ואלה תולדות: What does it mean?

As we have been learning in class, there can be more than one translation for the words ואלה תולדות in ספר בראשית. We said in class that it could be one of two things: a narrative, as in "ואלה תולדות שמים וארץ", when it talks about the beginning of mankind, or it could be a genealogical list, as in "ואלה תולדות שם", where we learn the genealogy from שם to אברהם. After looking at the different places where it is used in ספר בראשית, we began to see a pattern. We found that there is a concept of "נבחר ונדחה" (chosen and pushed aside). For everyone that does good and is chosen, there is a story about their life. For everyone that does bad and is "pushed aside", there is only a list of their descendants until the next chosen person, mentioning the bad person as briefly as possible. Below is an outline of what is written above, along with some other examples of "ואלה תולדות".

ואלה תולדות שמים וארץ

• Everyone on earth was chosen. They were all made בצלם א-לוקים and were given the command to פרו ורבו ומלאו את הארץ וכבשוה. There were religious and moral directives.
• Adam had קין, הבל, and הבל .שת was killed by קין, and קין was expelled from the land. That left שת whose descendants all became corrupt, except for נח.
• Assumed morality wasn't there.
  

אלה תולדות נח

• Recreation of the world- שבע מצוות בני נח created and a religious and moral system spelled out and articulated
• מגדל בבל- דור הפלגה- They don't recognize 'ה.
  

אלה תולדות אברהם

• אברהם and his children are chosen. We don't know if both children were chosen to begin with, but later on, ישמאל only gets a genealogy list. יצחק is the one who gets a story.

אלה תולדות יצחק

• Like in the story of אברהם, both of יצחק's sons may have been chosen to begin with, but in the end, only יעקב gets a story.
  

אלה תולדות יעקב

• The sons of יעקב must have known about the whole story about only one son being chosen in the past, which would be a logical explanation for why they threw יוסף in the pit and sold him. He was obviously the favorite son, and his brothers were scared that he would be the one to get a story told about him, and they would not. They might have thought that if they got rid of יוסף, they would have a better opportunity of getting their own story. Instead, all of them are chosen. there is no more נבחר ונדחה.
• ספר בראשית is the story from the beginning of time until the creation of the ב"ני. The בנ"י become the chosen people in the chosen land. This helps to explain why we got the Torah and became the chosen nation instead of anyone else. ספר בראשית= ספר התולדות.

תולדות

In class this week, we learned about the word תולדות. We said that it could mean either "Stories" or "Children of". Honestly, most people do not learn ספר בראשית as in depth as we do here, so they do not understand the immense honor it is to have your story written down in the "stories" section. I know I didn't understand. Of course I knew that the people whose complete stories are told in Bereshit were wither very great people or they had stories that future generations could learn from. In our analysis of Sefer Bereshit, we found that there were many "mess-ups" in the various "batches" of people. The first mistake was the family of Adam and Chava. They were the first people created in the image of Hashem. They were also the first ones to violate a direct commandment from Hashem. Their story teaches us that defying a direct commandment from Hashem won't lead to anything good. The next mistake was their son Kayin. He was the first one to use the power of jealousy for evil. This particular incident was probably the source for "Don't covet" in the Ten Commandments. He was punished for his sin, but his descendants continued to defy Hashem. It was Adam and Chava's third son, Shet, who recognized Hashem and whose descendants include Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, and Bnei Yisrael. Though Hashem also had to deal with Noach's generation and the generation of the Towel of Bavel, all of it eventually led to BNEI YISRAEL: the chosen people. Now it's our job to emulate the great deeds of our forefathers and avoid the mistakes of the "unchosen people".

Adam vs. Kayin

I'd like to compare Adam's sin and punishment to Kayin's. Adam violates the first ever commandment by G-d when he eats from the Tree of Knowledge. His punishment is that he will be banished from Gan Eden, his home and will have to toil to make the found produce crops. Later, his son, Kayin becomes jealous of his brother Havel. G-d had accepted Havel's offerings and had not accepted Kayin's. While working in the field one day Kayin murders Havel. His punishment is that he is cursed and is banished from the land and will be a nomad for the remainder of his life. But, Hashem will protect him from being murdered by the people. To me, this whole situation is confusing. Adam was the first ever person. He was like a baby. He was still learning right from wrong and was very naive. Kayin, on the hand had more experience than Adam, and had the chance to learn from Adam's mistakes. Yet, he receives divine protection after his sin. One could argue that this is because in Adam's time there wasn't anyone to be protected against, since he and Chava were the only two people on Earth. Also, Adam violated a direct violation from G-d, and Kayin did not. Both were asked questions by G-d, giving them a chance to own up to what they did, and do Teshuva. Neither did Teshuva. Adam blamed his wife, and Kayin pretended to be innocent. To me, it would make sense to let the people kill Kayin and not give him any divine protection. After all, he did commit murder. From the concept of מדה כנגד מדה, Kayin should be murdered. The man he killed was G-d fearing and G-d must have liked him if he had accepted his offerings. Here is my personal explanation for this: After Adam sinned, G-d saw that man is drawn to sin. It takes a lot of effort to prevent them self from committing a sin. Perhaps G-d thought that just because Adam sinned doesn't mean every human from then on will too. Then came Kayin and Havel. Havel showed great potential and feared G-d. Kayin was not like his brother, and his offerings were not accepted, causing him to eventually kill his brother out of jealousy. G-d saw that man had become corrupt. Without divine guidance and protection they would never learn and life on Earth would be a disaster. If G0d just sent Kayin off into the world and he was killed, the cycle would begin again. Sin, punishment, exile, death, corruption and so on. G-d had to protect Kayin so he could help the human race and hopefully prevent any further corruption.

Adam and Chava's Yom Kippur

Right now we are in the Aseret Y'mei Tshuvah and Yom Kippur, the final day of judgement for this year is coming up. During these ten days we are supposed to reflect on everything we've done and make tshuvah for our transgressions. This time of year we get tons of e-mails asking for forgiveness for any possible hurt feelings. (I don't think this is the right way to do it, but that is a different story.)

In perek gimel, we learned how Adam and Chava tried to hide from Hashem and, in a way, their sins. They did not want to face up to what they had done and repent. Because of this, Hashem kicked them out of the garden.

From this story we can learn many different lessons but there are 2 that I want to focus on. First is the most obvious Hashem is King and Ruler over all, and that if you don't follow his commandments you will be punished. As a side note to this lesson, we all know that this is most definitely true, yet we also have the ability to repent. This means fully accepting what we have done, and resolving to never do it again. By doing so, we can nullify our sins.

The second lesson is that no matter what you do, your sins will come back to haunt you. You cannot run from them or Hashem as Adam and Chava tried to do. This will inevitably make your situation worse. The first step towards moving on is always acceptance.

As a seperate idea, the day that Adam and Chava hide is almost like their own personal Yom Kippur. They had the ability to 'fess up to Hashem, but decided to hide instead. Thus, He declared their banishment from the garden.

Man's Advantage

According to the article we read, it seems as if only humans have the option of doing תשובה. We see that when אדם and חוה sin, 'ה asks them what happened, giving them the option to confess. With the נחש, though, 'ה doesn't ask what happened, he just punishes it. The נחש is part of nature, and as such, has no hope of doing תשובה. The laws of nature are very strict. It is not in the laws of nature for an animal or another part of nature to do תשובה. Only creatures made בצלם א-לוקים (humans) merit the demonstration of the attribute of mercy.
In the example given in the article, there was a man named R' Elazar ben Dordaya who was known for having had many inappropriate relations with women all over the world. One of the women told him that he would never be accepted as having done תשובה. He felt terrible for what he had done and went to many creatures of nature to ask them to beg for forgiveness on his behalf. He went to the mountains and valleys, the earth and sky, the sun and moon, and the stars and constellations. All of them said that they had to pray for forgiveness for themselves first. R Elazar sat down and began crying. He cried for a long time and said, "There is no one for me to depend on but myself!" After a short time, a voice rang out and said R' Elazar ben Dordaya is invited to Eternal Life.
As the article says at the end, "There is no repair and no teshuva – not through the heavens and the earth, neither by the agency of the mountains and hills, nor any hope in the sun and moon or the stars and constellations, nor through the snake. Teshuva and repair exist only within man, and we have no one to rely on but ourselves."
We should all work to do תשובה and repair ourselves, especially during these עשרת ימי תשובה and we should all be signed and sealed in the ספר החיים.

DO TESHUVA!!!

With Rosh Hashana finished a matter of hours ago and now in the midst of a fast day, what we are learning in class about Adam and Chavah can be connected to all that has happened. All G-d wants us to do is repent and be good children. He does not want to punish us nor does he want to keep us in exile. From the article we all read I got out of it that G-d is put into a position where He needs to punish us. If He did not punish us and set us straight, the world today would just be running around crazy! G-d gives us numerous opportunities to do teshuva. We should take every single one and use them to do just that. To repent and right our wrongs. We are lucky in a sense that we have all these opportunities because Adam and Chavah did not G-d gave them one chance to confess and forgive them. Instead of confessing which might have lessened the punishment, they decided to lie/hide. We are so lucky that today and throughout this whole time we can right our wrongs. Confess to G-d like Adam and Chavah should have done. Who knows what the world could have been like if they would have just come clean and told G-d the truth. And who knows how our doing teshuva now could impact or change the future.

Bereshit and עשרת ימי תשובה

As everyone already knows, we can learn a lot from Parshat Bereshit during the עשרת ימי תשובה. The main theme in the beginning of Parshat Bereshit is sin and punishment, eventually followed by repentance. At the beginning of the Perek, Adam and Chava ate from the tree of life, thus defying Hashem's direct commandment. After they sinned, they realized that they were naked. In response, Hashem totally changed the nature of man (by making him work hard for food and by making childbirth painful) and exiled them from the garden. Cain later killed Hevel and was punished (he became a nomad for the rest pf his life). Cain's descendants did not recognize Hashem. They made advancements in technology, but they never declared themselves as loyal to Hashem. It was the third son of Adam and Chava, Shet, who, along with his descendants, recognized Hashem as the one true G-d.

We can learn a lot about the nature of sin, punishment, and repentance. Since these ten days are mainly for recognizing our sins and for repenting for them, we should "learn from the past and apply it to the future". The first main point is not defy a direct command by G-d. If you do that, then you will be punished. The second point is that the first steps in repenting are recognizing your sin and feeling remorse for what you have done. The third is that in the future, you should always recognize and follow Hashem in the ideal Torah lifestyle. With these steps, we should be able to achieve forgiveness and be sealed in the book of life.