Such answers seem simple and straightforward, but they have eluded human society for as long as it has existed. The answers to these questions are about personal and communal morality, about how we treat other people, particularly strangers and the poor. Thus, the key question about this week's Torah portion isn't science's "what?", "where?", or even "how?", but rather religion's "why?" Why does the river turn to blood? Why do Jews ritually recount this story each spring throughout the world? In the miraculous story of Exodus, the natural world becomes God's manifestation of morality. This is the God of the underclass, of the downtrodden, of the oppressed. Unlike the pagan gods of thunder, sea, and other natural forces, the God of Exodus cares deeply about right and wrong. Ancient Israelite religion brought moral judgement to human activity.
It isn't immoral, bad in itself it is merely unconcerned with the questions of right and wrong. The world of ancient paganism (and modern science) is amoral. In this week's Torah portion, nature itself rebels against human immorality. But in doing so, it is important that we do not undermine the metaphorical drama of the text. Certainly it is entertaining to speculate on a Nile river red with algae bloom. The circumstances in Kansas demonstrate how religious fundamentalists intrude upon the creativity and growth of scientific knowledge and theory.īut the obverse is true as well. However, literalism does a disservice to both religion and science. This year the Kansas State Board of Education made the teaching of evolution optional in its science curriculum due to pressure from Christian evangelical groups.
However, those who seek to read Torah as a history book, or worse, as a science primer, may well miss the spiritual significance of the text.įundamentalists and other Biblical literalists often pounce on naturalistic explanations of Torah events, such as the Red Tide, as "proof" that the Bible "really happened," and thus possesses authority even beyond that of profound religious and moral instruction.Īccording to recent polls, fully 44 percent of Americans believe the earth is less than 10,000 years old, created by God in six 24-hour days. When it trains its eye on the scripture, it does so with a literalism that is part of the scientific methodology. Science is concerned with the analysis of objective data. However, there are pitfalls in the "scientific" investigation of the Bible, especially as lay people generally understand it. Archaeology and literary analysis have proved particularly helpful to Biblical scholars seeking to unravel the "true" meaning of the text. There is no doubt that reading the Torah through the lens of scientific and academic knowledge can provide insight to an often-cryptic text. There was a massive die-off of fish, just as in Hiroshima Harbor, and a consequent abundance of frogs and insect swarms. Evidently well water was safe-only the river was tainted-again, consistent with the characteristics of a Red Tide. The Nile Delta is warm and salty Red Tides most often occur in spring, the time of Passover.Īccording to the Bible, after the Nile "turned to blood," the Egyptian people had to dig wells for drinking water. This is a tempting naturalistic explanation for the Biblical account of a miraculous event. What does the Red Tide have to do with the Torah? Biblical scholars and early marine biologists of the late nineteenth century postulated that the first plague of the Exodus story, the blood color of the Nile, might have been an outbreak of Red Tide.
Red Tides most often occur in warm salty harbors, deltas and estuaries- they are a thick concentration of microorganisms that literally stain the sea a brownish red color. Rather, this marine catastrophe was the product of a naturally occurring phenomenon, harmful algae bloom known as the Red Tide. What was the cause of this disaster? Not some accidentally uncovered source of decades old residual atomic radiation, nor the run-off of industrial pollution. Fully 90 percent of the oyster harvest was lost. Grim images of the harbor clogged with dead fish were broadcast on televisions and computer monitors throughout Japan. In March 1999, fishery officials in Hiroshima issued grave warnings about mass deaths of fish, ducks, and possibly marine animals.
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