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I’m giving a shiur on the parsha of noach to large group of 20 year old women. Any stories, lessons or short divrei torah on the topic would be much appreciated! Thank you!
torah tavlin- its an awesome source for my parsha lessons….. it has a page for a halacha, hashkafa, mashal, story….. its a great piece!
You can check out the nightly dvar torah thread. Additionally, here’s another dvar torah.
The Pasuk says ????? ?????? ???????? ???????? ?????? ?????????????. Rashi brings down the Medrash that says some say this pasuk is for good and some say it’s for bad. The meforshim who say it’s for bad say that he was a tzaddik in his dor but in the dor of Avraham Avinu he wouldn’t have been anything.
R’ Moshe Shternbuch Shlita in Sefer Taam V’daas asks, why does this mean bad, he was a tzaddik in his own dor, that’s good enough! What do we have to other generation? R’ Shternbuch answers that Noach would have been a tzaddik in a dor of Tzaddikim and forsure in dor of tzaddikim. But in the dor of Avraham Avinu, he wouldn’t be considered anything. Avraham Avinu had the middah of chesed. Noach didn’t have this middah and wouldn’t be considered anything in the dor of Avraham Avinu.
Maybe this is why Noach had to spend a year in the ???? doing chesed by feeding the animals.
Did anyone ever notice that Noach never said shira and never said thank you for saving him and his entire family from the Mabul! The korbanos he brought were just because Hashem told him to bring them by commanding him to bring more of the kosher animals he never did anything on his own initiative. Rashi brings down that he was an mekatnei emunah maybe for this reason Hashem waited untill Avraham to establish His people. Maybe you can talk about this in your shiur. It is just a haarah!
“Noach ish tzaddik”; before you can be a tzaddik, you have to be a mentch…
If I recall correctly, it’s a Kotzker vort (I may be wrong, it’s happened before…).
The pasuk says that Noach was tamim “b’dorosav”. Rashi says: Some of “raboseinu” infer praise (of Noach) and some infer criticism. Those who infer praise say that if he was so great in *his* generation, when he was alone, imagine how great he would have been if he had been around people like Avraham! Others infer criticism – only in his generation could he have been considered great, because there was no one truly great. But if he had been in a generation with people like Avraham, he would not have stood out at all.
The question is, why are these p’shatim mutually exclusive? Likely both are true – “ba’asher hu sham” he was not on the level of Avraham’s generation, but if he had been in Avraham’s generation he would have been far greater.
Looking more closely at Rashi, perhaps this is what he means to say: there are two aspects of this word that one could choose to focus on. Those who focus on the positive aspect are Raboseinu. Others, people of little significance, focus on the negative aspect. This is what Rashi means when he uses the word raboseinu only for the first inference.
Velts meahugener, are you aware that these two peahutim are a machlokes in gemoro (rav yochenen and rish lakish, if I remember correctly),
Not exactly “people of little significance”.
If I recall correctly, it’s a Kotzker vort (I may be wrong, it’s happened before…). “
Sounds like a DT from the Kotzker. I admire his words so much. There was a great DT I had heard (and hope I am not mangling, as it was long ago) about him having his talmidim in his succah and asking if they believed the Ushpizin were there. They all nodded yes, of course they believed, to which he responded that he did NOT believe it. He KNEW it, because he could see their neshamos all present. And that is how we are supposed to feel when in our own succahs. Our emunah should be so profound, that we KNOW and not merely believe.
I also believe that if a person could be a great tzaddik in a generation of reshaim, how much greater would he potentially be in a generation of tzaddikim to emulate.
Rashi says that ?? ????? ????? ??? ????? ????? ????? ???? ????? ??? ?? ?? ????? ?? ??????? ???? – Noach was from those of lesser Emunah, he believed yet he didn’t believe, and he didn’t go into the Teivah until the waters pushed him in.
It sounds very strange that a ???? like ?? wasn’t a proper ????? ??’ – was not ?? ??? ???? ????????? The Chanukas HaTorah (I think) offers a wonderful ??? (It probably is not what ??? means, but it is a nice ??? anyway) – he says that we read ??? wrong.
?? ????? ????? ??? ????? – Noach believed in those of lesser emunah that they would do ?????, and therefore ????? ????? ???? ????? – he didn’t believe that the ???? would come {because it would be unnecesary} – and ?? ?? ?? ????? until the waters pushed him in, and he saw that it was too late for them to do ?????.
Oomis, I think it actually the other way around. Someone mentioned that certain Tzaddikim saw the Ushpizin, to which the Kotzker replied that he didn’t. He believes it, and that is even greater.
The Gemara in Sanhedrin 108 relates the Machlokes between Rebbe Yochanan and Reish Lakish. Rebbe Yochanan stressed the ‘Bidorosav’, that in another generation he wouldn’t stand out, while Reish Lakish said that if in his generation he stood this much above them, in a better generation he would have surely reached great heights.
Although both can be true, the question is what the emphasis of the Pasuk is.
Additionally, the Machlokes here is about who Noach was and how he got there. According to Rebbe Yochanan, Noach was a person who was able to withstand great temptations in the face of all evil. This was his greatness. In a better generation he would not shine. His essence would never have a chance to make its mark. He was placed in the right generation for him to fulfill his task. This is not necessarily a derogatory statement. It is rather a description of what he is about, and where his greatness lies.
Reish Lakish says that Noach got where he was by climbing the ladder rung by rung. He rose above his generation. Had he been among better people he would have been able to climb even higher.
If we take this a step further we see another Machlokes, in Brachos 34b. Rebbe Yochanan says that Tzadikim Gemurim are higher than Balei Teshuva and Rebbe Avahu says that Tzadikim can’t stand in the ranks of Balei Teshuva.
So, this is sort of Leshitaso. Rebbe Yochanan saw the concept of Tzadik Gamor as the highest level. This is how he described Noach, as unbending and pure. Rebbe Yochanan himself had this Middah (as we see on Daf 19 that he refers to himself as a descendant of Yosef). Reish Lakish was himself a Baal Teshuva, and he saw the greatness of being able to rise above yourself. He describes Noach as someone that rose above the situation.
Yosef too, had the greatness of withstanding great temptations of evil and of standing firm and unbending. At his father’s house his greatness was not recognized and he was looked down upon. However, in Mitzrayim his greatness shone. Klal Yisroel needed him to be there first to be an example of how to live amongst the Egyptians.
Questions on the Parasha:
1. The Torah tells us at the end of the Parasha what happened to Terach, Avram, and Haran. What about Nachor? We know who he married but then the trail goes cold?
2. After the Mabul, Hashem commands Noach to leave the Teiva. Why would he need a commandment to leave? Wouldn’t it be quite obvious that once the land dries Noach can leave? After all, he sent a raven and multiple doves to check whether the floodwaters had receded?
The second question has two answers brought in the Midrash, and the truth is there is quite a powerful mussar in one of them. Maybe that can be a Dvar Torah.
On the first question, at least he got better treatment than those Vayoled Banim Ubanos.
eyefortruth Q1 the torah only tells us things relevant to the foundation of Klal Yisroel Nachors history has no relevance.
As for the second question i would love to hear the answer can you please post it TY!!
with all due respect, this thread should not really exist if there is a beautiful dvar torah thread already here…
http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/coffeeroom/topic/ywn-coffee-room-nightly-dvar-torah
actually, on second thought the Torah does tell us about Nachor at the end of Parshas Vayera he had Besual avi Rivkah Imeinu!!!!
nevertheless, yagdil torah v’yadir….
why would there be a mahn de’omar to read the posuk in a negative light, interpreting noach to be ONLY good in HIS generation, but not in avrom’s? if you can just as easily interpret in a positive way, why choose the pessimistic route??
rabbi schwab zt”l writes a beautiful answer. because how can it be that noach who was so great and such to which the torah (i.e. Hashem) describes him as an ‘ish tzaddiq’, how can it be that eventually reshayim and murderers will be his descendants (Pharoah, Haman, Hitler, Ahmadinejad yemach shemom, etc). If he was so perfect, his children should logically follow in perfection. just as a perfect seed, with no flaws, predictably blossoms into a perfect tree with no flaws. it MUST be that there was some smudge, some character defect, some teeny-tiny flaw that can only be discovered by intense and extreme scrutiny. therefore this mahn de’omar searched, investigated and interpreted and twists the words in a very negative way to highlight that THIS is where the chisoron of Noach must be.
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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