Genesis Cycle 6 Noach

Noach 

This week we are in the parashah Noach. Of course, we all immediately think of the flood. We think of the animals two by two.  For some of us it’s fun. For many of us, it’s a relief. There’s so much of Torah that is so abstract and difficult to grasp. At least this myth is somewhat solid.

Let’s pull back our perspective though just for an experiment. What is really going on here? God creates the world. God creates man. After much drama, the goodbye to Eden, the killing of Abel, we then follow the toledoth…or the generations after Adam to Noach.

The toledoth are revealed in three parts for each man.  First, we are informed of the age of a man right before he has children. Next, we receive the names of the children. Third, we are told the age of a man at the time of death.

Now let’s look at the man Noach. First,  we are informed of his age right before the flood. Next,  we get a detailed description of the flood. Finally,  we are informed of his age at the time of death. The flood contextually therefore can be seen as one of his children. To be more specific, the placement of the flood myth is the same placement as the names of children when giving the list of the toledoth.   Of course,, we can turn this: The child of man, even a man good for his generation, can be logically and syntactically  in the same position as such a flood.  The child of man and therefore man can be manifest with the same potential of power.

The structure of Noach therefore supports a thesis that God is literally using power in man to destroy power-run-a muck (evil)  in man.  We’re not really looking at a flood then, are we? It feels like a flood. It feels like rain. It feels like the ark. However, the images themselves become something much more than what they seem.

In the end, the first thing Noach does when he walks onto land is to make an offering to God. He is recognizing the piece of God within himself and his own involvement in the catastrophe. He is accepting the divine intervention. He is offering his human power to God so that it can be transformed to the power we all yearn for: Love.

In the end God creates a covenant with man so that when we see a cloud we will see an arrow in it (a rainbow) and be reminded of the restraint we can and therefore must show when it comes to our human edge. Is it the same cloud that we follow as we are journeying through the wilderness?  Just a question.

Continuing with the parashah Noach,   we then decide that our physical power…in other words our ability to use and manipulate the material world…that same physical power that is itself  the cause as well as the metaphor for the flood….can now be focused to build a big city and a big building that will itself reach for the heavens and obviously to God.

Do we ever learn?

Today we still live in a world where the abuse of power…our myopic attempt to use the material world to find God…literally throws blinders on many of us. We use money. We use clothing. We use food. We use drugs. We use the power of strict material/fundamental interpretations of Torah… to reach sky high and touch the heavens. It’s all the same.

It isn’t easy rising beyond the power of the very physicality that suggests our conscious existence. In this world where we are flooded with solid adds, where we are flooded with solid cars, where we are flooded with solid fashion choices, with strict and fundamental Torah teachings, even with drinking water choices, how can we politely look  at an abstract metaphor of an abstract covenant and focus on the abstract offering and abstract transformation of that very flood that both saves and kills us? It isn’t easy. This is what the parashah here is about though. It’s about giving up on our human power and letting ourselves symbolically and thoroughly sculpt all material (Torah material as well) into Divine Love.