Table Talk for Shabbat Noach

This week's Torah portion, which tells the story of how Noah builds a huge ark to make it through the flood that God brings upon the earth, is one of my very favorites.  I think it is both interesting and a bit scary--the idea of a storm so huge that it could flood the entire earth, the idea that God is so disappointed with humans that God wants to just wipe everything clean and start over, and the idea that Noah had to stay in one place, with all those animals, for so long!  So many animals would have needed so much food and would have made such a big mess... How did Noah get through it?  Who cleaned up the big mess that the animals would have made? 

So let's remind ourselves of what happens in the story of Noah and the ark.

God, looking down on the people on earth and seeing their behavior, becomes upset and decides that humans are just evil to their core and he should just wipe the slate clean and start over.  But God sees that Noah is far more righteous, a way better and nicer person, than the rest of the people on earth and so God decides to let Noah live and become the father of the rest of human history that will start when the flood is over.  God tells Noah that a huge storm is coming and he must build an ark (which is basically a huge boat) and tells Noah exactly how to do it.  Noah is then supposed to get two of each animal (and different numbers of a few specific animals), making sure to bring a male and a female of each animal so that each kind of animal will also be able to have babies and survive the flood.  Noah is also supposed to bring his wife, his sons, and their wives with him on the ark to survive the flood.

Then the rain comes.  And keeps coming. And coming.  For 40 days and 40 nights, which is the Torah's way of saying A REALLY LONG TIME.  Finally the rain stops, and Noah and his family and the animals wait for the land to slowly dry.  Eventually Noah sends out a raven (a black bird) to see if it can find a place to sit, which would mean that the land was becoming dry.  But the raven comes back.  Noah waits and then later sends out a dove (a white bird), which returns to him with an olive branch in its mouth.  The ark comes to a rest on the top of Mt. Ararat, and Noah and his family and the animals finally leave the ark and start building their lives again.

This week's questions that I encourage you to discuss as a family are:

(1) If you had to spend 40 days and 40 nights on an ark with any person or group of people, who would you want with you?

(2) Who do you think cleaned up all that mess on the ark?  Noah?  Mrs. Noah?  His sons and daughters-in-law?

(3) Have you ever been so frustrated with something you made, or a project you were working on, that you just wanted to throw it out and start all over?

(4) Have you ever had to start something all over, whether it was your choice or not?  What happened?  How did you feel?

(5)  How do you think Noah and his family felt when they started to build the ark?  How do you think they felt during the storm?  How do you think that they felt when they were waiting for the waters to dry?  How do you think they felt when they left the ark and had to build their lives all over again?