Noah and His Impact in our pre-Flood History

It is always fascinating to learn new things. Sometimes things that we are learning will support our views, and sometimes they seem to be contradictory. Regardless of our feelings, we are constantly expanding our knowledge base.

My personal growth comes from a number of different sources. Nowadays, artificial intelligence seems to be the topic of many conversations. People keep on questioning its ability to learn and analyse information. However, it seems strange that we as a human society are feeling uneasy about it. It is not the first time in the history of humanity that people have felt “squeezed out” by progress and inventions. All it takes is remembering the Industrial Revolution. History has many lessons for us.

Like a tree that requires roots to have nutrients delivered to leaves and fruits, we need to be strongly rooted in our history. Nowadays, with everyone becoming “an expert” or “influencer”, we are literally watching a parallel reality pop on our screens. More often than not, we are consuming reports. Like it or not, all the reports are heavily influenced by political views and certain agendas (sometimes with an additional flavour of bribes and propaganda). Regardless of it, they will bring different examples from our common history and spin it as an “opinion”.

These opinions are shaping our attitude towards everyday events. Questions of trust and reliability are becoming more obvious if we are ready to do research. Research should not be confined by boundaries or opinions. We should be ready to be truly challenged and admit our mistakes, should it become a necessity.

All of the above influences our vocabulary. Some things are practically impossible to define, and sometimes definitions are shifting and fluid. One of the examples is saying “my truth”. Let me put it as clearly as possible – there is “my opinion” and “truth”. However, there is no such thing as “my truth” – it’s either true or not. If that is the case, can we ever use the word truth? Is there an ultimate truth?

The answer is staring us in the face. There is an ultimate truth and ultimate reality. When we are learning stories from the Bible¹, they are true. We are often learning opinions and interpretations of the Bible stories; however stories themselves are true. They are real and carefully selected for us by our Creator.

Today, we are going to look into the story of Noah. We meet Noah at a very difficult time. We learn that the land has become defiled by hamas, which is commonly translated as robbery. By the very definition, robbery is something that uses force. Even at a time when robbery was a common event, there was a righteous man by the name of Noah. He is not influenced by the corrupt generation, and we learn that “Noah walked with God” (Genesis 6:9).

This is the first point of reflection for me. Since we know that the robbery is not classified as a good deed and we are working on constant improvement of ourselves, we can still be susceptible to the temptations. How much more so, when the society around us is accepting (and sometimes encouraging) it.

If unsure, look around and see how things that do not belong to us can be easily taken. For example, you are running a company, and you are concerned with the amount of ongoing costs? Would you make sure you have paid your contractors and employees, or would you start by paying bills first? And if you find the answer to be a difficult one, let me help you – you should pay your employees and contractors first. Yet time and time again, you hear people doing jobs without payment in full.

This is effectively taking something that does not belong to you. On the other hand, how many times we were caught by people promising to do certain things and failing to deliver goods or services. With age, we are becoming more sceptical, however we still see people taking deposits and… There are many more examples we can see in our everyday lives. It is important to note that the world was different at the time of Noah and his generation. It is considered to be prosperous. Therefore, there are no reasons or even excuses to commit any acts of violence or injustice. However, they failed to recognise the Creator of His Oneness.

So let us go back to the story of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, and he withstood temptations. He is described as someone who walked with God. Therefore, once the world became filled with robbery of all kinds, Noah was chosen to continue with the mission of co-creating the world itself. Noah is informed that he is going to be saved.

Something that sounds like joyful news – you and your family will be saved, actually, requires a huge commitment. Noah is told to build an ark. There are very clear specifications of it. And just at the moment that we think things are going to become clear, it is actually raising many more questions than answers.

Just allow yourself to reflect on this part of the story. Do we know if Noah knew how to build anything at all? Especially a boat or an ark of that size? What about his neighbours? Family? Did people around Noah understand the mission? Come to think of it, did Noah even tell them? Was he supposed to talk about his mission? Would it trigger repentance, which could have possibly saved the world from the flood? Or maybe he was not successful in telling the whole story for one reason or another? There are a lot of questions (some addressed in our sages’ discussions and some are our personal lessons to be learnt).

Yes, we are getting back to the story. The building project is on the way, and it is getting obvious that it is not a boat – it is an ark. Generally speaking ark cannot be steered; it is just floating for survival purposes. Our sages will tell you that the whole process took 120 years. It is uneasy to do something day in and day out for such a long time and not give up on a project, wouldn’t you agree? However, Noah is the righteous man, and he follows all the instructions. What would you think about anyone who does not have an ambition to move up in his career, doing a similar and unpopular job without any pay. If we are honest, righteousness would not be the first thought in our heads. Yet we would be very wrong. So maybe we need to learn to do something very unpopular as long as this is helping us to fulfil our mission. In reality, we are often unsure about our lives, however the 7 Noahide laws are a very good guideline.

We know for sure that at the time of the flood, Noah was 600 years old. The rain came, and you would think people around Noah would think it’s a good time to listen to him. However, we are clearly learning that they failed to acknowledge the possibility that Noah was right. One can only wonder about the reasons for it – could it be they were not ready to hear, or did not believe or just were too stubborn to admit their faults. The Bible is silent about it.

Maybe it is a good lesson to have for us – we should keep our minds open and be ready to admit that we were wrong. There are a number of reasons for people arriving at a wrong conclusion, including but not limited to consuming wrong information. We definitely can discuss the problem of consuming wrong information due to the limited amount of it, like say the life was behind the iron curtain or nowadays, say in a place like China. However, please do not neglect the problem with overflow of information, poor journalism and our addiction to social media (where most of the time algorithms will filter information). Make no mistake, it is possible to read the opposing points of view and research for yourself.

At all the given times, we have to keep in mind that only the Bible has the truth. Therefore, regardless of everything else, it is our responsibility to have a line on the sand that we are prepared to defend. If we are honest with ourselves, we can either believe in the Creator or in people. If you are a realist, you will accept the knowledge of the Divine. This simple reality gives us a chance to feel secure in our decisions. This exact reality saved Noah and his family.

Previously, we have encountered the story of Lot. Lot lived in a wicked place (Sodom). When the time came to save himself and his family, not all of his children were ready to trust him, and even his wife was not ready to hear the message. Unlike Lot, Noah was the righteous man. As such, he could save his children and even their spouses. From that, we realise that our beliefs and behaviour impact ourselves first and foremost, with the hope of being a positive role model for our spouses and our children with their families. This is a powerful enough impact to improve the world.

So here we are, Noah is going to be the biological father of all humanity. It is interesting to note that initially, the first man created (Adam) was given the Garden of Eden (paradise). Yes, he had to look after the vegetation and animals, however he was not given the gift to actually help with planting trees or mowing the grass or anything else. In the case of Noah, the Almighty actually gave a space for Noah to actually create an ark. And yes, Noah used the given raw materials to build it. Only God can create something from nothing, and our world is a clear example of it.

This is the story of Noah in a nutshell, and it is our intent to go back to the story and learn it in detail as well as discuss the matter of the flood.

1. All the references to the Bible are 5 Books of Moses only. ↩︎