Noah

[Ms Tercy Lonan]

“Noah was in his generations a man righteous and
whole-hearted; Noah walked with God.” So
begins the chapter on Noah, immediately confusing the
reader with what appears to be a straightforward story
about our world.
However, it confuses only those who aren’t yet ready to
read the Bible differently, still finding the simple historical
narrative about a person named Noah satisfactory.
Let us leave them to their search for Noah’s Ark on
Mount Ararat, and delve into the text, instead. As much as
we can, let us understand how it is connected to each and
every one of us, to our spiritual search, to our souls, and the
very purpose of our lives.


Let us start by recounting the topic of this chapter. Having
seen that the earth is full of sin, God makes a covenant with
Noah to build an ark and take shelter there with his wife,
kids, and animals. In the meantime, God will flood the
earth, effectively destroying everyone.
Then, Noah is to emerge from his ark with his family
and the saved animals, and they will become the progenitors
of future generations of people and animals on Earth. The
people will wish to build a Tower of Babel and speak the
same language, but they will fail. Then, they will disperse
throughout the world and stop understanding one another.
Ask yourself, “Where am I in this story of Noah?” Or
better yet, “What is the meaning of my inner Noah?” You
must seek only one approach to the contents of this book:
“Everything I read here is about me.” Noah, the righteous,
his wife, kids, and all the animals, the ark and the Tower
of Babel all exist within me. They are forces, desires that
govern my inner and outer worlds. All I have to do is get to
them and sense them, and the gates to all the secrets will
open for me.
In the previous chapter, Beresheet (Genesis, “In the
Beginning”) we spoke of the creation of the world, the abode
of souls. We clarified how, following all the animal desires,
the human desire was born, symbolizing man’s aspiration
for the spiritual world, for the Creator, which then shattered
into myriad tiny pieces that fell into our world.
This descent is still continuing. It will continue until we
are ready to face our primordial egos, to see our true “I.” We
have yet to arrive at this point; we must still be prepped to
not only see the ego but endure it, and not only endure it,
but resolve to escape from it.


Jumping a bit ahead, know that our “I” will be personified
by Pharaoh. But we’ll talk more about that later on. In
the meantime, we’re making our way to Pharaoh, to the
complete realization that we are slaves to our egos. The
descent has only just begun. For the moment, we feel as if
we’re still close to the spiritual world. We continue to sense
the Light—this initial joy from meeting the Creator. In other
words, the Creator isn’t yet completely concealed from us,
so the night of our escape from Egypt hasn’t yet arrived.
However, we already feel ourselves as egoists, and this
feeling is extremely distressing.