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Noach
Genesis 6:9 - 11:32
G-d instructs Noah -- the only righteous man in a
world consumed by violence and corruption -- to build a
large wooden teivah ("ark"), coated within and without
with pitch. A great deluge, says G-d, will wipe out all
life from the face of the earth; but the ark will float
upon the water, sheltering Noah and his family, and two
members (male and female) of each animal species.
Rain falls for 40 days and nights, and the waters
churn for 150 days more before calming and beginning to
recede. The ark settles on Mount Ararat, and from its
window Noah dispatches a raven, and then a series of
doves, "to see if the waters were abated from the face
of the earth." When the ground dries completely--exactly
one solar year (365 days) after the onset of the
Flood--G-d commands Noah to exit the teivah and
repopulate the earth.
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Noah builds an altar and offers sacrifices to G-d.
G-d swears never again to destroy all of mankind because
of their deeds, and sets the rainbow as a testimony of
His new covenant with man. G-d also commands Noah on the
sacredness of life: murder is deemed a capital offense,
and while man is permitted to eat the meat of animals,
he is forbidden to eat flesh or blood taken from a
living animal.
Noah plants a vineyard and becomes drunk on its
produce. Two of Noah's sons, Shem and Japeth, are
blessed for covering up their father's nakedness, while
his third son, Ham, is cursed for taking advantage of
his debasement.
The descendents of Noah remain a single people, with
a single language and culture, for ten generations. Then
they defy their Creator by building a great tower to
symbolize their own invincibility; G-d confuses their
language so that "one does not comprehend the tongue of
the other," causing them to abandon their project and
disperse across the face of the earth, splitting into
seventy nations.
The Parshah of Noach concludes with a chronology of
the ten generations from Noah to Abram (later Abraham),
and the latter's journey from his birthplace of Ur
Casdim to Charan, on the way to the Land of Canaan.
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