[Avodah] Local, Non-Global or Global Flood

[Zev Sero]

On 1/12/2010 5:03 AM, Arie Folger wrote:
> R'ZS wrote, regarding Rashi on Bereishit 1:1:
>> So Rashi tells him no, it doesn't mean that, it means that they
>> were created for the sake of two "reshises".  He doesn't like
>> that, so Rashi tells him if he wants to avoid drush then he'll
>> have to read it as if it said "bereshis bero".
>
> Actually, I think that the above analysis emphasizes Rashi's secondary
> point, while missing his main point. To borrow from the title of a
> work that uses the kind of analysis I want to suggest here, What's
> bothering Rashi?
>
> What bothered Rashi is, first and foremost, that it is incongruent to
> suggest that G"d created heaven and earth in the beginning, since
> heaven was created on the second day, and earth on the fourth.

Except that Rashi absolutely does *not* say that.  He could easily have
done so, and *had this been his problem he would have done so*.  His
problem is indeed that this can't be the order, but he goes out of his
way *not* to say that shamayim was created on the second day.  (And
eretz on the *fourth*?! What's that about?)

Rashi *says* what his problem is with saying that shamayim and eretz
were created first.  He doesn't leave it to our imagination, so that
we might fill in our own reasons, as you do.  He tells us his reasons,
so how can you ignore them and substitute your own?   Rashi already in
this pasuk accepts that shamayim and eretz were created on the first
day.  What he rejects is that they were created first.  Mayim had to
be created before eretz, and both esh and mayim had to be created
before shamayim.  And once we know that these two things were created
before shamayim and eretz, who knows what else might also have been
created before them?  One thing we know, they did not come first.

Therefore if the pasuk were telling us what were the first creations,
it would have to read, at the very *least*, "bereshit bara E' et ha'esh
ve'et hamayim, ve'et hashamayim ve'et ha'aretz".  Since it omits esh
and mayim, we *know* that it's not talking about the order of creation,
and therefore "bereshit bara" must be read in a non-standard way, and
he offers us two options: a drash which at least preserves the vowels,
or a pshat which requires us to ignore the vowels.



> Of course, I already hear you scream that in 2:4, Rashi finds a way
>  toclaim heaven and earth had already been created on day one.

Indeed.  And not only in 2:4; that's just where he *proves* it, but
he *asserts* it all through chapter 1.  He's known this pasuk was
coming all along, and he prepared us and steered us away from an
understanding which would have given us problems with it.  So no,
there is no "evolution", no new discovery that makes us reevaluate
what we've learned till now.  Rashi has never for a moment allowed us
to believe that shamayim and eretz were created after the first day,
and now we finally learn why, and we thank him for having kept us
from a reading that seemed more logical at the time, but would have
run us aground on this shoal.

Had Rashi done what you suggest, he would davka have *let* us think
the shamayim were created on the second day, and only now have pointed
out why that couldn't be, and have told us to retrace our steps and
come back to this point with the correct reading.  That might have been
an interesting teaching method, but if so it's one he chose not to use.




-- 
Zev Sero                      The trouble with socialism is that you
zev at sero.name                 eventually run out of other people’s money
                                                      - Margaret Thatcher