פרשת נח תשט"ז - השינויים בפסוקים מקבילים

These are the generations of Noah. Noah was in his generations a man righteous and wholehearted; Noah walked with God.

And the LORD said unto Noah: ‘Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before Me in this generation.

ראיתי צדיק [THEE] HAVE I SEEN RIGHTEOUS — It does not say “righteous and wholehearted” (as it does at the beginning of the Sedrah); hence we may infer that only a part of a man’s good qualities should be enumerated in his presence (since here God is speaking to Noah and calls him only “righteous”), but that in his absence the whole of his good qualities may be told (since when the Torah speaks about him in the earlier passage it calls him “righteous and wholehearted”) (Eruvin 18b).

ויצאו שניהם AND THEY BOTH WENT FORTH — And why did He bid them go further and so separate them from Moses? Because there is a rule that one should utter only a part of a man’s good qualities in his presence, but that the whole of them should be told only in his absence. Similarly we find in the case of Noah, that in his absence (i.e. when Scripture speaks about him) it says of him: “a righteous and whole-hearted man” (Genesis 6:9), whilst in his presence (i.e. where God is speaking to Noah) it states, (Genesis 7:1) “for thee I have seen righteous before me”, (and it does not add: whole-hearted) (Sifrei Bamidbar 102). — Another explanation is: God bid only Aaron and Miriam to draw near in order that he (Moses) should not hear the reprimand administered to Aaron.

And the LORD said unto Noah: ‘Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before Me in this generation.

And Noah did according unto all that the LORD commanded him.

And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons’ wives with him, into the ark, before the waters of the flood.

ויעש נח AND NOAH DID — This refers to his coming to the Ark.

מפני מי המבול BECAUSE OF THE WATERS OF THE FLOOD — (מפני properly means ‘‘from before”) — Noah, also, was of those people who are wanting in faith: he believed and he did not believe that the Flood would come, and he would not enter the Ark until the waters forced him to do so (Genesis Rabbah 32:6).

"Before the water..." - He went in before they came. And we don't know the reason why he says in his interpretation that he was of little faith. Because the text testifies that he was righteous and pure and that he did everything God commanded! מפני מי המבול, these words supply the reason why Noach entered. We do not understand the scholar in Bereshit Rabbah 32,6 who claimed that Noach lacked in faith because he did not enter the ark until after the rain forced him to. After all, the Torah had specifically stated that Noach was perfect and did all that G’d had commanded him.

And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.

And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bore up the ark, and it was lifted up above the earth.

ויהי הגשם על הארץ AND THE RAIN WAS UPON THE EARTH — But later on (v. 17) it says. “And the Flood was upon the earth”! But the explanation is this: when He poured down the water at first He made it fall in mercy (gently), in order that if the people would repent, it might prove a rain of blessing; but when they did not repent it became a destructive flood (Genesis Rabbah 31:12) .