Deep Water: נח
The section of the Torah that will be read in synagogues this week is נח (the story of Noah). In both this week’s parsha and last week’s parsha, we see that there is a connecting theme: the danger, but also potential, that water represents. Last week, we read in synagogue about the unformed world and its state of תהו ובהו. We learned of G-d separating the מים למים (water from water) with a רקיע (firmament). In נח, we see what happens when G-d breaks down that division to create המבול מים (the flood waters).
In בראשית 1:2 we read of the תהום (tahom), which the dictionary BDB translates as “deep, sea, or abyss,” a word which is not the standard use for water or sea. Targum Onkelos brings an Aramaic form of the same word תהומא. In the Septuagint, it translates it simply as “water” (τοῦ ὕδατος). The word תהום carries a weight to it that the Septuagint is missing in its translation here, by using a more generic word. The root of the word תהום is old and is also found in Akkadian (the ancient language spoken in Babylon both before and during the time of King David), where the word timiati means “sea, lake.” Rashi states that the תהום is water on the surface of the earth, but I think that Radak gives a fuller image of מקום רבוי המים ועמקים (a place of abundant water and depths). Here, the description captures the image and weight of the word תהום: at the beginning of creation, we have a state of primordial chaos (תהו ובהו), which in the darkness is inclusive of our תהום. Out of this chaos, G-d begins to bring order.
How do you understand this word?
For Noah, water is both violent and chaotic, but also under G-d’s control. In Chapter 6 verse 17, G-d brings a flood (מבול מים). Rashi reads with Onkelos טופנא “flood” since everything was “destroyed, mixed-up, and carried away” (שבלה, שבלבל, שהוביל). Rashi adds that the flood swept away all this destruction to Babylon, given how “deep” (עמוקה) it was. The word used by the Septuagint here is κατακλυσμὸν ὕδωρ, which reads “a water flood / deluge.” When the waters of the deep are opened by G-d in Chapter 7 verse 11, we return to the word תהום in the Hebrew, which here the Septuagint does a better job and translates τῆς ἀβύσσου, as “…of the deep/abyss.”
The primordial image of תהום, and the feeling that rain from above and springs from below can be uncontrollable and unpredictable forces is not so hard for us to imagine today. It is very much a part of the human experience. Sometimes a translation can capture this subtle meaning and connect with the reader, other times a translation can miss it, or be inconsistent (as we’ve seen this week with the Septuagint).