Parshah Summary – P’shat
The parshah opens with the description of Noah as an ish tzaddik tamim, a righteous and pure person in his generation, and God expresses displeasure to Noah with the world which has become consumed by violence and corruption. God tells Noah that a flood is coming, and that he should build an ark to float upon the water, saving Noah and his family, along with members of each animal species. Rain falls for 40 days and nights, and the waters churn for 150 days more before calming and beginning to recede. When the ark settles on Mount Ararat, Noah dispatches a raven, and then a series of doves, “to see if the waters have subsided from the face of the earth.” When the ground dries completely—exactly one year after the onset of the Flood—God tells Noah to exit the ark and begin repopulating the earth.
Noah builds an altar and offers sacrifices. God swears never again to destroy humanity because of their deeds, and sets the rainbow in the sky as a testimony of the new covenant with human beings. God also instructs Noah regarding the sacredness of life: murder is explicitly forbidden, and while humans are permitted to eat the meat of animals, they are forbidden to eat flesh or blood taken from a living animal. Noah plants a vineyard, makes wine, and becomes drunk. Two of Noah’s sons, Shem and Yaphet, are blessed for covering up their father, while his third son, Ham, is punished for behaving inappropriately in the presence of his drunk and naked father, though his precise offense is not explicitly described. The descendants of Noah remain a single people, with a single language and culture, for ten generations. Then they try to build a great tower to symbolize their own invincibility; God confuses their language so that “one does not comprehend the tongue of the other,” causing them to abandon their project and disperse across the face of the earth, splitting into seventy nations. The parshah concludes with a chronology of the ten generations from Noah to Abram (who becomes Abraham), and the latter’s journey from his birthplace of Ur Casdim to Haran, on the way to the land of Canaan.
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אֵ֚לֶּה תּוֹלְדֹ֣ת נֹ֔חַ נֹ֗חַ אִ֥ישׁ צַדִּ֛יק תָּמִ֥ים הָיָ֖ה בְּדֹֽרֹתָ֑יו אֶת־הָֽאֱלֹ–הִ֖ים הִֽתְהַלֶּךְ־נֹֽחַ: These are the offspring of Noah; Noah was a righteous person, perfect in his generation; Noah walked with God.- Bereisheet (Genesis) 6:9
What does it mean that “Noah walked with God?” There are two kinds of Action – what we might call “Creative/Responsive/Relational” and what we might call “Functional/Mechanical.” Functional/Mechanical is not for its own sake; it is a means to an end. Creative/Responsive/Relational is for its own sake; it is living life in the moment. Life in the moment is a kaleidoscope of qualities, of fleeting experiences. Naturally, when a particularly delicious or interesting moment arises, we may want to hold on to its qualities, to capture them in some way. But how? Is it possible to preserve the experiences that come to us in the fleeting moment?
To this question comes an ingenious answer: art. It is through art that the ineffable qualities of experience can be put into some kind of form, to be saved from the flood-waters of time and visited again and again. In this sense, “Noah’s ark,” which saves all life from the flood, can actually be seen as a metaphor for art. In reference to Noah’s building of the ark, it says: וַיַּ֖עַשׂ נֹ֑חַ כְּכֹ֥ל אֲשֶׁר־צִוָּ֖הוּ יְהֹ–וָֽה׃– Noah did just as Hashem instructed him… (Bereisheet 7:5) So in the metaphorical sense, Noah is an artist, but not one of mere personal expression. Rather, his salvific artistry emerges from a Divine instruction; it is a mitzvah. But the mitzvah of art is not that of music or painting or sculpture; it is the art of living. Our canvas is this moment—our words, our actions, even our thoughts. The Baal Shem Tov taught that the word for ark--tevah—also means “word,” giving a deeper meaning to God’s instruction to Noah: בֹּֽא־אַתָּ֥ה... אֶל־הַתֵּבָ֑ה – “Enter the ark…” This hints at this practice of fully entering the words we speak, entering the deeds we do, so that our words and deeds become temples of Presence—expressions of No-am—that is, Divine beauty, sweetness, pleasantness, grace. This is why, as Shabbat ends, we pray: וִיהִי נֹֽעַם אֲדֹנָי אֱלֹהֵֽינוּ עָלֵֽינוּ וּמַעֲשֵׂה יָדֵֽינוּ כּוֹנְנָה עָלֵֽינוּ – May the Divine sweetness be (V’hi No-am) upon us; may the work of our hands be established… As we move from rest into work, we ask that our actions themselves become art; we ask that the No-am, the “Divine sweetness,” infuses the work of our hands. How can this happen? Part of the key is the practice of Shabbat. On Shabbat we cease creating; we rest. And in that sacred rest, our artfulness of doing is renewed. But there is a deeper level—not only resting from action, but resting within action. And this is the meaning of the verse: אֶת־הָֽאֱלֹהִ֖ים הִֽתְהַלֶּךְ־נֹֽחַ׃ – Noah walked with God… The “work of our hands,” maaseh yadeinu, is Creative/ Responsive/ Relational, but the “work of our feet” is repetitive—walking, cleaning, moving, lying down, standing up: ordinary, Functional/Mechanical activity. Usually, we wander through these motions unconsciously, lost in thought, dull and habitual. But the secret of “walking with God” is to bring our awareness into the simple and repetitive, to sense the Divine Presence in each step, in each breath, in this body that acts. This is the deeper Shabbat—available at any time, in our simple movements. And here lies the key in Noah’s name--Noakh—which means “rest.” To embody Noakh is to let the thinking mind rest in the living awareness of the senses—in the sounds, the scents, the textures of this moment; this is meditation. And from Noakh—rest—emerges Noam—Divine Sweetness. When we rest our awareness in our simple, Functional/Mechanical movements, rather than wandering in the alleyways of thought, then we can make our Creative/ Responsive/Relational actions into more beautiful manifestations of No-am, b’ezrat Hashem. In this time of Parshat Noakh, may that Divine Sweetness be upon us— V’hi No-am aleinu—the work of our hands, the walking of our feet, the Art of Living Awake…
Read past teachings on Noakh HERE
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