There are only two animals on the ark mentioned by name. They are the raven and the dove. The Midrash also talks about the actions of the lion, the monkey and the dog. Of all of them only one actually has a speaking part. That is the raven. I would like to take a look at what saith the raven and understand him and perhaps gain some insight into Midrash aggadah in general.




Chapter 8 verse 7 says and he sent out the raven and it went going and coming until the water dried from on the face of the earth. Rashi comments that the raven didn’t keep leaving the ark and coming back but rather he circled around the ark not wanting to leave. Why didn’t he want to leave? Rashi quotes a passage in the Talmud that tells us the raven accused Noach of sending him away so that Noach could take Mrs. Raven for himself. Noach responded “rasha / wicked one. On the Ark I am not even allowed to have relations with my own wife certainly not with an animal.

Now that is quite a Midrash. Let’s first break it down technically and then try to understand it didactically.



Rashi reads the verse. The verse says the raven was yatzo vshov which would normally mean going and coming. Rashi asks himself. Why would the raven be going and coming? If he went and came back why would he go again? So Rashi offers another translation for the words yatzo vashov. He says it must mean the raven was circling the ark. Why would he have been circling the ark? Without any straightforward explanation Rashi quotes a Midrash. You might ask ‘What about the possibility that the raven was circling because it couldn’t find anywhere to go’? That is certainly the straightforward explanation of the verse. However then the Torah should have said it returned to the ark. Why circling. Our sages tell us the Torah wants to teach an additional message. That message is contained in the story of the ravens’ suspicion of Noach.



Now let’s try to understand this raven and why Noach called him a rasha, wicked. Let’s say you are driving down the road and you see me struggling with a flat tire. You pull over to help. You get the tire changed. Instead of thanking you I say “well you certainly showed me up”. Where does a comment like that come from? Why didn’t I assume you just stopped out of the goodness of your heart? The answer can only be because if I had stopped for you it would have been to show you up not to do a kindness. The Sifri a Midrash on the book of Deuteronomy says (1-28) what is in your heart is on your friend and what is in his is on you. The raven could have only leveled such an accusation if it was something he himself would have done. This should come as no surprise to us because we are familiar with a Midrash that tells us that although Hashem forbade all creatures from engaging in relations on the ark the Raven broke the rules. Now we know what kind of a creature this was and now we know why he would have such outlandish suspicion of Noach. To the raven it actually made sense.



Of course this is only true when we presume to know what is going on. What if I know for sure what is going on? Am I also projecting? The answer is many times yes. With out hard and fast evidence when I make an assumption about someone or surmise something I could be telling myself more about myself than I am telling myself about the other person. So perhaps we should all take a lesson from the raven and when we have an opportunity to view someone in a negative light lets all say “nevermore”.