said,1 and why did
he kill his brother? Clearly the rejection of his offering by G-d had aroused his
jealousy, but a motive for the murder is given by Genesis Rabbah (22.7):
“Come,” said they, “let us divide the world.” One took the land and the other
the movables. The former said, “The land you stand on is mine,” the latter
retorted, “What you are wearing is mine.” One said: “Strip”; the other
retorted: “Fly [off the ground].” … Rabbi Joshua of Siknin said in Rabbi
Levi’s name: Both took land and both took movables, but about what did they
quarrel? One said, “The Temple must be built in my area,” while the other
claimed, “It must be built in mine.” … Rabbi Judah b. Rabbi said: Their
quarrel was about the first Eve. (Freedman ed., p. 187)
Translating these quarrels into contemporary terms, we could say they were about
territory and control, religion, and women. Since time immemorial these have been
the issues that have led to war and strife. Clearly it was important to include this story
near the beginning of the Torah, since it presents us another fundamental aspect of our
world.
3. Enosh and his generation
A single verse at the end of Parashat Bereshit (Gen. 4:26) tells us: “And to Seth, in
turn, a son was born and he named him Enosh. It was then that men began to invoke
the Lord by name.” Rashi explains:2 “Began [Heb. huhal] – this word is connected in
meaning to hullin, or profane matters, viz. calling the names of men and the names of
idols after the name of the Holy One, blessed be He – making them the objects of
idolatrous worship and calling them deities.” Only a few centuries 3 had elapsed since
G-d had revealed Himself to man before some of the world’s inhabitants decided that
On this question, see for example: Menahem ben-Yashar, “Le-Fetah Hatat Rovet,” Beit Mikra, 7/4
(1963), pp. 116-119; Abraham Korman, “Het’o shel Cain,” in Ben-Zion Luria (ed.), Sefer Gevaryahu,
1, Jerusalem 1989, pp. 17-20; Elhanan Samet, “Va-Yish`a H’ el Hevel ve-el Minhato ve-el Cain ve-el
Minhato lo Sha`ah – Madu`a?” in Iyyunim be-Farashat ha-Shavua – Bereshit Shemot, Series 1,
Jerusalem 2002, pp. 6-20.
2
Although Ibn Ezra shows linguistically that huhal means 'began', i.e., a positive process, nevertheless
his view is outweighed by that of the midrash (Genesis Rabbah 23.6) and other medieval
commentators. See Samson Raphael Hirsch’s commentary on this verse.
3
Enosh was the son of Seth, Adam’s grandson, and was born 235 years after Creation (calculated
according to Gen. 5:3-6).
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there actually is more than one G-d.4 Faith and belief are among the foundations of
human existence, therefore this story, as well, appears in the beginning of the Torah.
4. The Generation of the flood
Contrary to what one might think, the story of the flood begins at the end of the
previous weekly reading, not the beginning of this one (Gen. 6:1-7):
When men began to increase on earth and daughters were born to them, the
divine beings saw how beautiful the daughters of men were and took wives
from among those that pleased them… It was then, and later too, that the
Nephilim appeared on earth – when the divine beings cohabited with the
daughters of men, who bore them offspring. They were the heroes of old, the
men of renown. The Lord saw how great was man’s wickedness on earth, and
how every plan devised by is mind was nothing but evil all the time. And the
Lord regretted that He had made man on earth, and His heart was saddened
The Lord said, “ I will blot out from the earth the men who I created.”
One does not have to read very closely to discover the focal point of the sinning here.
The word “daughters” appears three times in the above passage, the word “wives”
once. The world had discovered how to use force in order to satisfy its cravings.
Midrashic literature expands on the moral depravity of the entire world, even the
animals.5 Although Rashi’s explanation (based on Sanhedrin 108a), “Their fate was
sealed only on account of their sin of robbery,” is well-known and is how
commentators tend to explain the reason for the flood, one must consider more closely
whether G-d would indeed destroy His world on account of stealing grain, or even
someone’s cow?6 From the text we see that women were losing their freedom and
being sexually exploited. The vehemence of G-d’s reaction, deciding to destroy His
young world because of its having lost a sense of moral limits, is a loud and clear
warning to the world for all generations. The Holy One, blessed be He, destroyed the
world, washed away all its sins in clear water, in the hope of refining the heart of man,
leaving only one speck of life on the face of the earth: Noah and his family.
5. The behavior of Noah’s sons, upon leaving the ark (Genesis 9:20-28)
Noah, the tiller of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. 7 He drank of the
wine and became drunk, and he uncovered himself within his tent. Ham, the
father of Canaan, saw his father’s nakedness and told his two brothers outside.
… When Noah woke up from his wine and learned what his youngest son had
done to him, he said, “Cursed be Canaan, the lowest of slaves shall he be to
his brothers.”
The language here is obscure; did Canaan deserve to be eternally cursed just because
he saw his grandfather’s nakedness?8 The Sages (Sanhedrin 70a) explain that he did
The Sages (Genesis Rabbah 2.3) viewed the idolatry that Enosh’s generation brought to the world as
characterizing the creation of darkness (“with darkness over the surface of the deep” – Gen. 1:2).
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“R. Judan said, when a bride was made beautiful for her husband, the chief [of these nephilim]entered
and enjoyed her first. Hence it is written, For they were fair, which refers to virgins; And they took
them wives, refers to married women. Whomsoever they chose: that means [they cohabited also with]
males and beasts" (Gen. Rabbah 26.5, Freedman ed., p. 213).
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There is a homily which ascribes this to the following: “Said R. Hanina: ‘Hamas’ (violence) refers to
what is worth a perutah [the smallest coin]; gezel (robbery), to what is of less value than a perutah.
And this is what the people of the age of the Flood used to do: When a man brought out a basket full
of lupines [for sale], one would come and seize less than a perutah’s worth and then everyone would
come and seize less than a perutah’s worth, so that he had no redress at law” (Gen. Rabbah 31.5,
Freedman ed., pp. 240-241).
7
The Sages were critical of this; cf. Tanhuma Shemini 11, and Rashi on this verse.
8
Ham’s involvement in the episode is complicated.
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not simply see; one view is that they (Canaan and Ham) copulated with him, another,
that they castrated him. Why did Canaan and Ham do this? Had they not witnessed
the flood? Had they not understood why it had been brought upon the earth? Had
they not learned the message it sought to convey? Rashi explains this in his
commentary on verse 25:
Why did Ham castrate him? He said to his brothers, “Adam had two sons, and
one killed the other in order that he might possess the whole world; our father
has three sons, and he wishes to have yet another.”
Fear of having yet another person competing for possession of the world led to this
dastardly deed. They did not want there to be more than three successors after the
flood. Indeed, sometimes we have not room in our hearts for other people, to share
our wealth with them, even if it is great. Thus, we see the place held by this “little”
story in the Genesis narratives. Note that in fact Ham was guilty of the same sin that
had brought on the flood. Through this story the Torah teaches us about another
aspect of our character, namely how difficult it is to learn and internalize a message.
6. The Tower of Babel
Many interpretations9 have been given this story (Genesis 11:1-10).10 Most of them
share in common an emphasis on human hubris growing to the point of believing
humans could fight G-d or protect the world against Him. The story ends with the
failure of these proud souls, confounding them to the extent of not even being able to
express themselves: “so that they shall not understand one another’s speech” (Gen.
11:7).
These six stories open the Torah, each story as unsavory as it is important. All
negative human characteristics are revealed in this sequence of stories. In my humble
opinion, the Sages summarized them succinctly in two statements: in the first, “Rabbi
Eliezer ha-Kappar said: Envy and lust and ambition take a man out of the world”; and
the second, “in every [other] law of the Torah, if a man is commanded: ‘Transgress
and suffer not death’ he may transgress and not suffer death, excepting idolatry,
incest, and murder” (Sanhedrin 74a, Epstein ed., http://www.come-and-hear.com).
These two fundamental statements are based on these six stories: primordial man
sinned by being too curious, not overcoming his thirst for discovery and for the taste
of the forbidden fruit. His first-born, Cain, lusted for power, was jealous of his
brother and shed his blood. The generation of Enosh led the world astray, sinning by
spreading idolatry. The generation of the flood lusted for women and exploited their
power to satisfy their lust. Ham and his son, Canaan, could not bear competition and
were led to sin by their lust for honor and power. A great resemblance can be seen
between them and the builders of the tower, who held thought themselves divine and
wanted to rule the world, but this lust for honor caused them to be removed from the
world.
Sanhedrin 109a explains: “What did they do? The scholars of R. Shila taught: They said, ‘Let us
build a tower, ascend to heaven, and cleave it with axes, that its waters might gush forth.’ In the West
[sc. Palestine academies] they laughed at this: If so, they should have built in on a mountain! R.
Jeremiah b. Eleazar said: They split up into three parties. One said, ‘Let us ascend and dwell there;’
the second, ‘Let us ascend and serve idols;’ and the third said, ‘Let us ascend and wage war
[with
G-d].’ On this subject, see the explanation by Rashi (Gen. 11:1), Rashbam (Gen. 11:4), Rabbenu Bahya
(Gen. 11:4), and the original ideas of Abarbanel.
10
See Yehudah Elitzur, “Li-fshutah shel Parashat Dor ha-Pelagah,” in: Ben-Zion Luria (ed.), Sefer
Gevaryahu, 2, Jerusalem 1989, pp. 1-3; Amos Frisch, “Le-Verur Het Dor ha-Pelagah,” Bi-Sdeh
Hemed, 14/7 (1971), pp. 440-443; Yitzhak Ari Shevet, “Nimrod Tzadik or Rasha, Hatza`ah Hadashah
le-Het Dor ha-Pelagah,” Talelei Orot 8, (1998-1999), pp. 11-19.
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The stories of Genesis provide a workshop in the human endeavor.11 Fortunately, this
frightful series of narratives comes to an end, and even finds amends. With the birth
of Abraham, the world receives someone who will understand human weakness and
who will teach the world how to cope with it. This perspective on the text makes
clear the division into weekly readings, deliberately telling of Abraham’s birth by the
end of Parashat Noah,12 in the midst of tempestuous, sinful times, thus making a
connection between the portions telling the sorry story of creation and Parashat Lekh
Lekha, which describes the chosenness of Abraham.
See the article by Menashe Duvshani, “Mussar ve-Civilizatziah be-Sefer Bereshit,” in: Asher Weiser
and Ben-Zion Luria (eds.), Sefer Korngreen, Tel Aviv 1964, pp. 297-305; Issachar Jacobson, Parashat
Bereshit and Parashat Noah, in Binah ba-Mikra, Tel Aviv 1986, pp. 15-21.
12
This is also surprising. Just as the story of the flood begins at the end of Parashat Bereshit, so too
the birth of Abraham is described at the end of Parashat Noah (Gen. 11:26). The obvious question
about the division of the Torah into weekly readings we hope to discuss on a future occasion.
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