Our parshah begins by describing Noah's righteousness: "He was a just and upright man in his generation". Why does the Torah emphasize this? What does this add to our understanding of the parshah text? And what can we learn from this for our daily service to HaShem?
The people of Noah's generation were completely different from him. They were wicked and sinful against G-d, they corrupted their way and the world in which they lived. The Torah emphasizes that, although all of Noah's generation behaved incorrectly, he did not learn from his behavior, Noah was “just and upright”, completely. All of his actions were according to the will of G-d. He was not ashamed of his conduct; he kept HaShem's mitzvot, even though he was the only tzadik in the whole world! All the men of Noah's generation disappeared in the Flood, while Noah, by his good behavior, was saved and also saved his whole family.
From Noah we learn to behave correctly even if the environment acts in the opposite way. Sometimes a Jewish child wants to perform a mitzvah, but the Yetzer HaRah whispers to him: "Look around you, there is no one who does this mitzvah, learn from them and don't do it." The answer is: “I must be like Noah: I must do what is right and good, and I don’t have to be ashamed, and if my environment still does not behave like this, let them look at me and with G-d’s help they too will learn to behave correctly".
As Noah was able to follow HaShem's way, although it was different from that of his entire generation, we too have the strength to triumph over the Yetzer HaRah and fulfill the mitzvot of G-d without paying attention to the behavior of our environment. Just as Noah was able to rise up a new world, so every Jewish child can save with his conduct an entire world and bring redemption for his entire generation. This is very easy, because every Jewish boy and girl knows that they are part of a gigantic army, in which no soldier is alone, they are part of HaShem's army.
