Rav Henkin writes in the name of his grandfather that those who argue about how great of a tzadik Noach was are not really disagreeing with each other. Noach was very old and had already lived through two generations. In the first one (migdal bavel) they demonstrated kindness and menschlichkeit to each other but they were flippantly unobservant of bein adom l’makom. In the second generation, the people observed bein adom l’makom but they openly stole from each other. In each generation Noach was a tzaddik gamur. Now it isn’t so hard to observe bein adom l’makom when no one else is, hence he was really nothing compared to Avraham Avinu in the first generation. But to be a mensch and a decent human being when you’re surrounded by debauchery– now that is really something special. So depending on which dor you look at, Noach was both exceptional and unexceptional.
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