Noach - 5773

And I will set up My covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you and your sons, and your wife and your sons' wives with you. (Bereishis 6:18)

A covenant was necessary for the fruits so that they should not rot and become putrid, and so that the wicked of the generation should not kill him. (Rashi from Bereishis Rabbah 31:12)

This understanding of the covenant is somewhat surprising as there really should be a simpler interpretation: The covenant was Hashem’s promise to Noach that he would survive the flood and emerge from the Tevah to begin the repopulation of the earth. In fact, this is the Ramban’s interpretation!

Rashi’s limitations on the extent of the Divine commitments lead us to an intriguing conclusion: There was no inevitability to Noach’s coming out of the Tevah alive. Hashem only promised that he would not be killed before the flood and that the food would not spoil, nothing more. This would mean that Noach’s being in the Tevah was not merely an opportunity for refuge from the floodwaters; it was a time for Noach to earn his right to survive the flood.

Interestingly, this seems to be a point of contention between Ramban and Rashi later in the story. We read that after the flood, “Hashem remembered Noach…” Ramban takes this to mean that Hashem remembered the covenant that he had made with Noach before the flood and accordingly sent a wind that caused the waters to subside. This, of course, is consistent with his understanding of the covenant.

Rashi, however, understands the verse to mean that Hashem took note of something that transpired in the Tevah – Noach’s prayers for an end to the ordeal. The clear implication is that, had Noach not prayed, the waters would not have subsided and Noach would not have emerged. This follows Rashi’s earlier position that the covenant did not entail Noach’s leaving the Tevah alive.

What Noach achieved in the Tevah perhaps can be understood in a different way.

The sin for which the fate of humanity was sealed was Chamas – theft. (See Rashi at 6:13.) The root of this sin seems to be a self-centeredness that allows an individual to see the entire world as existing only for his personal benefit or gain. (“What is mine is mine and what is yours is mine.”) Now, while Noach was clearly the greatest of his generation, he was not totally free of this personality flaw. The Zohar (1:67) tells us that in a sense Noach was responsible for the flood because he did not pray for his generation after his own safety and that of his family was assured. Consequently, Noach could not become the foundation of a new generation and a new world unless that fatal flaw was totally removed.

Hashem’s plan was to remove that tiny speck of self-centeredness by giving Noach the responsibility of service to others – specifically the myriads of animals which he was commanded to protect, feed, and nurture. Just as service to others naturally follows from selflessness, service to others can instill selflessness. (See Sefer HaChinuch, Mitzvos 16, 40, 99, 264, and 299 for a general statement of the principle that actions can instill personality traits and Mesilas Yesharim, Chapter 7, where this principle is applied regarding alacrity in Mitzvah performance.) That this experience was successful is attested to by the comment of the Zohar (1:254) that the sacrifices that Noach brought after coming out of the Tevah were to atone for the sin of not praying for his generation.