בס"ד
Parshat Noah begins the story of the world as we know it. It has a number of components. It starts with a glimpse of the old world of Adam the first man, an account of the great flood which destroyed it, and stories of the new world's earliest generations. It gives the genealogy of the three sons of Noah and the nations that they fathered, culminating with the introduction of Abraham who is the seed of the perfection of man.
It is structurally similar to parshat Bereishit and invites comparisons. Noah is labeled as a tsadik (saintly individual) but Adam is not. Adam’s first act is disobedience in eating the forbidden fruit. Noah’s first act after the flood is to offer sacrifices as an act of devotion. As such the new world is getting off to a good start.
Next is a story of Noah getting drunk and sleeping naked in his tent. This behavior while not noble is not evil either. The reaction of his son Ham in the spirit of the stone age is to make sport of this, but the other two sons in the spirit of a new and better civilization modestly cover him up. In other words Shem and Yafat immediately make known that they disagree with Ham about this. When Cain kills Abel there are no immediate protests. To his credit Cain does admit his sin and ask for mercy and the wife of Noah is from his line. Adam also has a change of heart and this results in a line of tzadikim, the tenth of which is Noah. However this is not enough to save that world.
The story of the Tower of Babel is about humanity in rebellion against G-d. However when their languages become a source of confusion they abandon the project and don't return to their folly. This is unlike the generations before the flood which are constantly getting worse.
The lesson seems to be that for something to ultimately succeed in this world the original idea must be fundamentally good and when errors are clear they cannot be ignored and must be promptly dealt with.
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