The Miraculous Ark

Originally published on Gimme Some Torah by Rabbi Eli Garfinkel on October 16, 2026.

A cruise ship under construction. Photo by Ian Simmonds on Unsplash

Bereshit/Genesis 6:16

צֹ֣הַר ׀ תַּֽעֲשֶׂ֣ה לַתֵּבָ֗ה וְאֶל־אַמָּה֙ תְּכַלֶ֣נָּה מִלְמַ֔עְלָה וּפֶ֥תַח הַתֵּבָ֖ה בְּצִדָּ֣הּ תָּשִׂ֑ים תַּחְתִּיִּ֛ם שְׁנִיִּ֥ם וּשְׁלִשִׁ֖ים תַּֽעֲשֶֽׂהָ׃

Make an opening for daylight in the ark, and terminate it within a cubit of the top. Put the entrance to the ark in its side; make it with bottom, second, and third decks.

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Noah’s ark was an immense construction project. It was 450 feet long, about 12 full size school buses. It was about as wide as a six lane superhighway, and it rose to a height of three adult giraffes. God’s directions in the Torah included the construction of three decks. In the midrash, Rabbi Neḥemya taught that the ark had 900 animal stalls.

Despite all this complexity, the Torah only mentions Noah as its builder. It takes thousands of people to build a cruise ship, and they do so over the course of 2 to 3 years. A project of that magnitude requires skilled engineers, welders, electricians, and a dozen other specialities. And even though a midrash says Noah took 120 years to build the ark, the notion that Noah built this massive ark by himself lacks credibility.

Did other people help Noah? The Talmud (Sanhedrin 108b) says the other human beings made fun of Noah for building the ark and ridiculed the idea that the world would soon be destroyed.

So it seems unlikely that Noah hired builders. Even if his wife, three sons, and their respective spouses helped, the project still seems impossible. A midrashbased on our verse (Gen. 6:16) solves the problem by crediting a miracle:

You shall craft it [ta’aseha]” – it [the ark], too, assisted [in building] itself.

The midrash takes the verb תַּֽעֲשֶֽׂהָ (ta’aseha), which means make it, and reads it as תֵעֲשֶׂהָ (tei’aseha), which means it shall be made. The latter reading, in the niphal conjugation, suggests that the building was passive and happened on its own.

What do we learn from this midrash? I think we learn that, Noah notwithstanding, we should not expect miracles when building or creating anything. Trying to complete a gigantic project alone is a fool’s errand. Planning and strategizing are essential steps in making anything successful.

My dad (ע׳׳ה) used to express this idea by saying, “Don’t start vast projects with half-assed ideas.”

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