Tag Archives: Noah

How Did Adam Live 930 Years?

This week’s parasha is Vayelech, which begins with Moses’ statement that “Today I am one hundred and twenty years old” (Deut. 31:2). It was the 7th of Adar, Moses’ birthday, and also his day of passing. Moses goes on to conclude his final speech to the people, then sings a deeply prophetic farewell song in next week’s portion Ha’azinu, followed by his blessings to the people in the last parasha of the Torah, V’Zot HaBracha.

Moses was the greatest of all prophets, the humblest man to walk the earth, and the central founding figure of Judaism. He was blessed with living a full and healthy life spanning exactly 120 years. It has become common today for people to wish each other 120 years of life. Why is this the specific figure? Can humans not live longer? Don’t we see in Genesis that Adam lived 930 years, Noah lived 950 years, and Methuselah (Metushelach) lived a record 969 years? What happened?

The Flood Generation

Ten generations from Adam, the world had descended into endless sin and immorality. God decreed that man’s days “will be numbered at one hundred and twenty” (Genesis 6:3). Many believe this to mean that God decreed humans will no longer be able to live past 120 years. Indeed, when looking at modern records of longevity, the vast majority of the world’s oldest people die close to 120 years. There has only been one official case of anyone exceeding 120, a Frenchwoman named Jeanne Calment who lived 122 years.

However, the traditional Jewish interpretation is that the Genesis verse above does not mean man is unable to live past 120. After all, our forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob lived long after this decree, and they lived 175, 180, and 147 years, respectively. Rather, the Jewish Sages state that God decreed the arrival of the Great Flood 120 years hence. God gave mankind 120 years to repent, and possibly avert the Flood. Noah was commissioned to go around and inspire people to mend their ways, and he had 120 years to do it.

Unfortunately, Noah failed in this endeavour, unable to bring even a single person to righteousness (as the Ark only carried his own family at the end). This is one reason for why the Flood is known in Hebrew as mabul Noach, literally “Noah’s Flood” (or mei Noach, “Noah’s waters”), as if he was partially responsible for not doing enough to inspire people to change. Because of this, many (including Rashi) have commented on the verse “Noah was a righteous and pure man in his generation” (Genesis 6:9) to mean that Noah was only righteous in his faulty generation. Had he lived in another generation, such as that of Abraham, he would not have been deemed so righteous!

We see from the Biblical chronology that after the Flood, people’s life spans steadily shorten. Moses’ older siblings Aaron and Miriam lived 123 and 126 years. Moses died at 120, and this appears to have become the new limit. After Moses, there are only a few people noted to have lived longer, one of which is Yehoyada the High Priest, who lived 130 years (II Chronicles 24:16).

What accounts for this steady degeneration in longevity?

Yeridat HaDorot

The Talmud (Shabbat 112b) states: “If the earlier [scholars] were sons of angels, we are sons of men; and if the earlier [scholars] were sons of men, we are like asses…” This is one of many passages that attests to the well-known concept of yeridat hadorot, “the descent of the generations”. It is said that each passing generation falls lower and lower in its wisdom and spiritual greatness. This concept can solve the puzzle of longevity.

The body is a finite lump of matter. It is only animated and vitalized by the infinite soul within it. Thus, the greater the soul, the longer the body can live. As the spiritual potential in each generation falls, so too does the lifespan.

Moreover, it is taught that Adam contained essentially all of the souls of humanity within him (Sha’ar HaGilgulim, ch. 11). As more and more people were born over the centuries, this single universal soul broke down further and further into smaller and smaller fragments. With the exception of a number of “new souls”, the vast majority of the world’s 7 billion people are all parts of the soul of Adam. It is therefore not surprising that today’s spiritual capabilities (and with that, the lifespans) are severely limited.

At the Speed of Light

Science may offer another intriguing possibility. According to modern physics, time as we know it doesn’t really exist. The universe is one interwoven fabric of both time and space. The faster one moves through space, the slower the effects of time for that person. There is actually a formula to measure the impact of this time dilation, known as the Lorentz transformation. It is given by the equation ΔT = t√1-v2/c2 [or: t = t0 ÷ √(1-v2/c2)], where v is one’s speed and c is the speed of light.

Theoretically, the speed of light is the absolute maximum in our universe. At light speed (just under 3.00 x 108 m/s, or 300,000 km/s), time will totally stop for the traveller (if plugging it into the formula, one gets a value of zero). This seems impossible. However, if we plug in a value very close to light speed, such as 2.99 x 108 m/s, we get a very interesting result.* A person who has perceived living 80 years will have actually lived 980 earthly years! That makes Adam’s 930 years a more palatable 76, and Methuselah’s record 969 as 79. This fits in well with the verse in Psalms that a normal lifespan is 70 to 80 years (Psalms 90:10). But how could Adam and Methuselah have lived at near-light speed?

Beautifully, the Sages teach us that Adam was not a human like us. In many texts (such as Bereshit Rabbah 20:12), Adam is described not simply as a being of flesh, but rather as a being of light. Though most will interpret this metaphorically, there are those sages, such as the Arizal (for example, in Sefer HaLikutim, Bereshit, ch. 3) that interpret this quite literally. It remains to be seen what this means exactly, and if it has anything at all to do with physics, but perhaps there is much more to the idea of Adam being a man of light than we can imagine.

The article above is an excerpt from Garments of Light: 70 Illuminating Essays on the Weekly Torah Portion and Holidays. Click here to get the book! 

——–

*To be fair, choosing a value such as 2.99 x 108 m/s may be deemed quite arbitrary. One can also plug in finer values even closer to the speed of light, such as 2.997 or 2.9972, and so on, each of which would give a more refined result. The point of this exercise is simply to illustrate the relativity of time, and what might explain the difference in perceived years between our generations and those of the first people, through a scientific perspective.

What Are the Jewish People “Chosen” For?

This week’s very powerful Torah portion is Va’etchanan. In it, Moses continues his farewell speech to the nation before his death. Among other important points, he recaps the Ten Commandments, and proclaims the text of the Shema. Included in this speech are a number of significant prophecies and statements.

Moses reminds the people that what they witnessed at Mt. Sinai was a totally unique, once-in-history event, where God brought forth a divine revelation to the entire nation, with every single individual experiencing a prophetic vision. Moses tells us to always remember that this has never happened elsewhere in history (Deuteronomy 4:32-34). Although modern Biblical critics will immediately point out that there is no proof that such a national revelation ever took place, Moses tells us that no other people has ever even claimed such a thing! To this day, there is no nation or religion that claims to have started with a national revelation. Strangely, only the Jewish people make such a claim.

National Revelation at Sinai (Providence Lithograph Company, 1907)

A 1907 Illustration of the National Revelation at Sinai

(Although some point out that the Aztecs seem to have a similar story of their god guiding them through a Wilderness to their very own promised land in Mexico, most modern scholars agree that this myth is very recent, adopted from the Jewish story in the Torah. The Aztecs picked it up from Christian missionaries and made it their own.)

Another prophecy in this week’s portion is that the Jewish people will be scattered around the world, and will always remain small in number (4:27). Three thousand years later, the prophecy still holds true, with just 0.2% of the world’s population being Jewish. That’s quite amazing, as it defies normal growth patterns. There are roughly two billion Christians in the world, and their religion emerged over a thousand years after Judaism. The number of Muslims is also steadily nearing two billion, and they came around even later, roughly 1400 years ago. Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, and virtually all other major religions outnumber the Jews. Even the Bahai faith, which started just 160 years ago is quickly catching up, and will soon outnumber Judaism, too.

Moses suggests that it is precisely because we are small in number that God chose us (7:7). Perhaps this can be explained with simple economics of supply and demand. The more of something that there is, the less value it is perceived to have. (Note the word perceived; all human life is of course equal.) The sworn enemies of the Jews seem to agree: Hamas thought it was totally fair to demand 1000 Palestinians to be freed in exchange for one Jew – Gilad Shalit!

The big question is: why did God “choose” us?

The Chosen People

To understand why God chose the Jewish people, and what exactly we are chosen for, one must look back to the beginning of the whole story. Originally, there were no Jews and no Torah. There were only Adam and Eve, in a perfect world, living with God’s revealed presence. The problem of this “perfect” world was that Adam and Eve were essentially unable to truly enjoy it. Having never experienced anything “bad”, they had no concept of what is “good” either. Life was just bland.

In the middle of Eden, God placed the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. By consuming of its fruit, Adam and Eve would be introduced to these new concepts. They would now have to experience hardship and confront evil, but measure for measure, they would now also be able to enjoy goodness and pleasure. After all, it is only because we have had negative experiences that we can truly understand, appreciate, and strive for the positive ones.

Adam and Eve had a choice. They chose the Tree of Knowledge. With that, their perfect world was over. However, this was only temporary. God’s intention was for mankind to live in a world of goodness, not one of suffering. Yet, in order to make the most of the Garden of Eden, mankind first had to experience evil, overcome it, and transcend it. Ever since Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden, their mission has been to remove evil from their midst, restore goodness, and finally return to that Garden.

Adam and Eve were unable to do this, and neither were their children, or grandchildren. As humans multiplied, they only become more and more sinful, pushing themselves further away from Godliness and goodness. After ten generations, God hit the “restart” button to try again with Noah. Noah ultimately failed as well, and once more each passing generation only fell further into immorality. It took another ten generations before things started to change.

Abraham’s Revolution

Abraham was the first person to properly recognize what the universe was all about. He understood that the current state of the world was wrong. Life was never meant to be this way. Abraham thus made it his life’s mission to repair the world. He travelled across the Middle East and spread monotheism, righteousness, and Godliness wherever he went. Abraham embodied all of the traits necessary to restore the world to a state of Eden. And so, it wasn’t so much that God chose Abraham, but rather, that Abraham chose God.

To complete the task of repairing the world would require more than just one man. This huge mission would require a nation. Thankfully, Abraham’s son Isaac continued in his father’s path, as did Jacob the grandson, and his own twelve sons. From these twelve sons an entire nation was born – a nation whose mission would be to restore the world to the Garden of Eden.

History shows that the Jewish people have indeed done so. The Jews’ moral contributions to the world have been vast, and described in books like Ken Spiro’s WorldPerfect – The Jewish Impact on Civilization and Thomas Cahill’s The Gifts of the Jews, among others. The Jews’ contributions to science, medicine, and technology may be even greater. Some of the most important minds behind breakthroughs like the personal computer and the internet, the cellphone and lasers, vaccines and automobiles were Jews, as were some of the greatest figures in biology, chemistry, mathematics, and physics. It is also important not to forget the immeasurable spiritual contributions of the Jews to the world.

Of course, Jews are not perfect. The Torah itself attests to this many times, even in this week’s parasha that admonishes the nation on multiple occasions. At the end of the day, the name of our nation is Israel, which literally translates as “struggles with God.” Our history has been a difficult one, full of struggles and challenges. It is clear, though, that we are nearing the end of this period, and we will soon see the restoration of the Garden of Eden, as God originally intended.

The article above is adapted from Garments of Light – 70 Illuminating Essays on the Weekly Torah Portion and Holidays. Click here to get the book!

The Amazing Story of Og, the Giant King of Bashan

Devarim, or Deuteronomy in English, is the fifth and final book of the Torah. Deuteronomy comes from the Greek deuteronomion, meaning “second law”, which itself comes from the alternate Hebrew name of the book, Mishneh Torah, meaning “repetition of the law”. The name stems from the fact that Deuteronomy is essentially a summary of the four previous books of the Torah. The key difference is that it is given in the point of view of Moses, and records his final sermon to the people before his death.

One of the enigmatic figures mentioned in this week’s parasha is Og, the king of the land of Bashan. This character is explicitly mentioned a total of 10 times in the Torah, of which 8 are in this portion alone. He is first mentioned in the introductory verses of the parasha (1:4), which state how Moses began his discourse after smiting Sihon, the king of the Amorites, and Og, the king of Bashan.

Og’s Bed, by Johann Balthasar Probst (1770)

We are later told how Og had come out to confront the children of Israel, and the Israelites defeated his army in battle. Og is said to be the last survivor of the Rephaim (3:11), which were apparently a nation of giants. His bed is described as being made of iron, and being nine cubits long, or roughly 18 feet!

Rashi provides a little more information. He tells us that Og was the last survivor of the Rephaim in the time of Abraham. It was then that the king Amraphel, together with his allies, dominated the Fertile Crescent region, and decimated many nations that inhabited it. One of these groups of victims were the Rephaim, and Og was the sole survivor among them. He was the “refugee” mentioned in Genesis 14:13 that came to Abraham to inform him of what had happened.

So, who was Og? Where did he come from? Why did he initially help Abraham, but then come out to battle Moses centuries later? And was he really a giant?

Half Man, Half Angel

The Talmud (Niddah 61a) tells us that Og was the grandson of Shemhazai. As we have written previously, Shemhazai was one of the two rebellious angels that had descended to Earth. These two angels argued before God that He should not have created man, who was so faulty and pathetic. God told the angels that had they been on Earth, and given the same challenges that man faced, they would be even worse.

The angels wanted to be tested anyway, and were thus brought down into Earthly bodies. Of course, just as God had said, they quickly fell into sin. This is what is meant by Genesis 6:2, which describes divine beings mating with human women. Their offspring, initially called Nephilim, were large and powerful, and were seen as “giants” by common people. However, during the Great Flood of Noah, all of these semi-angelic beings perished. Except for one.

The Sole Survivor

Midrashic texts famously record that Og was the only survivor of the Great Flood, aside from Noah and his family. When the torrential rains began, Og jumped onto the Ark and held on tightly (Zevachim 113b). He swore to Noah that he would be his family’s eternal servant if Noah would allow him into the Ark (Yalkut Shimoni, Noach 55). The Talmud (ibid.) states that the rain waters of the Flood were actually boiling hot. Yet, the rain that fell upon Og while he held unto the Ark was miraculously cool, allowing him to survive. Perhaps Noah saw that Og had some sort of merit (after all, his grandfather was the one angel that repented). Noah therefore had mercy on Og, and made a special niche for Og in the Ark. This is how the giant survived the Flood.

A variant account suggests that Og survived by fleeing to Israel, since the Holy Land was the only place on Earth which was not flooded.

Abraham’s Servant

As promised, Og became the servant of Noah and his descendants. The Zohar (III, 184a) says that he served Abraham as well, and as part of his household, was also circumcised. As Rashi says (on Genesis 14:13), Og informed Abraham that his nephew Lot was kidnapped, and that the armies of Amraphel and his allies were terrorizing the region. Rashi quotes the Midrash in telling us that Og hoped Abraham would go into battle and perish, so that Og would be able to marry the beautiful Sarah. For informing Abraham, Og was blessed with wealth and longevity, but for his impure intentions, he was destined to die at the hands of Abraham’s descendents (Beresheet Rabbah 42:12).

Whatever the case, the giant soon fell into immorality. The Zohar continues that although he had initially taken the Covenant upon himself (by way of the circumcision), he had later broken that very same Covenant by his licentious behaviour. He used his physical abilities to become king over 60 large, fortified cities (Deuteronomy 3:4). When the nation of Israel passed by his territory, he gathered his armies to attack them.

It is said that Moses feared Og for a number of reasons: Og had lived for centuries, and was also circumcised, so Moses figured the giant had a great deal of merit. God told Moses not to worry, and gave Moses the strength to slay Og himself. As the famous story goes, Moses used a large ten-cubit (roughly 20 foot) weapon to jump ten cubits high in the air—and was only able to strike Og’s ankle! Still, it caused Og to trip over and be impaled by a mountain peak. (On that note, there is a little-known Midrash which states Og survived the Flood simply because he was so large, and the floodwaters only reached up to his ankles! See Midrash Petirat Moshe, 1:128)

It is important to remember once more the old adage that one who believes that the Midrash is false is a heretic, yet one who believes that the Midrash is literally true is a fool. It is highly unlikely that Og was actually so immense (especially considering that this would make him bigger than the dimensions of Noah’s Ark). The Torah tells us his bed was nine cubits long, which the most conservative opinions estimate to be closer to 13 feet, a far more reasonable number.

There are many more colourful stories about Og, including one where a Talmudic sage found his thigh bone and ran through it (Niddah 24b). Another suggests that Og is actually Eliezer, Abraham’s trusty servant (Yalkut Shimoni, Chayei Sarah 109). This is an intriguing possibility, and might help explain how Abraham and Eliezer alone were able to defeat the conglomeration of four massive armies (See Genesis 14, with Rashi).

Archaeologists have even found mention of Og in ancient Phoenician and Ugaritic texts. One clay tablet from the 13th century BCE (Ugarit KTU 1.108) is believed to be referring to him as Rapiu, or the last of the Rephaim—as the Torah states. It suggests that Og’s grandeur got the better of him, and he began to consider himself a god among puny men:

May Rapiu, King of Eternity, drink [w]ine, yea, may he drink, the powerful and noble [god], the god enthroned in Ashtarat, the god who rules in Edrei, whom men hymn and honour with music on the lyre and the flute, on drum and cymbals, with castanets of ivory, among the goodly companions of Kothar…

Perhaps this hubris was Og’s fatal flaw, and brought about his ultimate downfall.

Dolmen (courtesy of www.museodeidolmen.it)

Dolmen (courtesy of www.museodeidolmen.it)

Interestingly, there are also a number of dolmen found in the modern-day area that would have been Bashan. These dolmen are massive stone structures that were erected millennia ago, with some rocks weighing many tons and perplexing scholars as to how they were put together. It is thought that dolmen served as burial tombs, and perhaps have a connection to the tradition of giants living in the Bashan area.

This is an excerpt from Garments of Light: 70 Illuminating Essays on the Weekly Torah Portion and Holidays. Click here to get the book.