By Daniel Abraham and Shmuli Phillips
In a chapter which explores some of the complex challenges posed by science to understanding the Torah, Judaism Reclaimed notes the approach taken by Rambam to similar difficulties in his day. Faced with what were considered in medieval times to be decisive arguments against the doctrine of ex-nihilo creation, Rambam – echoing Rabbi Yehuda Halevi in the Kuzari – works with a principle that the Torah cannot be interpreted in a way which contradicts matters which are clearly proven. It is notable, however, that Rambam set the bar for reinterpreting the Torah based on scientific knowledge particularly high, and did not ultimately endorse a re-evaluation of the Torah’s opening passages on the basis of Aristotelian science.
When we examine the Torah’s accounts of early humanity – and particularly its accounts of the flood – in the modern era, we are assailed by an array of basic challenges to its literal reading. Scientific theories and accepted wisdom based on geology, paleontology, zoology among other disciplines combine to present a formidable barrier to the Torah’s narrative. Had Rambam and Rabbi Yehuda Halevi been living in the 21stcentury, we might ask ourselves, at what point might they have considered this body of evidence sufficiently persuasive to justify reinterpreting the opening parshiyot of the Torah? Furthermore, are there any existing indications within our tradition which might support such an attempt? With regard to the creation narrative, our tradition explicitly regards it as esoteric and containing profound secrets which go far beyond its simple meaning. These traditional teachings could be taken to support a radical – possibly even allegorical – rereading in view of modern scientific knowledge. Turning our attention to the flood, however, our tradition does not appear to regard the passage as being esoteric or bearing a hidden meaning. What can be found though are scattered teachings which seem to limit its scope from a worldwide deluge to something significantly more local – a position advanced by Rabbi Dovid Tzvi Hoffman in his Torah commentary.
One of the first midrashim that grabs our attention is from Midrash Tehillim. When God was deciding which mountain to give the Torah on, Mount Tabor speaks up and says “The Torah should be given on me because the water of the flood did not descend on me.” (Midrash Tehillim 68:9). Elsewhere in Bereishit Rabbah 33 we read about the flood not raining upon the entire land of Israel. Zevachim 113a says this as well – a particularly significant source because it is located in a legal rather than an aggadic passage.
Ramban also adds that it’s possible that the rains did not fall upon the oceans as the Torah specifies “The rain was upon the land”. Other opinions go further and state the flood did not affect all parts of the earth. Meam Lo’ez writes how the great ocean, “was not affected by the flood, which only destroyed inhabited areas. The Torah therefore says, “there was rain on the earth” (ha’aretz) (7:12), and not, “there was rain on the world” (ha’olam). [The “earth” primarily denotes inhabited areas.] In his book The Challenge of Creation, Rabbi Natan Slifkin also notes, “Rav Saadia Gaon’s view [was] that the Deluge only covered inhabited parts of the world.” Rabbi Yonatan Eybeshutz goes into more detail, explaining that the flood was not necessary in uninhabited areas. He also writes that if the Americas had no population at the time of the flood, then no flood would have occurred on the continent (Tiferet Yonatan to Bereishit 8:22). So although the Torah states that all the mountains on earth were covered with the flood, there are opinions that this was not a literal depiction.
When we turn our attention to early humans and civilisations, further indications can be found of human (or proto-human) civilization beyond the primary biblical narrative. After slaying his brother Hevel, Kayin is condemned by God to wander to distant lands whereupon he is worried that “I will be a wanderer and an exile in the land, and it will be that whoever finds me will kill me” (4:14). If the entire human population is represented by those named in the Torah, this concern is not easy to understand. Furthermore, having gone into exile far away from Eden, Kayin proceeds to build a city – for whom might one ask?
Other categories of ancient human mentioned in chapter 6 of Bereishit appear to include the Nephilim (“mighty men of old”) and perhaps also the benei Elohim who corrupt early humanity and are noted as a cause for its descent into the depravity that prompted the flood.
Further sources indicate that groups of these Nephilim survived the flood. Some identify Og as one of the Nephilim who was allowed to be saved by ark during the flood. Other midrashim say that Sichon was another of the Nephilim who survived as well. From the text of the Torah we see that both Sichon and Og had sons, and that the Israelites slew both of these giants and their children with them. Perhaps most significantly, in Bemidbar 13:33 Rav S. R. Hirsch writes about the “Anakim” observed by the spies: “Thus there were still remnants of the antedeluvian Nephilim living in Eretz Yisrael. This fact fits well with the opinion (Zevachim 113a) that Eretz Yisrael was spared from the flood.” The implication being that there were people who survived the flood in Eretz Yisrael. The Zohar also makes reference to descendants of Kayin surviving the flood in a distant land.
If it is true then that human society existed well beyond the Torah’s limited descriptions and that the flood only covered a local area of Mesopotamia, why would it have presented its early narratives in such a misleading manner?
The answer to this requires us to recognize that the Torah is not primarily a historical work but rather a religious text which seeks to provide a foundation and insight into the nature of humanity and our relationship with God. As Rabbi Sacks put it, this does not mean that the Torah conveys untruths, but rather that it presents actual historical events through the prism of its theological teachings (https://www.rabbisacks.org/.../individual-and.../...). God’s relationship with humanity begins with Adam and Eve – the first creatures whose minds are sufficiently sophisticated to rationalize and think abstractly. As Rambam writes near the start of Moreh Nevuchim, the whole notion of commandments, reward and punishment only makes sense when one is instructing someone who can understand right and wrong and possesses the free will to apply it. Interestingly, the first humans who are believed to have been sufficiently mentally developed to create a system of writing – putting ideas and concepts into symbols – lived 6,000 years ago in Mesopotamia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_writing).
This was the society and “world” that the Torah was interested in; it therefore only obliquely references the existence of other groups of humans. Similarly, as far as the area of the planet that was of relevance to the Torah’s project at that time, the flood effectively encompassed the “entire world” and the ark contained “all animals”. As another chapter of Judaism Reclaimed demonstrates, while other ancient Near Eastern cultures proceeded to relate this flood through the eyes of their polytheistic prejudices, the Torah retold it instead with its own theological underpinning: monotheism, morality and justice.
Whatever extent one finds such an approach compelling or even desirable, we believe that it can legitimately claim solid basis within traditional sources, and is the leading candidate for those seeking to reconcile the Torah’s account with what science tells us today about ancient history.
First posted on Facebook, 30 October 2022, here.
