Noah (Genesis 6:9-11:32)

The portion is named,Noah, because of its protagonist. This week's portion contains a detailed description of the flood God brought on the Earth, and how he saved Noah and his family.

The entire population of the Earth had become corrupt, and God decided to destroy it. He commands Noah to build an ark, and bring into it two of each kind of animal in order to enable all species to survive, and seven of each kind of pure animal. The only humans to be saved are Noah and his family: his wife, his three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, and their wives.

The flood then begins, with an incredible downpour which lasts 150 days and destroys every living substance not in the ark. Noah then sends out different birds in order to see if the flood has abated, and eventually the dove returns with an olive branch, proving that the waters have dried. After exiting the ark, Noah gives sacrifices to God. God then promises that he will never again bring such destruction upon the Earth, and the sign of this covenant which he makes with mankind is the rainbow, which appears in the cloud.

The sons of Noah are now the ones who must rebuild humankind, and the Torah brings a list of all their descendants and the different peoples who came from them.

At this point, all humankind spoke one language, and together they decided to build a tower, known as the Tower of Babel (link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_of_Babel), which reaches up to the sky in order to secure their standing. God then realizes that when united, humankind can cause much harm, and therefore confuses their languages so that they cannot understand each other, and scatters them over the face of the Earth.

The portion ends with a list of the descendants of Shem, which leads down to the birth of Abram and the beginning of Abram's family's journey to Canaan.