Now I Know What Noah Saw

Now I Know What Noah Saw
September 2, 2005
Rabbi Gary S. Creditor

In the book of Genesis (7:17-23) we read: "The Flood continued forty days on the earth, and the waters increased and raised the ark so that it rose above the earth. The waters swelled and increased greatly upon the earth, and the ark drifted upon the waters. When the waters had swelled much more upon the earth, all the highest mountains everywhere under the sky were covered. Fifteen cubits higher did the waters swell, as the mountains were covered. And all flesh that stirred on earth perished – birds, cattle, beasts, and all the things that swarmed upon the earth, and all mankind…All that was on dry land died….They were blotted out from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark."

The accounts in the Torah are not children's stories. Certainly not Noah. Not after this week. Not after the tsunami of last December. We have read this portion of the Torah cyclically for thousands of years. Now we understand its reality. God has given us an account in the Torah of a cataclysmic event. In the vividness of the media, we now see what Noah saw, when he opened the door of the Ark.

As, with you, I have watched this tragedy that defies description, to which no words can ever do justice, and reflected on Noah.

Did Noah realize the totality of the destruction? What did he say?

While the Torah is silent, there is an ancient Midrash [cited by Dr. Louis Ginzberg in the anthology "Legends of the Jews"] that fills the void. "Also Noah and his sons, thinking that death was nigh, broke into tears. Noah prayed to God: 'O Lord, help us, for we are not able to bear the evil that encompasses us. The billows surge about us, the streams of destruction make us afraid, and death stares us in the face. O hear our prayer, deliver us, incline Thyself unto us, and be gracious unto us! Redeem us and save us!'" How these words resonate and echo, prayed during and after Hurricane Katrina ravished the Gulf area. It is still the prayer on tens of thousands of lips.

I wonder: What Noah was thinking during the forty days and nights?

Again, the Torah is silent but I surmise that he thought: Will this ship make it? What is left out there? Maybe he just said simply: "God! Make it stop!" Yet until its appointed time, it did not stop. And until after the Flood abated, God did not speak to Noah. There is no voice inside the winds of a hurricane but that of the storm itself. And while some preachers in the past announced that they had prayed away a hurricane, clearly, while a great deal of praying was going on last weekend, no prayers, of Christians, Jews, Moslems or anyone else, kept Katrina away.

On an excellent website named "Beliefnet" there was a column entitled "Did God Send the Hurricane?" It begins the following way: "What caused Hurricane Katrina to slam the U.S. Gulf Coast? Was it a typical late-summer tropical storm caused by wind, water, and heat? Mother Nature crying out on behalf of the earth's pain? An angry God? Depends whom you ask."

My personal Jewish response, among many: Indeed the Torah portrays God acting through and using nature. The Bible presents the hypothesis that there is a direct connection between our moral behavior and our physical world. The Flood of Noah, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah occur because of idolatry and its result of moral evil. Ethical behavior results in abundant crops and immoral society experiences drought and famine. Abraham's great argument with God is whether He will destroy the innocent along with the wicked. The Torah clearly indicates that He would not. In the destruction that we are witnessing there are so many innocents, babies and elderly. The column I cited referred to those who believed that the Hurricane came as revenge for Israel removing settlers from their homes in Gaza, or "punishing America for her sins; on one side its sexual immorality and porn and Hollywood, and on the other side its conspicuous consumption and Hummers." I do not believe that Judaism would have us believe in a God who wreaks havoc upon the innocent. The laws of nature are part of the world that God created, but, as Rabbi Kushner in his book "When Bad Things Happen to Good People" correctly presents, there is uncontrolled randomness of bad events, of evil in the world.

You want to ask me the obvious question: So where is God during all this? I answer by citing the story of Elijah in I Kings 19:11-12. Elijah has questioned the worth of his being a prophet of God. So God tells him to come out of the cave. "And lo, the Lord passed by. There was a great and mighty wind, splitting mountains and shattering rocks by the power of the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind – an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake –fire; but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire – kol d'mahmah da-kah – a soft murmuring sound, the still small voice." In the still small voice that each of has through prayer and through money, and later on through material.God is present as this globe is present, with its natural beauty and its natural horror. He is the source of all existence, which then functions according to its inherent physical natural laws. God is made manifest throughour deeds, in our voice, in our acts of salvation, in our deeds of redemption.  In the still small voice of our lives is where God is also to be found, the God who enables us to give, and give again.

This exact lesson is found in the ancient Midrash on the Book of Genesis (XXX.3) where several Rabbis could very well have been discussing this question. They are interpreting the verse in Psalms (145:9) that Sarah will chant tomorrow in the Ashrei: "The Lord is good to all, and His tender mercies are over all His works." The Midrash records:

Rabbi Joshua ben Levi interpreted in Rabbi Levi's name: The Lord is good to all, and He inspires mankind with His spirit of compassion. Rabbi Abba said: Should a year of famine commence tomorrow and men show compassion to each other, then the Holy One blessed be He, will also be filled with compassion for them.

Then the Midrash tells this story:

In the days of Rabbi Tanhuma, Israel had need of a fast (because of drought) so they went to him and requested 'Master, proclaim a fast.' He proclaimed a fast, for one day, then a second day, and then a third, yet no rain fell. Thereupon he ascended [the pulpit] and preached to them, saying: 'My sons! Be filled with compassion for each other, and then the Holy One, blessed be He, will be filled with compassion for you.' Now while they were distributing relief to the poor they saw a man give money to his divorced wife, whereupon they went to him [Rabbi Tanhuma] and exclaimed, 'Why do we sit here while such misdeeds are perpetrated!' 'What then have you seen?' he inquired. 'We saw So-and-So give his divorced wife money.' He summoned them and asked him, 'Why did you give money to your divorced wife?' 'I saw her in great distress,' replied he, 'and was filled with compassion for her.' Upon this Rabbi Tanhuma turned his face upward and exclaimed; 'Sovereign of the Universe! This man, upon whom this woman has no claim for sustenance, yet saw her in distress and was filled with pity for her. Seeing then that of Thee it is written, The Lord is full of compassion and gracious(Psalm 103:8), while we are Thy children, the children of Thy beloved ones, the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, how much the more shouldst Thou be filled with compassion for us!' Immediately the rain descended and world enjoyed relief.

It will be a long, long time before hundreds of thousands, millions of people enjoy relief. We have never experienced such an occurrence-without-contingency in the history of our country.

If we seek compassion upon ourselves,

if we desire to make God manifest in this world and in our lives,

then it must be from within us,

by our deeds, by our compassion,

by our graciousness.

Let the still small voice of the Lord speak through each one of us.

Let us be partners in the salvation of these broken lives and the redemption of humanity.                                                            

Amen