A few questions were presented to the Malbim on the nature of the world and why and how things have changed. How it that people used to live for a 1000 years and now people don’t even live 10% of those years?
Scientists have found in an iceberg a frozen sheep with grass in its mouth. How is it possible that a sheep was found in a place where the climate is so cold it could not graze or even exist? How could there have even been grass in its mouth in a place that is covered with ice and snow? Archeologist found the bones of elephants and monkeys in northern Europe; cold weathered countries though these animals live only in the warm climates of the world? Lastly, how is it that a rainbow is the expression of a covenant between Hashem and the world that he won’t bring a flood? We know it’s just the reaction between the bending of sunlight as it shines in the clouds, much like a prism that shows different colors, it’s a natural reaction to light. How does a natural rainbow represent this agreement? It’s like saying if there are clouds in the sky then its proof, yet clouds are there anyway.
The Malbim explains that the basic change in the earth was the slight modification in axis from 0 degrees to 23.4 degrees that created the new world we live in today. Imagine if you lived in New York which is 1500 hundred miles from Miami and in a flash Miami weather turns to New York weather, and New York turns into the Arctic Circle.
From the equator till the North or South Pole is about 6000 miles every 10 degrees equals 690 miles therefore 690 x18= 12,420 there is 180 degrees in half a circle. So 23.4 degrees= 1637 miles and if in a flash the world was tilted that many miles, the polar caps had a meltdown and the world flooded. This is how the flood came about.
From the great flood the world changed. Before it was one pleasant climate, now we have the different seasons of winter spring summer and fall. Since the climate changed, animals who lived before the flood were found where they no longer live now. Before all was constant and the luminaries were a function to differentiate between day and night, signs, holidays and years. ( Beraishit 1-14). If a person lived in New York it was always 73 degrees; if he wanted cooler weather, he traveled north, and south for warmer weather. Because before the flood there was no change in climate, there was no stress and impact on the human body, and people lived longer and were stronger.
The Medrash tells us that once in forty years, clouds would come in and it rained for a few days. Then they were gone, there was never a cloud in the sky to form a rainbow. Unlike today where we constantly have clouds in the sky and many days of rain, then people experienced rain only once in 40 years. It was therefore very frightening and the rainbow reassured humanity that it won’t be a flood. The rainbow was not simply something pretty in the sky but evidence of our new changed world. In this way it serves as a covenant between Hashem and humanity that He will never send another flood.
