Genesis Cycle Four Noach 6:9 to 11:32

Noach

First we have Genesis. A beautiful thing is brought into being by the miracle of sacred Light. It flowers and expands. Details and labor go into it as if crafted by angels. There is a God beyond a God and beings we can’t even imagine. Boundaries of space and time help us to understand it. Words and companionship help us to act within it. What is it? It is us. One and two. Born from each other. man and woman, man and community, God and man.

Then we delude ourselves. We declare that we need God for only a few drops of rain…that we have rivers and wells more than enough, that we can do it alone. We start believing that the gifts God has granted is our own doing. Time passes. Generations eat up generations. We move out, move away, separate ourselves emotionally and physically from faith, hope, God-like behavior, people we love, our sacred selves, our sacred home. We shut off the connecting power. We raise our fear above our love. We get lost in our arrogance because we have money or friends or self-lies or confusion and we have that opportunity. We can cut ourselves off completely from our lovers, our mates. We can move about one by one. We can even fool ourselves into believing that our cutting-off is spiritual. We can raise ourselves above God and take it upon ourselves to do the cutting off. We can embrace our personal identity in our oh so desperate actions… bow to the idol that is ourselves, make excuses for the pain we cause. We can continue on this ego-escalation and just let destruction feed destruction for eternity.

But wait. Look.

Suddenly we have become a crippled ugly manifestation of the vivid and amazing creation…of what was meant to be. We don’t like ourselves. We don’t want to be this way. What do we do? We blame others but even that seems crippled. We can destroy others but more destruction will only add to the darkness. Continued creation of who we are (considering what we have become) will just (also) add to the darkness. How can we get around this stand-off?

This is what we learn in the parsha Noah. Here, we see God’s pain and work to preserve something worth saving…in other words…us. . He calls to the final soul, that last aching grasping breath. He seeks within ourselves and within others that tiny thread, that tiny spark that can be the seed for a complete rebirth and regeneration. Here we can almost hear the cry of God as this final piece is resurrected….Oh how much more painful it is to save a piece then just to destroy the whole thing. How much easier it is to wipe something out in full, to walk away clean and finished, to cut off that connection, cut the losses, cut the umbilical cord… than to seek and explore, push a fist into the disgusting muck and pull out something anything… any person with any redeeming qualities that can resemble a new beginning.

It takes great attention to detail, action, order, timing. And more. It takes an ability to be purified by fire, to hike up a mountain to sacrifice your only son, to have faith in a God Who attaches to us beyond the wilderness of our minds. It takes prophetic-like action, an ability to give up all but the final piece of ourselves for a God who does everything to destroy all but that same final piece. It takes the stripping off of our skin, our blood, our nerves, our veins, our very bones until we get to the heart and stripping off almost all of that.

Almost all.

It takes the ultimate raw pain of accepting and holding onto only the exquisite veil left after we have prostrated ourselves in complete humility. And because this is what happens in the parsha Noah…this is what God shows us by raising Noah above the destruction…the parsha itself enables not only prophecy but the covenant.

Once again, this is what happens in the parsha Noah. Evil has spread. There’s idolatry, promiscuity, nastiness that is beyond description. Rabbi Nehemiah (Sanhedrin 108a) describes the person Noah as a tightly sealed vial of perfume in a graveyard. Other Talmudic rabbis compare the generation of Noah to the generation of Israelites that pray to the gilded calf and therefore must die in the wilderness, to the men of Sodom, to the spies who die by the plague. They don’t (our sages say) have any share in the world to come. Here’s more. Their soul shall not return to its sheath. Their souls will not be revived or be judged. Rabbi Abba bar Kophana says that even Noah was unworthy. After all in Genesis 6:7-8 we read I repent I made them and Noah. Finally, the sages quote Isaiah: Ye shall conceive chaff and ye shall bring forth stubble-your soul as fire will devour you.

And as we get tossed about in this mad environment, this finished society, this doomed relationship, this really messed up community…God manages to grasp onto the tiniest of hopes. He manages to raise up this hope, organize it, protect it, destroy the whole world around it, and allow it to survive despite the gnawing impossible drunk and naked almost unbearable pain of having to witness the collapse of his beloved creation. Finally, God has to transmit Himself through this hope, this shock of rainbow color and circumcision, the remains of man and beast, this new growth pushing up from below. Our prophets Abraham and Moses also give up all but the final pieces of themselves…just as God has exemplified. They give up their very selves for days on end, prepare to give up their life-blood, and even personal redemption.

Prophecy would have been impossible therefore without the flood. The covenant as well. The pain and almost-destruction of the flood enables our prophets to be the mirror-images of God. And it also enables us today…to act prophetic at times if not always, to accept that the opening of our hearts is the only way to God, and that the only real opening is the slit we make knowingly…where we can have the strength and patience to build an altar. Whatever feels right or wrong, whatever others may say, whatever the mores of present society… it is our responsibility to walk the path until we can do the action, to stand strong for love, for creation even in our disgust and annoyance…to destroy within us whatever is already in the process of self destruction in order to sacrifice our purest selves to God. And it is our responsibility to do this for the God-in-each-other as well.

So, how to apply this to today? Only destroy if the situation is already destroying itself. Don’t be arrogant. Don’t think you have it all figured out. Pray before you act. Pray hard. And when you do destroy-to-create be aware of that spark, that flame, that light in the palm of your hand that can be raised up. Don’t let go of it. Know it. Cling to it. Be patient if it takes time to find it. It is there. And then nurture it. And feel yourself holding it gently. Stand strong by it. Organize your loving-kindness. Don’t confuse the flood with the rainbow. Don’t cause a flood casually. Move quickly beyond the flood and with a strong sense of order in the chaos. Know your power. Feel the pain of separation and be a catalyst for regeneration. Give it 120 years (to really know) and then 7 more days just in case. Guard yourself against people who creep out of the shelter of love and give up easily. Fan the sweet smelling perfume of the sacrifice. Hold strong and allow yourself to feel protected in the very heart of God’s amazing creation. Know who you are.