Parashat Noach encompasses the flood story, the Tower of
Babel, and the genealogies that set up God’s calling Abram to set out for the
land of Canaan.
The story of Noah has clear parallels with the story of
Utnapishtim in the Epic of Gilgamesh. The differences, however, are differences
that make the story very clearly ours. For example, while Enlil wants to flood
the world to wipe out humanity’s constant noise, God wipes out the world because
God sees “how corrupt the earth was, for all flesh had corrupted its ways on
earth.” The idea that God is horrified by category violation and lawlessness is quite clearly derived from Torah categories. The specifics of the Noah story both reach back to creation and forward
to Abraham, the Mishkan, and into the prophets (where the Noah story serves as
a useful metaphor for later exiles and redemptions).
The question then becomes not how or whether we borrowed the
story, but why is this story placed here? How is it a useful hinge to get us from creation to
Abram? What does Noah provide us that B’reishit didn’t? Additionally, how does the
parasha shed light on later stories of sin, exile, redemption, and law-giving?
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