...HaShem said in His heart: "I will not continue to curse again the ground because of man, since the imagery of man's heart is evil from his youth; nor will I again continue to smite every living being, as I have done. (Gen. 8:21)

The story of Noah and the Flood is probably one of the most widely known stories of the Torah. The world is evil, so G-d decides to essentially "reboot" the system and start again w/ Noah and his family and all the animals in the Ark. But I found the above line from this weeks portion interesting, and it is something I have been wrestling to understand all week. If G-d knew that man was "evil from his youth" then why destroy the whole world in the first place? Did G-d suddenly change His mind? Realizing that man was evil anyways throwing up His hands, as it were, and saying, "Well fudge it!"? What does this verse mean in the context of the overall story of Noah?

There are several points I want to hit that I believe will illuminate the meaning behind this verse. The first is the nature of man vis-a-vis the Torah, primarily dealing with the Yetzer HaRa, the Evil inclination. The second is the nature of the evil being done in the antedeluvian period. Third is the role of Noah vis-a-vis the people of the antedeluvian period. And finally the question of, does this verse illustrate an all knowing G-d changing His mind, or does it signify something else?

The Yetzer HaRa, or Evil Inclination, is a part of us all, it is part of the nature of being human. As we are the connection between the Divine and the Animal, we find these two aspects constantly fighting for control over us. The Yetzer HaRa represents our selfish, personal, and often animalistic, desires. Greed, Lust, Gluttony can all be characterized as part of the Yetzer HaRa. The role of mankind is to rule over and control these desires and to channel them through our Yetzer HaTov, our Good Inclination, to be positives. But they are our ultimate challenge, to rise above our baser desires and embrace our divine, not our animal side. Perhaps the hardest part, as Nachmanidies points out, is that these desires are a part of us from day one. These are our animalist desires, pure personal instinct. The parts connected to our Yetzer HaTov, things like intellect, spirituality, and desires for self-improvement, are things which must be nurtured in order for them to truely develop. The Yetzer HaRa does not need this, anyone can watch a baby and see that its basic instincts are there, it is a me oriented being. Babies just want to eat, sleep, and poop. It is up to the parents, as well as society as a whole, to teach and nurture this creature. They are responsible for teaching the child morailty, basic societal conducts, etc. If the Yetzer HaTov is not fully nurtured the Yetzer HaRa will continue to be the sole driving force in that child's life.

This brings me to my second point. We know that man was evil in the time of Noah, this is the reasoning for destroying the world. Society as a whole was evil. In last week's parashat we read:
"HaShem saw the wickedness of Man was great upon the earth, and that every product of the thoughts of his heart was but evil always." (Gen. 6:5)
First it began with small things, such as robbery which is listed in Gen. 6:11. Slowly the society itself began to degrade. Theft, murder, rape. The world wasn't just filled with bad people, but a world of Hitlers, Stalins, Maos, Tamberlanes, Charles Mansons. There appears to have been no concept of morality, let alone any kind of civil order.

The Zohar, the book of Jewish mysticism, states:

Then the entire earth was corrupted, because man is the essence of the world, and his corruption infects all of Creation.

Rav Hirsch shows us how sin, if unchecked and allowed to continue, will begin to bleed into all aspects of our society:


There was no fostering of the Yetzer HaTov, only the rampant rule of the Yetzer HaRa.

Now that we have established what society was like in that time in the story, what of Noah? He is called a righteous man, a Tzaddik, surely good can be found in him. Why not spare the world for his sake? The text of the Torah says: "Noah was a righteous man, perfect in his generations". Now there is a running arguement amongst the sages as to the meaning of this verse. One side says that he was truely righteous, and had he lived in the time of Abraham, he would have been even MORE righteous. The other is far more critical, that in a world of murders and rapists, it doesn't take much to be a good, or even righteous, person. Had he lived in the time of Abraham he would have been an insignificant figure. For this particular discussion, I will take the position of the latter arguement.

The role of the righteous person, the moral person, is to set the example and influence those doing wrong to change. The great leaders of the Torah and Tanach, from Abraham to Moses to Samuel to Malachi were active members of their community, and when troubled times came they called people to repent. In some cases, such as Abraham and Moses, they even argued with G-d over His decrees, showing their leadership qualities. Noah did none of these things. He seemed to have lived isolated from the world, and this isolation became embodied in the Ark. There's an old saying, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." Sadly, in those times, the one good man, Noah, did exactly that - nothing.

So we come to the answer to our final question. Did G-d change His mind? I do not believe so. Man had allowed himself to fall into the desire of the Yetzer HaRa, allowing the entirety of creation to become corrupted, and the one man poised to stand and bring about a change that would have saved countless lives, stood by, first, and let the evil happen and then did nothing but live on mountain, building his Ark, as the storm came. G-d knew that Noah would not do what would be necessary and would not fulfill his ultimate potential. This is why the flood is often referred to as "The Waters of Noah"

G-d, however, knew that in subsequent generations, the good and righteous people would take their role as leaders seriously. Yes, the Yetzer HaRa would continue to be a force and challenge for mankind, but, there would be those who would encourage the growth and nurturing of the Yetzer HaTov. They would do this by example and by being a vocal and central force in their communities. Therefore, even though we still have the Yetzer HaRa as a part of us G-d will never again destroy the whole of Creation because of our misdeeds, because there will always be some force of good to counter it.

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It is nice to point out that without the Yetzer HaR'a, we won't eat, drink, and even Chicken won't lay eggs. We need the Yetzer HaR'a in some degree but the Yetzer HaTov has to be cultivated in order to be our second nature. Think of the Yetzer HaR'a as a fire, when it is small, it is warming and comforting but when it is big, you will know that it is nothing but trouble, same thing with everything on earth. What we need is an appropriate 'dosage' of these two.

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