In His Generations
Welcome to prasha Noach. This parasha begins in Genesis 6:9-11:32. It begins by telling you Noah was righteous in his generations. It also says he was just and right, telling you how he managed to be that way, he walked with God. The commentaries see two possible meanings to the statement that Noah was righteous in his generation. One theory says that he was only righteous because every one else around him had turned so evil. The other avenue of thought says he was righteous all the way down his bloodline. It was true that evil was all around him, but it says Noah had his walk in God. No matter what goes on around you, if you have your walk in God, you can still be righteous. You do not have to become like the world, even if the entire world is corrupt around you. We are heading to that point it seems in the world now. So prepare yourself now to become like Noah, minus the boat of course:. Let's discuss this boat/Ark for a minute. The size of the boat was very large. According to the "smallest" estimate of 18 inches per cubic, the dimensions of the Ark were 450 x 75 x 45 feet, which equals 1,518,750 cubic feet. Each of its three stories had 33,750 square feet of floor space. No doubt this was one large boat. People always look at the size of elephants and the huge animals that were housed on the ark in amazement. Yes, it was a large boat, but who says the animals were all taken aboard in their mature states? Could Noah have taken baby elephants, baby lions, baby tigers, etc? The scriptures never tell us the exact ages of the animals. As babies they would eat less food, so I believe that idea could be a possibility. The Scripture says the animals came to Noah, it never says Noah went out and gathered them up (Gen.7:9,15-16). That means YHVH chose the animals himself that would be saved.
There were seven pairs of clean animals and two pairs of unclean animals aboard. Even in Noah's time there were still clean and unclean animals, even though before the flood man is not mentioned eating meat, why. There were still offerings that were made to YHVH and He has always had a standard in what was clean and unclean in offerings. Noah proceeds to get the Ark ready for him and his family. The food has been gathered in. The Midrash records the greater part of the provisions consisted of pressed figs, greens and seeds. Seeds were also necessary to bring along for growing food after the flood. The animals are in and YHVH tells Noah get in, you're going boating:. YHVH himself shuts the door on the Ark. It was now the six hundredth year of Noah's life. The rain begins. Not only does the rain begin, but the Scriptures say the fountains of the deep broke open AND the windows of the heavens were opened up. I personally believe this is where the firmament of ice was opened up to pour down upon the earth which we wrote about in the previous parasha. This firmament was around the earth from the creation period. So now it rains forty days and forty nights. The Scripture tells us that all flesh on the earth died. I believe that eliminates a theory of a localized flood. (7:21,22,23) The water was upon the earth for a hundred and fifty days.
Then it says YHVH remembered Noah. When It says YHVH "remembered" Noah, it doesn't mean He all of a sudden said, hey wait, I've got Noah and his brood down there floating around in an ark, I've got to go do something with them! The English language sometimes gives the connotation that in its concept is totally misleading. YHVH could never "forget" anything to have to remember it later. Remembered here simply means He now turns his attention toward Noah. It's been ten months now and the waters have decreased. In all it was said to have been an entire year the earth was uninhabitable. Notice when the waters dried up from off the earth (Gen 8:13), it was on the first month on the first day of the month. We see a Sabbath and a New Moon just had taken place. What did Noah do when he got off the Ark, he built an altar and offered up a sacrifice to YHVH. Rambam says there is a tradition that the altars of David, Solomon, Abraham, Noah, Cain, Abel, and Adam were all in the same place, Mount Moriah, the site of the Temple in Jerusalem. I've heard preachers say before the first thing Noah did when he got off the Ark was to get drunk.
I don't agree with that. It was much later in time the Scripture records that Noah became a man of the soil and planted a vineyard.(Gen 9:20) How could he have gotten drunk off the grapes as soon as he got off the Ark if he had to plant the vines first? It is after Noah gets off the Ark that YHVH tells him that he can now eat meat. The fear and dread of man was now put upon every creature now on the earth. Remember the animals before were with Noah in the Ark and there they had not feared him. But the world was different now, now they were seen as food (the clean ones), even the unclean ones could have been used for their hides. All living creatures were delivered into Noah's hand. (Gen 9:2) Right after that Noah is told not to eat the blood. Did you also know if you read carefully it says YHVH made the covenant with Noah AND all the living creatures on the earth. It says it was made with every living creature that went out from the Ark. (Gen 9:10,12) In other words, He even promised the animals He'd never destroy them off the face of the earth by water again. I believe it bears mentioning that Abraham was considered the first Hebrew, the father of the faith. Abraham was born one thousand nine hundred and forty eight (1948) B.C. and the nation of Israel was reborn in 1948. He knew Noah and was fifty eight years old when Noah died. Noah was born in 1056 from creation, the flood occurred in 1656 and Noah died in 2006 B.C. We know that Noah had three sons that are recorded in Scripture, Shem, Ham and Yahpheth. Through Ham came Nimrod who tried to get everyone into building the tower of Babylon. Before Nimrod there were neither wars nor reigning monarchs, but the Babylonians made him leader of their people (bad choice). After which he went to Assyria and built great cities. We all know at the tower of Babylon was where YHVH came down and dispersed all the people's language from one common language (which I fully believe was Hebrew) to multiple languages. As matter of fact, in Gen.11:7, we see once again where it says, "Let us go down and confound their language." I suppose here again this "us" word is going to be defined as having been YHVH and the angels again by the anti-messiah groups .
I wonder why YHVH could never do anything by Himself, He always had to have the angels help, or so it seems to the anti's of the world:. So we begin to wind up this portion with the Scripture describing Abraham's family. The Scripture gives us Abraham's father's name but not his mother's, which is often the case. The Talmud says Abraham's mother's name was Amathlai. Abraham had two other brothers, Nahor and Haran. Haran died, which was Lot's father. Abraham and his brother Nahor married Haran's daughters. Nahor married Milcah, Abraham married Sarai.. There is a tradition that is NOT recorded in the Bible so we can only say it is tradition that Abraham was thrown into a fiery furnace by Nimrod. The tradition says that Terah, Abraham's father, was an idol maker for a living and Abraham had smashed his idols after coming to know the one true God. For this, Terah was complaining to Nimrod and that was why Nimrod had Abraham thrown in the furnace. Of course the tradition says Abraham was not harmed by the fire. As I said, this is not in Scripture so it's up for grabs as being true or not. But it is interesting to know these ideas the sages have told down through time. So we see by this family tree that Sarai was Lot's sister and Abraham was his uncle. As we end this parasha, we see Terah leaving the Ur of Chaldees with Abraham, Sarah and Lot, heading to Charan. Terah dies there in Charan at the age of 205. Before we close I want to give you one last tidbit from the Talmud. In Gen.11:29, you see in the lineage Sarai mentioned along with another female name of Iscah. Maharal comments that these two people are one and the same. Both are Sarai (Sarah). He comments that a woman has two missions in life, the first as an individual and the second when she marries and has a higher joint mission with her husband. Thus Iscah is the name indicating her personal greatness and Sarai/Sarah, the name indicating her Abrahamic mission, this name being used exclusively after her marriage to Abraham. Has this been proven absolutely true, or has it been absolutely been proven false? Neither. It is an interesting idea if you are married to think about what your other name might be in the records of heaven that you're not aware of. If you're single, I guess you could spend your time thinking about more important issues:.
There were seven pairs of clean animals and two pairs of unclean animals aboard. Even in Noah's time there were still clean and unclean animals, even though before the flood man is not mentioned eating meat, why. There were still offerings that were made to YHVH and He has always had a standard in what was clean and unclean in offerings. Noah proceeds to get the Ark ready for him and his family. The food has been gathered in. The Midrash records the greater part of the provisions consisted of pressed figs, greens and seeds. Seeds were also necessary to bring along for growing food after the flood. The animals are in and YHVH tells Noah get in, you're going boating:. YHVH himself shuts the door on the Ark. It was now the six hundredth year of Noah's life. The rain begins. Not only does the rain begin, but the Scriptures say the fountains of the deep broke open AND the windows of the heavens were opened up. I personally believe this is where the firmament of ice was opened up to pour down upon the earth which we wrote about in the previous parasha. This firmament was around the earth from the creation period. So now it rains forty days and forty nights. The Scripture tells us that all flesh on the earth died. I believe that eliminates a theory of a localized flood. (7:21,22,23) The water was upon the earth for a hundred and fifty days.
Then it says YHVH remembered Noah. When It says YHVH "remembered" Noah, it doesn't mean He all of a sudden said, hey wait, I've got Noah and his brood down there floating around in an ark, I've got to go do something with them! The English language sometimes gives the connotation that in its concept is totally misleading. YHVH could never "forget" anything to have to remember it later. Remembered here simply means He now turns his attention toward Noah. It's been ten months now and the waters have decreased. In all it was said to have been an entire year the earth was uninhabitable. Notice when the waters dried up from off the earth (Gen 8:13), it was on the first month on the first day of the month. We see a Sabbath and a New Moon just had taken place. What did Noah do when he got off the Ark, he built an altar and offered up a sacrifice to YHVH. Rambam says there is a tradition that the altars of David, Solomon, Abraham, Noah, Cain, Abel, and Adam were all in the same place, Mount Moriah, the site of the Temple in Jerusalem. I've heard preachers say before the first thing Noah did when he got off the Ark was to get drunk.
I don't agree with that. It was much later in time the Scripture records that Noah became a man of the soil and planted a vineyard.(Gen 9:20) How could he have gotten drunk off the grapes as soon as he got off the Ark if he had to plant the vines first? It is after Noah gets off the Ark that YHVH tells him that he can now eat meat. The fear and dread of man was now put upon every creature now on the earth. Remember the animals before were with Noah in the Ark and there they had not feared him. But the world was different now, now they were seen as food (the clean ones), even the unclean ones could have been used for their hides. All living creatures were delivered into Noah's hand. (Gen 9:2) Right after that Noah is told not to eat the blood. Did you also know if you read carefully it says YHVH made the covenant with Noah AND all the living creatures on the earth. It says it was made with every living creature that went out from the Ark. (Gen 9:10,12) In other words, He even promised the animals He'd never destroy them off the face of the earth by water again. I believe it bears mentioning that Abraham was considered the first Hebrew, the father of the faith. Abraham was born one thousand nine hundred and forty eight (1948) B.C. and the nation of Israel was reborn in 1948. He knew Noah and was fifty eight years old when Noah died. Noah was born in 1056 from creation, the flood occurred in 1656 and Noah died in 2006 B.C. We know that Noah had three sons that are recorded in Scripture, Shem, Ham and Yahpheth. Through Ham came Nimrod who tried to get everyone into building the tower of Babylon. Before Nimrod there were neither wars nor reigning monarchs, but the Babylonians made him leader of their people (bad choice). After which he went to Assyria and built great cities. We all know at the tower of Babylon was where YHVH came down and dispersed all the people's language from one common language (which I fully believe was Hebrew) to multiple languages. As matter of fact, in Gen.11:7, we see once again where it says, "Let us go down and confound their language." I suppose here again this "us" word is going to be defined as having been YHVH and the angels again by the anti-messiah groups .
I wonder why YHVH could never do anything by Himself, He always had to have the angels help, or so it seems to the anti's of the world:. So we begin to wind up this portion with the Scripture describing Abraham's family. The Scripture gives us Abraham's father's name but not his mother's, which is often the case. The Talmud says Abraham's mother's name was Amathlai. Abraham had two other brothers, Nahor and Haran. Haran died, which was Lot's father. Abraham and his brother Nahor married Haran's daughters. Nahor married Milcah, Abraham married Sarai.. There is a tradition that is NOT recorded in the Bible so we can only say it is tradition that Abraham was thrown into a fiery furnace by Nimrod. The tradition says that Terah, Abraham's father, was an idol maker for a living and Abraham had smashed his idols after coming to know the one true God. For this, Terah was complaining to Nimrod and that was why Nimrod had Abraham thrown in the furnace. Of course the tradition says Abraham was not harmed by the fire. As I said, this is not in Scripture so it's up for grabs as being true or not. But it is interesting to know these ideas the sages have told down through time. So we see by this family tree that Sarai was Lot's sister and Abraham was his uncle. As we end this parasha, we see Terah leaving the Ur of Chaldees with Abraham, Sarah and Lot, heading to Charan. Terah dies there in Charan at the age of 205. Before we close I want to give you one last tidbit from the Talmud. In Gen.11:29, you see in the lineage Sarai mentioned along with another female name of Iscah. Maharal comments that these two people are one and the same. Both are Sarai (Sarah). He comments that a woman has two missions in life, the first as an individual and the second when she marries and has a higher joint mission with her husband. Thus Iscah is the name indicating her personal greatness and Sarai/Sarah, the name indicating her Abrahamic mission, this name being used exclusively after her marriage to Abraham. Has this been proven absolutely true, or has it been absolutely been proven false? Neither. It is an interesting idea if you are married to think about what your other name might be in the records of heaven that you're not aware of. If you're single, I guess you could spend your time thinking about more important issues:.