Parshat Noah Genesis 6:9 -11:32
Parshat Noah
Genesis 6:9 -11:32
Rabbi Denise L. Eger
In this fast moving world that we live in, we all know that communication is paramount. With all the social networking sites that demand our attention, texting, tweeting, cell phone calls keep us constantly in touch and constantly communicating with work, family and friends. There are so many avenues to make ourselves heard it can be dizzying. Each mode of communication has its unique shorthand and its unique signatures. Twitter keeps it short -140 characters. Facebook asks you for your status update. Texting has its own shorthand and the phone too has its own unique signatures with specialized ringtones for different people.
But nothing perhaps is more frustrating that the dropped call. Even as we speed about talking on our Bluetooth headsets, midsentence our call can fade away. It interrupts the flow of conversation and might even create serious problems in our relationships. It necessitates call backs and everyone is frustrated when signal strength and communication towers are few and far between. It sometimes feels like the message is interrupted on purpose.
I imagine this is how the people felt during the building of the Tower of Babel which is a story in this week’s Torah portion, Noah. It is a mythic tale of the beginning of various languages. The story of the tower of Babel which is found in chapter 11 of the book of Genesis tells us that the people banded together to build a city and a tower to the heavens. Human ingenuity is at the core of this story. But God looks upon their cooperative work with suspicion worrying that their creations will empower humans and nothing will be beyond their reach. The people of Babel did not according to the implication by God put their creation in the proper perspective. And it seems that God fears that they will see themselves as gods. This is why God interrupts their communication by creating many different languages and spreading the people about the earth.
And that is in part the lesson we learn from this week’s portion that God and Divinity are not to be discounted or ignored when we human beings create and build. As part of our covenant with God that Abraham will make next week in Parshat Lech-Lecha, the Jewish people put God at the center. Our creations and experiments are placed in the context of our relationship with the Divine. We understand that when we create or build or farm that God is part of the equation. And that is part of the communication that we need to express.
We give thanks for the ability to speak and learn. We give thanks to God for the ability to use our human ingenuity to build and discover. We give thanks for making us in the Divine image.
Posted by Eric at October 21, 2009 12:38 PM
