TorahParsha

What world do you build in?

For this Shabbat, I've decided to share a thought on the Tower of Babel.

  

There is another City of Babel—one aside from the city of the people who build a tower. There is also the city of Nineveh: the city which Nimrod, ruler of the Kingdom of Babel, builds himself.

God does not let the City of Babel progress. But Nineveh goes on to become the great city.

The people of the City of Babel speak of bricks and of a tower; they speak of making a name for themselves. They do not speak of animals. And they do not speak of God. But Nimrod is a mighty hunter before the Lord­. And in the time of Jonah, when the people of Nineveh repent, they dress their animals in sackcloth alongside themselves. For the people of Babel, man is alone with his technology. For the people of Nineveh, man and beast are together in God’s world.

For the people of Nineveh, we are only one part of God’s universe.

The people of Babel build a city. The king of Nineveh builds a city.

It is only Nineveh that God lets flourish.

 

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Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

I have read Genesis 10:11, an ambiguous verse, as saying that Nimrod built Nineveh. 

Genesis 10:8-11, 11:1-9; Jonah 1:2, 3:8

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Talking, not talking (on Babel)

Another thought on the Tower of Babel. 

I’m considering taking a break from the weekly Torah reading to focus on this story for the foreseeable future--a new perspective on the Tower of Babel each week. 

I’d love to hear your thoughts on/interest in taking that path. I'm at [email protected]. 

 

 

Talking, not talking

 

i

Cain is violently jealous of his brother.

He tries to speak to him

he meets him in the field

he kills him instead of speaking.

 

Later, Cain builds a city

which he names for his son.

Which is a new kind of family name,

a new language of family—

a language of cities:

structured, neat

enclosing the open field

of family emotions.

 

 

ii

Between genealogies

—families birthing families,

naming them—

we meet the people of Bavel.

 

They are beyond family.

They are nameless.

We know nothing of their parents,

their children.

 

Of one language,

they communicate directly enough

to build a city.

 

Which they will build so as not to be dispersed,

to give themselves a name,

to unite.

 

iv

They structure a new city

a new name

a new family

through uncomplicated language,

through technology and work.

They are Cain’s disciples.

 

v

Perhaps God does not want more Cains.

He wants us

to connect through the depths.

 

So He scatters language back into chaos.

So humanity can begin to learn

what it needs to:

not how to hide behind ordered words

but how, finally, to face each other

how to connect.

 

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Shabbat shalom,

Abe

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Please pray for Yechiel ben Michal

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What language is for

With a new city, a new job, and a forthcoming book, I’ve decided to do something different and explore the Tower of Babel. For a thought on Parshat Toldot, please see my archive here.
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What language is for

i

God makes Man

and tells him

to name all creatures

until the culmination

of Man Ish

finding Woman  Isha:

the partner

who is taken from Man,

the partner

with whom he makes one flesh.

  

ii

In Babel

the people all speak one language.

They say:

Let us burn bricks liveinim into stone avanim

bitumen cheimer into mortar chomer

and build a tower to the sky

to make a name for ourselves.

 

iii

God scatters these people

into many tongues

across the face of the earth.

 

Now they must learn

how to translate their languages

back into the one single language

 

they must learn

how to re-discover each other

like the man finding his wife

becoming again one flesh

 

they must learn at last

what language is for

not for shaping the world

not for naming ourselves—

but for finding one another.

 

 

___

Shabbat shalom,

Abe

 

Please pray for Yechiel ben Michal, the people below injured in this week’s terror attack, and for peace in Israel. 

חיים יחיאל בן מלכה
איתן בן שרה
שמואל ירוחם בן ביילה
אברהם שמואל בן שיינה
אריה בן ברכה

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How do you define a life?

for Parshat Noach

 

i

God makes man from earth

—adamah—

and names man Man:

Adam.

*

Adam sins,

and God curses the earth

from which Adam is taken

for which Adam is named

which culminates in Adam.

*

Adam’s descendants

sin irreparably

and God covers the earth with water

and God wipes the children of Adam away.

 

ii

Lemech names his son Noah,

rest,

saying:

This child will grow up

and give us rest from the trouble

of the cursed the earth.

*

And Noah carries humanity

and the animal kingdom

and his family

through the waters of the ravaging Flood.

And his children

become the nations of the world.

 

iii

Adam is named

as the culmination of the earth.

The center of the story,

of course things cannot last

much beyond hm.

The culmination of the earth that precedes him,

of course he makes the earth less valuable

once he arrives.

*

But Noah is named for his life in others;

his life is defined through others.

He saves others through the Flood.

And, living through others,

he goes on and on.

 

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Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

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In honor of our new son, Jonah Zachary Mezrich, whose brit and naming was this week.

How light is shed

 

for Chanukah 

 

i

God commands Noah

to build a window in the Ark

to let light in.

At the Flood’s end

Noah opens the window

and sends out a dove

and the dove brings back an olive leaf.  

(And olives are the source of lamp oil.)

 

ii

In the Desert God tells the people

to make him a Tent

a home for Him amidst them

and place a Lamp

—a Menorah—

within it

and to light the Menorah with olive oil.

 

iii

At the first level

at the Flood’s end

at the rebirth of things

we must be ready to receive light

from without—

from the window,

from the bird that flies to us.

*

But at the height of things

when we have come near God’s presence

we light God’s home

we offer a light to God.

 

 

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Shabbat shalom & Chag Urim Sameach,

Abe

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When can we use force?

for Parshat Noach

 

i

God tells the first man and the first woman

I have given to you every herb...as food.

But God does not mention

the eating of animals.

We begin as vegetarian.

*

After the Flood,

God tells Noah:

Everything that crawls on the earth

is yours as food,

like the green herb.

 

ii

Only after the Flood could we eat meat.

*

Before you bear responsibility for taking life

first you need to understand the destruction of a world.

 

 

 

_____

Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

www.TorahParsha.com

 

What are years?

 

for Parshat Terumah

 

i

God tells Noah

to build a great ship

out of gofer wood

three hundred cubits long

fifty cubits wide

thirty cubits high

to carry the creatures through the storm.

*

God tells Moses

to build a Holy Ark

from shittim wood

one and a half cubits long

one and a half cubits wide

one and a half cubits high

to carry God’s Testimony

across the Desert

to the Land.

*

Pharoah asks Jacob

How many are the days of the years of your life?

Jacob

who has had a difficult life

who is old

answers Pharoah:

I have lived one hundred thirty years,

few and bad were the days of the years of my life. 

 

ii

A number is a measure

of material for carrying things:

cubits of wood for voyagers

cubits of wood for holy cargo

years of life for bearing good

or bad.

 

iii

A number is a question:

With only so much material

so much wood

so many cubits

so many years

—nothing more—

what can we carry

and how much

how will we carry good

and not bad

what is in our power

to justify the measure we have?

 

 

 ____

Title taken from the title of a poem by Marianne Moore

 ____

Shabbat Shalom,

Abe

TorahParsha.com

 

Please pray for Neshama Emuna bat Batya

 

 

The Tower of Babel

for Parshat Noach

 

i

God creates each thing with words:

He says, Let there be;

He names:

Day, Night, Sky, Land, Seas.

*

The Man is alone

so God makes each creature

and places each creature

before the Man

for the Man to name.

This is the way

God guides the Man to his wife,

the woman,

whom the Man names also.

 

ii

In Babel

the people

all share

one language.

They say:

Let us make a great city

and a great tower;

let us make a name for ourselves.

*

God is not pleased

and He sows discord in their language

and He spreads them out

across the earth.

 

iii

God utters Creation though words

Man comes to Woman with words,

with names.

But the people of Babel

wish to make a name for themselves.

*

There are words

that reach out

from the speaker

to a world,

from one

lonely being

to another.

Other words

are the way

we babble

about

ourselves.

Only one of these types

of speaking

does God

want.

 

 

______

Shabbat shalom,

Abe

 

Please pray for for Ayelet Yakira bat Chaya Hinda Matel Nechama

 

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Thought for Bereishit / Shemot

 

How we create ourselves

(The Tower of Babel)

 

i

God said: Let there be Light. And there was Light.

And God saw that the Light was Good.

And God separated the Light from the Darkness.

 

ii

In Babel, the people said: Let us make bricks; let us build a great city and a tower; we will make a name for ourselves.

*

God does not want this.

He makes the people speak different languages (before they had been of one language).

They can no longer understand one another.

They can no longer speak with one another.

They scatter from each other—across the whole earth—into many languages, many nations.

 

iii

We can create ourselves by pretending we are like God, Who creates Light from nothing: by making bricks, by building a tower, by making a name for ourselves, by building ourselves up from where we are.

Or we can create ourselves by acting as God did, when He drew out the Good Light that was hidden in Darkness:

—drawing out or own nationhoods, now hidden amongst the mass of people; discovering our place in the world.

God says: choose the second way.

 

Shabbat Shalom,

- Abe

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Please continue to pray for Ahuvah Rachel bat Orah, and for Rachel Tovah bat Yehudit Esther
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Frameworks for Journeys (for Parshat Noach)

i

Noah becomes drunk in his tent.

Noah’s son, Cham, defiles him.

Noah curses Cana’an, Cham’s son.

*

Terach fathers Abram, and Nachor, and Haran.

And Haran died before his father Terach, in the land of his birth.

And Sarai, Abram’s wife, was barren: she had no child.

*

The process of generations has failed in Terach’s family. As the process of generations has failed in Cana’an's family.

And Terach took Abram, his son; and Lot, the son of Haran, his son’s son; and Sarai his daughter-in-law, Abram’s wife; and they went to the land of the children of Cana’an.

*

But Terach dies. He never reaches Cana’an.

ii

God says to Abram: Go…to the land which I will show you, and I will make you into a great nation.

Abram and Sarai and Lot follow God to that land.

That land is the land of Cana’an.

Cana’an is the Land of Israel.

Abram’s descendants will live as a great nation there.

iii

Abram does not change the journey his father has begun.

He only takes this same journey in a new framework: a journey with God.

This new framework turns a failed generation into the beginning of a great people.

 

Shabbat Shalom, Abe

Special thanks to my wife, Kathi, for her insights this week, and for her editing each week.

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