{"id":65005,"date":"2019-10-31T11:17:28","date_gmt":"2019-10-31T09:17:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=65005"},"modified":"2022-02-14T17:58:39","modified_gmt":"2022-02-14T15:58:39","slug":"parashat-noach-the-rainbow-connection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/parashat-noach-the-rainbow-connection\/","title":{"rendered":"Parashat Noach: The Rainbow Connection"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[368,409],"acf":{"old_id":"65005","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":36663,"related_cahpter":"1068","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"A symbol of hope and peace, and an intimation of the divine","content":"

In this week’s parasha, the world is destroyed and yet it does not come to an end.\u00a0The paradox of the immediate destruction of what has been created, the undoing of what has been done, so soon after the beginning, is disturbing.<\/p>\n

When God says, \u201ceverything on earth shall perish\u201d (6: 17) it seems that the world is coming to an end. Not quite.\u00a0\u201cAnd I will establish my covenant with you and you shall enter the ark, with your sons, your wife and your sons\u2019 wives\u201d (6:18). Amidst the destruction there will be survivors, a remnant that will start over.<\/p>\n

Yet all is not rosy once the ark has landed on dry land, the storm has abated and the waters recede.<\/p>\n

When the waters stopped, \u201cGod remembered Noah\u201d (8:1). Nahum Sarna writes that Biblical remembering\u00a0is \u201ca focusing upon the object of memory that results in action.\u201d\u00a0God is able to stop the waters and make possible the conditions for the rejuvenation of the earth.<\/p>\n

Yet, human nature retains the propensities for evil that it had in the past: \u201cthe inclinations of the heart of man are evil from his youth\u201d (8:21), as stated earlier in Genesis 6:5.<\/p>\n

Yet this time, God makes a promise.\u00a0\u201cNor will I ever again destroy every living being as I have done\u201d (8:21). What is done to assure this promise? A tangible object appears.<\/p>\n

Why is it necessary?\u00a0One suggestion is that it is a symbol of God\u2019s future nonaggression, a bow that is not aimed down at humanity on earth but up in the sky where it can do no harm.<\/p>\n

The rainbow itself is a glistening but insubstantial thing, a completely natural phenomenon which can be glimpsed only rarely, when conditions are optimal for its appearance.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Talmud in Berachot 59a says that one who sees a rainbow should \u201cfall upon his face\u201d because the rainbow is a manifestation of the glory of God (see Ezekiel 1:28).\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

After this, Noah plants a vineyard (9:20) and gets drunk (9:21), yet the rainbow and its covenant is still with him.\u00a0At his death, we are told, \u201cNoah lived after the flood 350 years\u201d (9:28).\u00a0The rest of his 950 -year life was informed by his presence at the destruction of the world, though the majority of his life, 600 of his 950 years, had been prior to it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Noah has a choice. He could forget the trauma he witnessed in the violent floods raging over the earth by drinking, or by remembering the covenant as God remembers the covenant (9:15) along with the rainbow which symbolizes it, exemplifying God\u2019s awareness of human needs for indicators of God in the world.\u00a0 Noah could live the last part of his life in a drunken stupor, or striving for post-traumatic growth that could come with appreciation of the rainbow and other divine manifestations in the world, however small they are or difficult to find and interpret.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The author acknowledges Rabbi Daniel Yolkut for his source sheet on Noah as well as a helpful discussion, and Avivah Zornberg who told me last fall that the world was not coming to an end, just as it did not in parshat Noah.<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":102029,"id":102029,"title":"-620a7be1670b6--620a7be1670b7gen8-rainbow.jpg","filename":"620a7be1670b6-620a7be1670b7gen8-rainbow.jpg.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/cetwpuploads.blob.core.windows.net\/wp929\/uploads\/2019\/10\/620a7be1670b6-620a7be1670b7gen8-rainbow.jpg.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/parashat-noach-the-rainbow-connection\/620a7be1670b6-620a7be1670b7gen8-rainbow-jpg\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"620a7be1670b6-620a7be1670b7gen8-rainbow-jpg","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":65005,"date":"2022-02-14 15:57:21","modified":"2022-02-14 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