Parashat Noach - First Aliyah
Read the biblical text and try to understand it on your own, before reading the commentary.
How do you stay upright when everything around you is losing its way? The first aliyah sets Noah against a corrupt world, and then moves from a description of his character to a practical task: to build an ark and to preserve life.
Noah and his generation
“eleh toldot Noach Noach ish tzadik tamim hayah bedorotav et ha’Elohim hithalech Noach” (These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generations. Noah walked with God, Genesis 6:9)
Even before we are told what Noah does, the Torah describes who he is. But the added reference to his generation raises a question: does the bad environment highlight his greatness, or does it set a low bar for comparison?
Rashi brings two ways of understanding this. According to one, if Noah kept his righteousness in such a generation, in a good environment he would have gone further still. According to the other, his righteousness stood out relative to the people of his generation, but in Abraham’s generation he would have counted for nothing. These are two expositions that Rashi presents, not a single ruling of his own (Rashi on Genesis 6:9).
This dispute invites us too to examine how we measure ourselves: relative to what is accepted around us, or relative to what we are capable of being?
What went wrong in the world?
“vatishachet ha’aretz lifnei ha’Elohim vatimale ha’aretz chamas” (And the earth was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with lawlessness, Genesis 6:11)
The verses describe a corruption that spread through the world, and in God’s words to Noah in verse 13 the word “chamas” returns as the reason for the coming destruction. The picture of a land filled with injustice and violence raises a troubling question: what happens to a society when harming others becomes an ordinary part of life?
Facing this description, Noah receives detailed instructions: to build an ark, to prepare compartments in it, to bring in his family and the animals, and to gather food. The rescue demands of him orderly work and responsibility for the needs of others (Genesis 6:13-21).
Why build an ark, of all things?
Rashi asks why Noah was required to engage in building, if the Holy One, blessed be He, had other ways to save him. In his commentary he brings a midrashic explanation: the prolonged building was meant to prompt the people of the generation to ask, to hear about the coming flood, and perhaps to turn back from their ways. This is an interpretive layer that Rashi adds; the length of the building and this purpose are not stated explicitly in the verse (Rashi on Genesis 6:14).
According to this explanation, the ark was also an opportunity to turn toward those around him. Noah’s very act could stir a conversation and open a possibility of change.
The aliyah ends with a short sentence:
“vaya’as Noach kechol asher tzivah oto Elohim ken asah” (And Noah did according to all that God commanded him, so he did, Genesis 6:22)
The Torah opened with a description of his righteousness and ended with a description of his action. Between the two come detailed instructions for building, for gathering food and for preserving life. In this way the grand description takes concrete form: a righteousness that can be seen in what a person does. Already at the start of the aliyah, Rashi suggests that good deeds are the main thing a righteous person leaves behind (Rashi on Genesis 6:9).
And still, the two expositions that Rashi brings leave a question open: how far does the environment determine a person’s stature? That same corrupt generation can bring out Noah’s strength to stand against his surroundings, and can also raise the question of who he could have been had he lived among other people.
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