Dear Friends;

I hope that you’ll enjoy the following Parsha summary followed by a Dvar Torah;

” Parsha in a Nutshell “

Parshat Noah begins by describing Noah’s righteousness, compared with the wickedness of his generation. As a result of Mankind’s evil, Hashem brings a flood to destroy every living creature, sparing only Noah, his family, and at least one pair of every animal species, who live in an ark during the lengthy flood. When the waters declined, almost a year after the rains first began, Noah sends out a raven and a dove so as to determine whether the land has dried sufficiently so that they can leave the ark to resettle the earth once again. Hashem promises that He will never again destroy all of Mankind by means of a flood, and He designates the rainbow as a sign for that eternal covenant.

Noah plants a vineyard, drinks from its produce, and becomes drunk. In his intoxicated state, he shamefully uncovers himself in his tent. While his son Cham dealt with his father inappropriately, Noah’s other two sons, Shem and Yefet, cover their father in a respectful manner. Once sober, Noah responds by blessing Shem and Yefet, and by cursing Cham and his son Canaan.

Generations pass and the world is repopulated. The people attempt to wage war against Hashem by building the Tower of Babel, and Hashem responds by mixing up their languages and dispersing them across the planet.

The Torah portion concludes on an encouraging note with Abraham’s birth and his marriage to Sarah.

” Dvar Torah “

At the beginning of the Parsha, the Torah says: ” Noah was a righteous man, perfect in his generation…..”. So, the obvious question that comes to mind is why does the Torah mention “in his generation”, when it talks about Noah’s righteousness? Well, our sages have two opposing views regarding this matter. Some Chachamim praise Noah for his righteousness in his generation, since it is very difficult to stay righteous when you are surrounded with corrupt and evil people. They say, He would have been even more righteous, if he would have lived in some other times where they were more righteous people surrounding him. While others criticize him, for his righteousness is only apparent when is compared to wickedness of his own generation. If he would have lived in the times of Abraham, for example, he would have never reached his level of righteousness. With all being said, still Noah is the only person in the entire Torah to be given the title of “righteous” by Hashem himself. So, there is no question about Noah’s righteousness; the only doubt is about his level of righteousness.

But our sages say that despite Noah’s righteousness, he still didn’t have the zechut (merit) of becoming the forefather of the Jewish nation. Our family tree starts from Abraham and not from Noah. The Torah could have easily traced back Abraham to Noah and added him to the list of our forefathers, but decided not to. But why? Why didn’t our family tree start from the righteous Noah? What was he lacking, that disqualified him from joining the Jewish nation?

I read a very interesting explanation given by Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks. He says that the answer could be found in this week’s Parsha. After the flood, Hashem tells Noah to get out of the Ark and fill up the earth once again — to grow, multiply and rebuild a society. But once Noah got out of the Ark, he looked back at all the destructions. Overwhelmed by grief, he found refuge in wine. Instead of starting to build his future, he built himself a vineyard! He became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent.The man of God has become a man of the soil. The righteous man has become a drunkard. The man clothed in virtue now lies naked and unashamed. The most righteous man who walked with God now lies alone in disgrace! And all because he looked back instead of looking forward. G-d tells him to go and build your future, but instead, he concentrated on the destructions in the past! And this is what disqualified him from becoming a Jew — ‘Not having a vision for the future’. Because in Judaism, we build our future before we mend our past!

We can see many examples of vision for the future throughout the Jewish History. One of the more recent incidents is at the time of the Holocaust. After the fall of the Natzi regime, the European Jews did not sit idle and grieve over the loss of their loved ones. Instead, they immediately started to think about their future. They started to capture and rebuild the Land of Israel for the Jewish nation. They worked very hard to make Israel a prosperous country for their children which we do benefit greatly from it to this very day. Rabbi Sacks says that many of the Holocaust survivors didn’t want to speak about their past at the beginning. Only after many years, when they got settled in and were much older, they started to talk about their past and grieve over what they’ve lost. And all because, their future was more important than their past!

Yes my friends, Judaism is a religion of the future! We are always thinking about our future and that’s the secret to our success. The land of Israel prospers continuously, because the Jews in Israel are always thinking about building their future. Why do you think that the Palestinians never prosper and most of them live in poverty and under pressure?! Because they keep looking back instead of looking forward. They don’t care about building their future; all they think about is who did this land belonged to in the past!

B”H, the Mashadi community has always been a great believer of the future too. When our fathers left Iran, they did not sit back and grieve for what they’ve left behind, but rather, they immediately started to build the future for their family and their children in United States, and today we are enjoying the fruits of their labor. Even our leaders today, they all have a vision for the future. They see the needs of the community in many more years to come, and they act on it accordingly. May G-d bless them all.

So remember my friends, the secret to succeed in life is to have a vision for the future. Something that was unfortunately missing in Noah, which inevitably disqualified him to be the father of the Chosen People!

Shabbat Shalom, Chodesh Tov & Regards;

Martin