No'ach

1) "Generations" of No'ach

a) Continued sins of man
b) The flood
c) Resettlement of the Earth
d) The covenant of the rainbow

2) Episode of No'ach's drunkedness.
3) 70 nations

a) Lineages of Yefet and Cham (non-Semitic nations)
b) Lineage of Canaan (singled out from other b'nei Cham)
c) Lineage of Shem

4) Tower of Bavel
5) Geneaology of Shem

a) Life of Shem
b) Life of Arpachshad
c) Life of Shelach
d) Life of Eiver
e) Life of Peleg
f) Life of Re'u
g) Life of S'rug
h) Life of Nachor
i) Life of Terach


This sedra does not begin with a conjunction, making it one of the only 5 sedros in the first four chumashim to have this quality. Being that the other three, besides the special case of Bereishis, are Pekudei, Bechukosai, and Mas'ei, I would like to theorize that the Torah utilizes conjunctions between most sections as a means of attaching two separate stories together, and that the absence of such a conjunction implies that the Torah does not consider this to be a true break in the action. Being that Parshas Bereishis ended on a very dissonant note (leaving aside the small glimmer of hope of No'ach), and that the subject matter on either side of the break is very similar (see my post on my other blog, HaProzdor, for a further examination of this section), I believe that this possibility may have merit to it.

1 ends with the covenant between God and mankind, representing No'ach's apex, and his potential to build up the world in a way that is more in God's image than that built by Adam.

2 describes No'ach's downfall and death, having failed to reach his potential.

3 describes the world being rebuilt, despite No'ach's downfall, and 4 describes a second failure.

Finally, 5, which does not begin with a conjunction, serves a similar purpose to the last verse of the previous sedra and to the beginning of the first parsha of this week's: to describe the rise of a man who has the ability to fix the mistakes of the generations before him. This time, though, the man succeeds.

The division between this week's sedra and next week's describes the split between Avraham and his family, where he ceases to merely be subsidiary to his father (11:31), and becomes a leader in his own right, driven by the Divine decree. After the failures of Adam and No'ach, the mantle is being passed on to Avraham.

Bereishis

1) First day of creation
2) Second day of creation
3) Third day of creation
4) Fourth day of creation
5) Fifth day of creation
6) Sixth day of creation
7) Conclusion of creation, Sabbath
8) Creation of man and Edenic existence.

a) Prior to the woman's curse.
b) The woman's curse
c) After the woman's curse

9) Post-Edenic existence

a) Expulsion from garden
b) Kayin and Hevel, Lemech, and birth of Seth
c) Life of Adam
d) Life of Seth
e) Life of Enosh
f) Life of Keinan
g) Life of Mahalalel
h) Life of Yered
i) Life of Chanoch
j) Life of Metushelach
k) Life of Lemech
l) Introduction of No'ach; people begin to multiply and sin.

10) Decision to bring flood upon earth, distinction of Noach.

Notes:
1 does not start with a conjunction - this is logical, because there is nothing for it to be conjoined to (as, according to Chagigah 2:1, we are not permitted to delve into that which occurred before Bereishis).

2-7 are also not connected by conjunctions. As I will track over the course of this project, this is very out of the ordinary, and thus must be explained. Perhaps one can say that the seven parshiyos of creation are in some way distinct from the rest of the Torah, in that they serve as a sort of heading, rather than as a simple narrative. This general idea is supported by the frequent references to Ma'aseh Bereishis as being one of the most mysterious sections of the Torah (and its comparison to Ma'aseh Merkavah), but I'm not sure how to expand on it.

8 does not start with a conjunction, either. Perhaps one can note that, rather than occurring chronologically after the preceding 7 parshiyos, it describes the creation of man that was already expounded upon in the narrative of the sixth day of Creation, but from a different standpoint. This being the case, one can give the same answer to the lack of a conjunction at the beginning of this parsha that we gave for the lack at the beginning of the first parsha, i.e., that there's nothing for it to be attached to. The Torah could have started from 2:4 and still provided a coherent history of man's origins, even had it not elaborated on the minutae of each day of Creation.

The curse of the woman is separated from the rest of the parsha, including the curse of the snake and the curse of the man. Perhaps the Torah, rather than using the device of a s'tumah to indicate a change of topic, used it here to separate between three terrible curses, either so as not to mention them all at once or to emphasize each one.

9 begins with the expulsion from the garden of Eden [a] and then describes Kayin's birth, sin, and punishment (according to one Midrashic view) [b], which thereby effectively ends his lineage's active role in the story (which applies even according to the other views), although his descendants are not entirely wiped out until the flood in next week's sedra.

The Torah then presents a series of generational parshiyos that carry us from Adam to No'ach, the next significant character in the history of man.

The border between 9-10 seems to be an interesting choice. After the b'nei HaElohim take from whichever of the goodly b'nos haAdam they desire, HaShem declares that, because man is only flesh, He shall not endure them forever, but rather shall set a cap for them of 120 years - explained by most to refer to a period of 120 years until the bringing of the flood. The parsha then ends with the introduction of the Nephilim, who were produced from these relationships. In the 10th parsha, HaShem "sees" that man is full of evil, regrets his decision to create them and is saddened by it (very curious anthropomorphic phenomena), and declares that he will blot them out with a flood, save No'ach.

What is the difference between the narratives of the end of the 9th parsha and the 10th? Perhaps they refer to two different decrees - one a decree of 120 years (either until some punishment or something else - which is very unlikely to be a maximum lifespan) and the other a decree of bringing a flood? Why are the Nephilim mentioned only after God's first statement, especially in light of that their mention reflects into the past, implying that they already existed when God made His decree?

The ending of the sedra seems to be at a strange place, as it comes in the middle of the introductory narrative of No'ach. Nonetheless, looking at it as it is, all of the failures of the sedra - Adam, Kayin, and perhaps Lemech among them - have the ability to be wiped away by the man introduced in the last passuk of this sedra, who alone among his contemporaries finds favor in the eyes of HaShem. (Sadly, he does not live up to this potential. My rebbe, Zatzal, once noted the contrast between Moshe, who over the course of his live evolves from Ish Mitzri, an Egyptian man (Shmos 2:19), to Ish HaElokim, a man of God (Devarim 33:1), and No'ach, who over the course of his life transformed from Ish Tzaddik, a righteous man (Bereishis 6:9), to Ish HaAdamah, a man of the earth (Bereishis 9:20)).

I discussed some of these issues at HaProzdor.

What is this?

For each sedra, I have listed the different parshiyos p'suchos in an attempt to understand the Torah's system of divisions. I have pondered some of these ideas for a while, and have finally decided to take the initative of systematically working through Chumash in this way. I'm not sure what I'll find by the end of the year, but at least it will be an interesting way of looking at the Chumash.