Shabbat Parshat Noach - 5763
“Who Causes the Wind to Blow and the Rain to Descend”

This Shabbat, we read Parshat Noach, which contains an account of how an entire generation of humanity was punished by G-d for its sins, mainly of violent crimes inflicted one upon the other, and for their failure to repent for their sins. They were engulfed by a “Mabul,” a gigantic, all-destroying flood that covered the tallest mountain by waters to a depth of fifteen “amot.” These waters drowned all life that had lived on the land or in the sky, except for one righteous man and his family, and representatives from each land animal species and bird species that had populated the earth, seven pairs from those species that would later be declared “tahor,” or clean, by the Torah, and two pairs from each species that would later be declared “lo tahor,” not clean. Their means of rescue was a large boat, or “Tevah,” constructed by Noach, its righteous captain, and his family, over a period of one hundred twenty years.

At that time, not only were the “Arubot HaShamayim,” the windows of heaven, opened for the outpouring of rain, but also the “Ma’ayanot Tehom Rabbah,” the fountains of the great deep, uncovered, perhaps signaling the temporary abrogation of the separation of the waters “me’al la-rakia,” of the atmosphere, and the underground waters “mi’tachat la-rakia,” as the world was returned by the Creator to an earlier stage of Creation.

When the storm abated, HaShem invested the rainbow with a new meaning; namely, as a symbol of the Covenant that He would never again destroy life on earth by means of a Flood, and that living creatures need not fear sudden annihilation if they disobeyed the Creator; that the “Midat HaDin,” the Attribute of Strict Judgment, would be held more in check.

Water, of course, is a necessity of life, and its means of delivery to the world is by means of rain, or “geshem.” A human being could not survive longer than 2-3 days without water, and the makeup of the human body as well as that of the planet earth, is largely water. On Shemini Atzeret, in the Prayer called “Geshem,” we pray that HaShem will provide His world with an adequate supply of water, for the sake of our righteous ancestors:

“Water with which to crown the valley’s vegetation – may it not be withheld because of our unredeemed debt;
In the merit of the faithful patriarchs, protect the ones who pray for rain.”

And it is on Shemini Atzeret that we begin to recite in each “Shemoneh Esray” Prayer the phrase, “Who Causes the Wind to Blow and the Rain to Descend,” to indicate our belief that it is Almighty G-d Who is responsible for the weather. Or, more correctly, that it is we who are ultimately responsible to act like decent human beings, and then HaShem will respond “Midah K’neged Midah,” Measure for Measure, with timely rains of blessing, or if we fail to do our part, with drought or punishing storms which, while short of a “Mabul,” are destructive nonetheless.

I have always found fascinating the linkage between “Who causes the winds to blow” and the concluding reference to rain, “... and the rains to descend.” What is the connection between wind and rain? Recently, I learned a bit about the origin of hurricanes, information that sheds light on the wind-rain connection. It seems that most hurricanes originate in the Atlantic, just off the coast of West Africa. The strong easterly winds that originate in Africa are sufficient to generate a small disturbance in the atmosphere that allows convection to occur over the warm, tropical Atlantic. In this context, “convection” refers to circular currents of air that appear due to differences in density between hotter and cooler portions of the air. As heat and energy for the storm are gathered by the disturbance through contact with the warm ocean waters, the circular air currents become organized first into a thunderstorm, then a tropical depression, then a tropical storm, and finally a hurricane. The hurricane combines its own momentum with riding on the Trade Winds across the Atlantic, and eventually its path takes it into the Caribbean or the Gulf of Mexico (where landfall occurs either in Central America or along the Gulf Coast of Mexico or the US) or it curves northward to hit or miss the eastern coast of the US.

“Who lays the beams of His chambers in the waters; Who makes the clouds His chariot; Who walks upon the wings of the wind” (Tehilim 104:3).

Daily we thank HaShem for using wind in the past to defeat our enemies, “You blew with Your wind, and he was covered by the sea” (Shemot 15:10). And we pray that He will use the arrows of His storms against our present and future enemies, “So may You pursue them with Your storm, and with Your whirlwind, confound them” (Tehilim 83:16).

And we pray that He will bless us with wind and rain...

“For blessing and not for curse;
For life and not for death;
For plenty and not for scarcity” (conclusion of the “Geshem” Prayer)

Rabbi Pinchas Frankel

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