LIVING in JEWISH TIME HolyDays & Every-Days. Shabbat NO ACH GENESIS 9:13-22

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1 Larchmont Temple CHEVRAH TORAH 5779 LIVING in JEWISH TIME HolyDays & Every-Days Shabbat NO ACH GENESIS 9:13-22 ************************************* KEY KOSHI: HOW/WHY is time s natural unfolding God s post-flood promise? WHAT does Noah s response remind us about living in harmony with our world? HOW do we/does spirit survive in the face of life s storm? P SHAT Entering the Timeless Text: HOW do we experience it this moment?... 9:13] I have set My bow in the clouds, and it shall serve as a sign of the covenant between Me and the earth. 14]When I bring clouds over the earth, and the bow appears in the clouds, 15] I will remember My covenant between Me and you and every living creature among all flesh, so that the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. 16] When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures, all flesh that is on earth. 17] That, God said to Noah, shall be the sign of the covenant that I have established between Me and all flesh that is on earth. 18] The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth Ham being the father of Canaan. 19] These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole world branched out. 20] Noah, the tiller of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. 21] He drank of the wine and became drunk and he uncovered himself within his tent. 22] Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father s nakedness and told his two brothers outside. 13 א ת ק שׁ תּ י נ ת תּ י בּ ע נ ן ו ה י ת ה ל א וֹת בּ ר ית בּ ינ י וּב ין ה א ר ץ: 14 ו ה י ה בּ ע נ נ י ע נ ן ע ל ה א ר ץ ו נ ר א ת ה ה קּ שׁ ת בּ ע נ ן: 15 ו ז כ ר תּ י א ת בּ ר ית י א שׁ ר בּ ינ י וּב ינ יכ ם וּב ין כּ ל נ פ שׁ ח יּ ה בּ כ ל בּ שׂ ר ו ל א י ה י ה ע וֹד ה מּ י ם ל מ בּ וּל ל שׁ ח ת כּ ל בּ שׂ ר: 16 ו ה י ת ה ה קּ שׁ ת בּ ע נ ן וּר א ית יה ל ז כּ ר בּ ר ית עוֹל ם בּ ין א לה ים וּב ין כּ ל נ פ שׁ ח יּ ה בּ כ ל בּ שׂ ר א שׁ ר ע ל ה א ר ץ: 17 ו יּ אמ ר א לה ים א ל נ ח ז את אוֹת ה בּ ר ית א שׁ ר ה ק מ ת י בּ ינ י וּב ין כּ ל בּ שׂ ר א שׁ ר ע ל ה א ר ץ: פ ]ששי[ 18 ו יּ ה י וּ ב נ י נ ח ה יּ צ א ים מ ן ה תּ ב ה שׁ ם ו ח ם ו י פ ת ו ח ם ה וּא א ב י כ נ ע ן: 19 שׁ לשׁ ה א לּ ה בּ נ י נ ח וּמ א לּ ה נ פ צ ה כ ל ה א ר ץ: 20 ו יּ ח ל נ ח א ישׁ ה א ד מ ה ו יּ טּ ע כּ ר ם: 21 ו יּ שׁ תּ מ ן ה יּ י ן ו יּ שׁ כּ ר ו יּ ת גּ ל בּ תוֹ ך א ה ל ה: 22 ו יּ ר א ח ם א ב י כ נ ע ן א ת ע ר ו ת א ב יו ו יּ גּ ד ל שׁ נ י א ח יו בּ ח וּץ

2 REMEZ Living the Text s Truth: HOW do we make meaning of Time...? V.13 In the 601 st year, in the first month, on the first of the month, the waters began to dry from the earth RASHI That is Tishrei, following the system of R Eliezer; Nisan, following the system of R Joshua. RAMBAN They came out of the ark on the 27 th day of the second month. This verse affirms the general agreement that the world was created in Tishrei, as we read in the RH Service, Seedtime and harvest, cold and heat The months were counted from Tishrei, until the Exodus, when the Holy One commanded: This month shall mark for you the beginning of months. [Exod 12:2] SARNA On New Year s Day, exactly one year after God first spoke to Noah, the ground was dry, meaning no water was visible on the surface. It took another 56 days for the earth to be in the state it was on the 3 rd day of Creation. V.20 Then Noah built an altar to Adonai and taking of every clean animal and bird, offered burnt offerings on the altar. RAMBAM This was the same place Abraham bound his son Isaac; the same place Cain & Abel offered a sacrifice; the place Adam brought an offering after he was created, there Noah offered up [Hilchot Bet HaBechira 2:2] SARNA Noah builds on his own. His act of worship not only expresses gratitude but also has an expiatory function. Now that the earth has been purged sacrifice symbolizes the restoration of harmony between God & humanity V.21 Adonai smelled the pleasing odor, and said to Himself: Never again will I doom the earth because of mankind, since the devisings of man s mind are evil from his youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living being, as I have done. ALTER I will not again The repetition of this phrase may reflect, as RASHI suggests, a formal oath, the solemnity of which would then be capped by the poetic inset at the end [which uses the unconventional short-line form.] What is peculiar is that this is a pledge that God makes to Himself, not out loud to Noah. The complementary promise to Noah, in the next chapter, will be accompanied by the external sign of the rainbow. The silent promise here in God s interior monologue invokes no external signs only the seamless cycle of the seasons that will continue as long as the earth itself. V.22 So long as earth endures, Seedtime & harvest, cold & heat, Summer & Winter, Day & night, shall not cease. IBN EZRA This then implies y mei ha-aretz--the days of the earth have a fixed end but we hardly understand even one-one-thousandth of this matter! KIMCHI Thus our proof that the duration of the earth is finite, for God has already set a timelimit to its existence Thus the regularity of time is how we structure our lives The fact that God promises such regularity will not cease in the future is proof that during the deluge the pattern of day & night, the seasonal changes, had not functioned According to B REISHIT RABBAH, in the view of Rabbi Yochanan, none of the celestial bodies performed their normal functions during the entire year that Noah was in the ark Rabbi Yonatan countered: The celestial bodies functioned, but because Noah was captive in the ark shut off from the world, he could not be guided by what he could not see RASHI Thus, the six seasons: Seedtime & Harvest, Cold & Heat, Summer & Winter, each being two months, as we have learned in Baba Metzia [106b] IBN EZRA Seedtime & harvest dividing the year into two; cold & heat, summer and winter dividing the year into four, representing the four seasons. day & night these are divided among the seasons; what one lacks in one season it makes up for in the opposite season. The day lengthens, and the night shortens, and then they become equal again; then the day shortens and the night lengthens. The discrepancy is always made up and, in the end, everything ends up in balance. S FORNO they will not cease from continuing in this unnatural fashion which I set for them after the Flood The SFORNO submits that the various seasons and our ever-changing climate is the result of the Flood, which disrupted the perfect balance of nature that earth and man enjoyed from the time of Creation. These ideal conditions, with nature and man in sacred harmony, will be renewed at the End of Days.

3 DRASH Decoding the Message: WHICH Way in the direction of Redemption...? Prof OMID SAFI [Director of Duke s Islamic Studies ctr] There seems to be something in the air. Around the globe, 41 million people are suffering as a result of torrential rains and flooding. The storm, particularly Hurricane Irma, is quite personal to me. My own dear brother, Farzad, and his wife and their two beautiful children live in Miami. A couple of years ago, they put their life savings into buying a house... They evacuated their house on Thursday, right before the onslaught of the deadly storm. They own one car, and they had to engage in one of the most ascetic tasks anyone should ever have to do. Once they had put the four of them in their only car, they had to decide: What else do we take? As I write these words, it is unclear to them whether their home will withstand the storm. My parents, my other brother, and my sister are all hunkered down in a home, without power. Yes, this is personal. It hits very close to home. To some, it may seem strange to ask questions about seeking the spirit in the midst of a storm, the proverbial where is God when it hurts. I disagree. We keep insisting that God is not a cosmic Santa Claus and not a simple giver of goodies and gifts. If God is to be relevant, the same God of the sunny days has to be a God of the storms. If God is real, the God of the mountaintop has to be the God of the valleys. As always, we begin not with God, but with our own selves. There is no way of getting to God without starting with, and going through, our own messy and beautiful humanity. The Economist reported that there are now 400 extreme weather events a year, four times what they were in 1970 We would be remiss to not entertain the very real possibility that these extreme weather events are directly related to the general warming of the planet, and the ongoing crisis of climate change... This is the only planet so far that we have found inhabitable life for our species, and we might well be doing irreparable damage to our only home. The question is not so much where is God, but where is sanity, where is compassion, where is wisdom, where is humanity? Where are we? The storms teach me something about us: our sheer folly. Are willing to see our own complicity in all of this? The way we at least those of us in the West and in industrial countries like China are living is simply not sustainable for the planet. How we treat the planet, our relationship with the natural cosmos, is an indication of our own spiritual health. If we continue to burn fossil fuels, consume and consume and warm up the planet, even a few degrees, there will be enough melting of polar ice and resulting rising of oceans that entire coastal areas will be under water. How foolish are a people who refuse to save their only home. How deep is our denial? These hurricanes also teach me about the humanity that is left in us humans. Maybe this is why hurricanes and earthquakes bring out the best in so many people... We live in such a morally and politically divided age. When a natural disaster hits, we can be sad, we can be in awe, but few of us can be morally mad at a hurricane. So, in the absence of anger or revenge or blame, we resort to that in us which is perhaps most primal, most fundamental: compassion, love, service. That s why the response of so many in times of natural disasters reaffirms my faith that people are fundamentally good. So

4 many act not because they expect to be valorized on the news, or be tweeted about, but simply because it is unthinkable to not act when we see others suffering. We act through direct compassion, refusing to leave the saving of another life to the next person. There is hope for us humans yet, if we make this compassion an everyday ethic. The storm also makes me ponder more truth about God. Many religious traditions state that God has both a wrathful face and a merciful face. In both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, there are references to God s wrath. Naturally both scriptures also contain many references to God s mercy and love. The same pattern exists in the Qur an. And Muhammad taught that the Divine has a wrath and a mercy, but that God s mercy always comes before God s wrath. Indeed, there is a majestic wrath to God (jalal), and a more fundamental mercy and love, a beauty and a tenderness (jamal). In the Islamic tradition we are taught that to understand God perfectly, and to see the Perfection (kamal) of God, this majesty (jalal) and beauty (jamal) have to come together. May majesty never be bereft of beauty and mercy. May the God of storms and hurricanes also be the God of sunshine, the God of shade, the God of soft rain It is not quite a God-forsaken world, but a God s mercy-abandoned-world. Let us cling to the mercy, friends. Let us cling to the mercy among us. Let us bind ourselves to living in mercy with God s creation. Oh most merciful of all the Mercifuls, have mercy on us foolish, ignorant creatures. Have mercy on us when wrath is what we might have deserved. Have mercy on us so we may live. Have mercy on us. And teach us to shine that mercy onto one another. SOD Embodying the Mystery: HOW is The Tree sustaining/re-cycling/sanctifying Life? REBECCA BARLOW JORDAN Lord God, there is nothing natural about a disaster, because You supernaturally control the world and everything in it. You made the world; You created us. With one breath, you can destroy or give life. But You are also a God of grace, mercy, and love. In times like this, Lord, we admit our helplessness. We don t know what to do, but our eyes are on You. Help us to provide solutions, not blame. During actual storms, when the floods try to overtake us or when we re holding on to escape the rising waters, Lord hear our cry. When the winds howl around us and threaten to shred our hopes and steal our lifelong dreams, God help us! Send Your heavenly angels to protect us, and our loved ones, and provide lifelines from earth angels to keep us safe. Speak peace to the wind and the waves, and still our own souls so we can hear Your sweet whispers of love. When the hot fires of death encircle us or those we love,

5 shower us with Your life-giving water and extinguish the hungry flames with Your words or Your touch. Bless those who lay down their lives for others, for there is no greater love than this. Mend broken lives from heart-rending catastrophes and pour mercy and grace into hurting hearts. Make Your presence known in amazing and surprising ways as You often do when Your people cry out for intervention. Multiply both the efforts of responders and helpers and the material resources needed for life-giving sustenance Turn the hands of storms destined for destruction. Wrap Your people in a blanket of protection and love who remain in the path, and give safe passage to those who are fleeing the disaster before it hits. You are the only One who can provide what we need. When insurance won t cover, and human resources for survival or rebuilding look dim, Lord open our hearts Replace selfishness with sacrifice. Show us how to use our God-given gifts to bless others in desperate need. Breathe life into hopeless situations, and give courage to those on the brink of giving up. To those already grieving from loss, provide comfort as only You can. Lord, when we don t understand, help us to cling to You anyway Enlarge our love and trust in You, and show us any lessons we can learn that will help us now and in the future. When answers seem slow or we feel like You don t hear, remind us of Your track record of faithfulness. Strengthen our faith Help us to trust You to bring good out of disaster. Keep drawing people together, helping them to look upward and forward. Turn regrets into gratitude, and cause us to see Your purpose in all things. Lord, as we sort through the wreckage of disaster, present or future, may our confession always be: Though the hurricanes blow and the angry storms surge though the power fails, and the drought remains; though our resources are depleted, and all hope seems gone we will still trust in You, for You are Our Life; You are our Rock; You are our Refuge; You are Our Hope. Without You we are nothing, and without You we have nothing. You still love the world. So, we turn our eyes to You and pray, and wait, and trust. Thank You for the promises of Your Word. Thank You that You never leave us alone.

6 Rabbi PAUL KIPNES Eloheinu velohei avoteinu v'imoteinu, Our God and God of our fathers and mothers, The flood waters came, wreaking havoc upon our cities, our homes, our rescue workers, our sense of security, And we turn to You for comfort and support. Help us to differentiate between floods of destruction and down-pouring of Your love and comfort. We know that waters can destroy. In a world decimated many times before, having been submerged in waters from the Florida hurricanes, the Asian tsunami, and each of Biblical proportions, we remember the destructive abilities of these flood waters. Recalling now that the world, though filled with Your Glory, is not equal to Your flawlessness, we strive desperately, sometimes without success, to move beyond the impulse to blame You. Keep us far from apocalyptic thoughts, for we know that You ask us to care for each other, an awesome responsibility. We also know that we can seek You in the waters. We recall Your Loving Hand, guiding us in our infancy: From a barren rock, You brought forth water to quench our thirst, In the midst of a journey through the wilderness, You showed Miriam a myriad of wells which healed our parched throats, You guided us through Yam Suf, the Red Sea, moving us past destruction toward new life and new beginnings. Through Your love, we found our way. Be with us now, during these deluged days. Draw us close to those harmed by these waters, hearing their cries, responding to their needs. Lead us to support those who will fix the cities, care for the displaced, who bring healing to those suffering. Though our attention spans seem so short, may we be slow to forget those who were in danger.

7 Please bring a warm wind and hot sun from the heavenly realms to help dry up the flood waters. And may we all embrace at least one lesson spoken aloud by so many who - facing the floods - rushed to pack up their valuables: That memories of love and of time spent with family and friends are priceless, holy and sacred. This can never be taken away. As we rush to meet the challenge of living in this imperfect world of ours, May we slow down enough to cherish those who are truly valuable--kadosh /holy - to us. AMEN

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