Parshas Noach: Parallelizing a Zookeeper's Life and Torah Greatness

He was a kind fellow, little, quirky, sweet, innocent, kind of the type of person you may expect to find as the head zookeeper in the Virginia Zoo. I Believe his name was John. If I'm remembering correctly, it was this past socus that my family and I we took a trip down To the Virginia Zoo Actually found it brought in a safer in one place that there's a minnag to do this, to go to see a shem's animals. On a whole, homoid seems more of a Hasidish Minnag, but still my daughter wanted to see the giraffes. So we were off to the zoo and there we met John, who was outside the monkey exhibit, and I asked a certain question, kind of to make small talk. Clearly he takes his job very seriously. And Then John began to explain the ins and outs, the eun, sookia, the lumbus, of the difference between chimpanzees and monkeys and how they may look similar but they are anything but similar, from their diets, to their habitats, to their to new oce, their different instincts, totally different creatures. Clearly this was a well-prepared, soliloquy address and cheer. So there we were, the Virginia Zoo, listening to all the differences between a monkey and a chimpanzee, and while it was riveting, we were sitting waiting on every word. We were there for the giraffes, but we don't want to make Mr John feel bad, so we said they're listening intently. Eventually the conversation actually came to a interesting point about how it is that he got into the profession of zoo keeping. It's actually quite interesting. Zoo keeping is a remarkably dangerous Job. Through all the hard, long hours, the heavy labor, the schlepping, if to make sure that every animal eats at the right time, most zoos actually won't even hire you until you're well educated in the Animal science field and you have a degree in zoo ology. Perhaps you are already completed your shimush, a full Apprenticeship, by some other zookeeper in Europe. You need a license before you become a zookeeper and if you should hit the Harvard of all zoo keeping schools I go into the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom or UCF in central Florida you may just land the top zoo keeping job. Zoo keeping, zoology, very interesting. You, however, I don't know if you would be able to picture maybe one of the greatest G'dylem, and so whatever Goddl you may be thinking of let's say you're of Shmuel Kaminecki as a zookeeper just doesn't seem to process in our minds. But yet when we come to Parshasnoach, the Goddl Hadar is tasked with entering the Ark, bringing all the animals to the Ark, seeing to it that the right amount are brought into the Ark. They each have their own spot in this taeva and Noah along with his family. They are to be zookeepers for a year. Seems a bit odd. It's hard to picture. And what's even more eye-opening is that, at the very end of the year-long stay in this taeva, the Palsak tells us in Parshasnoach v'ayimachas kol ha'yakum, everything had been deleted on the world. As you're, alpeneha adama May all the mad beheema adaremes v'ad oif ha'yamahim, everything is gone from this torrent and this flash flood. V'ayimachum in our arats and the isha'er Achnoach, the Asheritovah ba taeva, and only Noah was now left in the taeva before he was to disembark. The end of everything. There's only one family remaining, but Noah is still in the Ark. For some reason. Everyone else has disembarked and says Rashi, because either a push-up shot is just he was the last one to leave, maybe like a dad escorting his family out, and he goes last to make sure everyone is off the boat. But he brings a medrish that tells us that he was inside coughing and retching blood out of his lungs because because of how hard he had worked for an entire year as a zookeeper. The Ramban actually goes into detail about his schedule and earlier in Parak Vav, every animal had to eat at a certain time. Can you just imagine what this looked like? It's troughs filled. I don't know if trough is actually for food or for its excrement, but all of its excrement taken out and brought to the bottom floor of the floor for the garbage in this Ark. They were zookeepers for a year and the last shot that Rashi says why Noah was still inside of the Ark while everyone else had already left the Yesh Arimim some say she ichir mizonos la arivi. He kishoy that he was a bit late, tardy in bringing his food to the lion, but love nem ahinsalik ba artsi ishulam. And the lion bit him. He got his payment in this world, as the Pazik in Proverbs tells us that Tzadikim take their punishment in this world. So he was bandaging himself up some first aid on his lion bite because of his failure to complete his responsibilities as a zookeeper. But the whole thing is just very hard to process. We must take the story not as a elementary Noah, the animals on an Ark, but at a very real level Noah, the Rapshmun Kamenetsky of the generation, the man who was the only individual left standing while everyone else had been swept up in Chummas, in deceit, in Xala, in stealing the whole world, was now condemned to be destroyed, gone, finished, except for Noah. No, I'm not, so came to any I'm. And what is the salvation plan? Why won't I shem just put him in a force field? Why won't it just be that everyone's gone poof except for Noah? And why is it that Noah must spend a year, that the plan is to be a zookeeper for a year? It's very hard for us to understand Chodra. There were so many ways that this Hatsala could have been brought about without making the Shmuel Kamenetsky of the generation into a zookeeper. And let's make things worse again before we make them better. We find earlier, and not earlier, but in Saferbaa, midbar, that in the arranging of the base Hamikdash and all of its different procedures, in schlepping all of the different animals and the oil to do the minura and all the different carbonos, the dirty work, so to speak we found that the greatest individuals did the dirty work El-Lazar, klayengadol El-Lazar, the son of Aron. He was schlepping these massive oil jugs. Literally, the Ramban actually measures for us how big these things were like 183 lug. It seems nearly impossible that a human being could have schlepped these oil jugs. How could he do it? Hashem actually says the Ramban gave this certain amount of extraordinary strength. It was some sort of magical power. Ka'iwe, hashem, ya'chlifu, ka'iachlifu. The only way it could have possibly been done was this superhuman strength. But the dirty work was carried out by the great ones. We find that the holier that you were in the marching and the parade, the processions, the Klayes are all marched in the midbar the closer you were to the Aron and the more you lifted it, the more you were tasked with doing the dirty jobs. They awaited only the highest class Jew. It's very hard to understand. It seems backwards. Be a Pagam in the great ones covered. Just imagine you would see Shmuel Kaminecki walking out of your neighborhood grocery store with bags in one hand and schlepping a case of water on his shoulder. Would you not run over to take it from him? But why is it that Nayach Ish Zadik Tomim Hayabedai Rai Sav was to spend a year as the zookeeper? The following is Suid. I saw it last year. I didn't really understand it. I asked a lot of questions about it First tried to translate it. This year we came back to it. It's eye-opening, it's novel, it's different, but it really does give a new perspective on some of the daily dirty jobs that we go through. It definitely gives a different definition of greatness. The aside's like this the Pasek says in Kohela's parakey Pasekhe's ve yistroin aretz bechol, he melech lasoda naavod, melech lasoda naavod. Those are the key words that even a king, he serves the ground. A king is indebted to the soil. The idea is that no matter how great you may become, you become a king. The only place that you'll find sustenance, food, is from the soil, from the ground. That the highest of the high, it serves the lowest of the low, dirt rules a king, so to speak. We know that there are four different forms of creation. Maybe we say life forms. There's something called the inanimate object, which isn't alive. That's called a domeim, a rock, dirt. Step up tzomeach. That would be something that's alive but can't really move. Like a blade of grass grows. Tzomeach Chai is an animal that moves. It's got some instincts, some DNA. It's a bit more alive than a blade of grass. Then the top level, the crown jewel of the world, is a medabar, a speaking human being. If you're to take the top level, medabar, a king, in fact, he actually serves the lowest level, this domeim the dirt. It's not your element of spining, it's an unbelievable idea. Life is sustained by the low of the low. This idea was actually a practical idea and Yeshiva asked Kelm, that great Talmud Tayyara headed by Ereb Semchazisul Zivbroide, that on Tsukkis they would auction off, they'd sell the jobs of the low jobs, the dirty jobs, to the Bahram for quite the sum of money they would auction off who would take out the garbage, who would clean the toilets, who would sweep the base? Majrish, because malach basod na avod great ones, they serve the low. Rebbe Yeruchim says that when he was new in Yeshiva's kelm, after the duchening, when they would wash their hands into a basin of water, the altar, the Rashi Yeshiva, would take the water that was now impure and dirty and spill it out outside. That was his job. And when Rebbe Yeruchim, who was new, saw the altar of Kelm bending down and taking the water out to spill it and dispose of it outside, he went over to take it from the altar to say it's beneath your dignity. And the altar looked at him as if to say you must be new here. A king serves the ground, the dirty work, is the only place that you will be able to find your life, life support. We all are clamoring to climb the ladder to greatness and we kind of imagine that to be where we are sitting, high and mighty, maybe with a pen in hand writing our Hedushetairah. Maybe it means to be in the penthouse office somewhere. Whatever it is that you imagine greatness to be. But you definitely don't imagine that in spilling the water outside of the impure Kohanims used water or taking out the garbage, washing the dishes, for that is godless. Well, yes, because Melech lasada na'avod, a king serves the soil. Think about Dovet HaMelech's schedule. What would you say that he was his nine to five. I would say he was sitting there with a harp, maybe singing, maybe writing his Tehillim, maybe as the chief general in an army, or marching. He's giving a big pep talk or something. But the Gamar Anbrachas gives a totally different outline of his schedule. He would wake up when his harp would blow as the first alarm clock, when the wind would blow through the harp would wake him up and he would spend his time, after a davening, answering Halacha questions. It says that his hands were filled with blood. He was answering family purity questions and making a woman permitted to her husband sitting there answering Halacha shailas that his hands became so cracked and so bloodied from all the shailas, the questions he was answering. And after that did he hit the base medres? Did he go out to war? Hardly. He started to give business advice for how people could make better investment decisions and the day-to-day routine average life Melech lasode naavod. I want to ask my Rebbe, the great Rebbe Weinreb, who's such a brilliant Talmud kacham and has such self-control, how it is that he remains humble when people speak about him with such honorifics and I imagine he's not naive to the fact that he has accomplished a great deal in his life. And he told me just very quickly and in his style that or Hashemi has a beautiful big family they should all live and be well, that after changing so many diapers every day and having your kids tell you no, and really they run the house in a very facetious way. He said it eventually. The whole COVID thing and Giva thing is just not even no Gaya, which is very different to me at the time, but it's brilliant and it comes to mind is melech lasode naavod. There are so many outcomes that are great from this idea, but the great ones really do Do so many dirty jobs. They end up as zookeepers. And once I heard this idea, other examples popped into mind. I now think of how, in Yeshiva, where we were actually all tasked with different jobs janitor jobs by Nussin Stein. He is the greatest Rosh Yeshiva that I know and my Rosh Yeshiva he's still seized it. There are tissues in certain spots of the Yeshiva. He checks the milk. He's involved in the dirty jobs, because where else is one supposed to find their Kias, says Shlomo HaMelech. Melech la Sudena, avoid. Even a king is indebted to the ground. Jef Gamliel was the bartender at a wedding. When the Gamar introduction wants to know, how is it possible? Well, melech la Sudena, avoid. How is it that Avromo Vino could hang up the phone on his Nivua with Hashem to go and take care of the guests in the upcoming parasha? As the Gamar concludes that it's greater to take care of guests than it is to talk face to face to Hashem, well, melech la Sudena, avoid Working in the trenches, sustaining yourself as a zookeeper, how you continue to live and how a king acts. It makes a lot of sense what the Apostle says here, that Melech found grace, favor in Hashem's eyes, because there was some grace that noah had. Maybe it was his actions, maybe it was his peace, but something proved to be meritorious that saved him and his family. But then the Apostle gives us an entirely new reason why he was able to exit the Tava. The original Chosem sounds like wasn't enough. The Apostle says Vayi's car in Hashem remembered Noach's actions. Rashi says he remembered that Noach had taken care of all the animals for that year. He had Rachmonis. He fed them at the right times. He was even punished when he messed up. Even one time Vayi's car, like him as Noach, melech la Sudena Avoid. That seems to be how Noach merited to leave the Tava and to actually continue to live on Our jobs, to be a five-star waiter To do Shemush the same way that a aspiring rabbi does Shemush under his rabbi. He gets hands on apprenticeship and the top zookeepers must learn from other zookeepers the Hatsala here. The only way for the world to live on was that it seems that the Gaddal Hadar should be a zookeeper for a year, that the zebra should have its food at its time, the lion its food at its time and that the garbage and the excrement should be taken out Because Melech la Sudena Avoid. We aspire greatness, but greatness seems to have now a new definition. I hope that I will be more excited when my wife asked me to take out the garbage. That's a chance to get some CPR, some extra life taking care of jobs that seem, in our eyes, to be dirty jobs. It even seems that the more responsibilities, the more dirty jobs that a men's has actually seems to define how kingly the person is if you really think about it. But I hope that our people will not be able to take out the garbage and only know that I survived and those with him in the Tava, and the only reason that they had to exit the Tava was because he was an expert zookeeper for an entire year. So let us love the dirty jobs. Let us understand that maybe John at the zoo wasn't so sillier out of his mind. Maybe his knowledge of chimpanzees and monkeys is quite valuable. Maybe he was quite alive, because Melech lasada na'avo, the king, serves in the field and you take care of the dirty jobs, is exactly where you will find your ultimate life. So gut it out of the trenches. Love getting your hands all dirty and bloodied and chapped from the jobs that are giving you the ultimate chias Melech lasada na'avo. Love the dirty work. Become the ultimate king and the ultimate zookeeper.