Last week’s Torah reading was mostly the story of Noah and the Flood. One of the more curious elements of the tale is what happens when the earth dries out enough for the animals and their human tenders to exit the vessel.

First, Noah is told by God to leave the ark; would Noah not have figured that out on his own? Maybe God was eager to get on with the ever-confounding development of humankind. Did God first politely invite Noah to step away from the ark, and Noah responded (in a full-blown Ashkenazi accent), “It’s okay. I’ll sit in de ark!”?

So here’s Noah, having spent a year with a host of creatures, leaving the ark and he does what? He builds an altar, takes a variety of “pure” animals and birds (how did he know?), and turns them into burnt offerings of thanks to God.

A year with those creatures; Noah knows their names, their hopes and dreams, and surely has witnessed offspring birthed or hatched. And the first thing that come to mind is to kill some as a thank-you to God for keeping the rest of them alive?

Curious indeed.

This week, it is Avram (not yet avraHAm) who is told to go somewhere. Like Noah, Avram is somewhat geographically at sea. Like Noah, he was promised progeny. Like Noah, Avram was party to a covenant with God.

Avram’s covenant — and promise of an heir — is also ritualized by the slaughter of some animals and birds.

Another curiosity: Avram is told that, as part of God’s promise, his descendants will spend four hundred years — or four generations, or 430 years, depending on variant tellings — enslaved in a foreign land. Redemption would follow, reassured God. (And Avram doesn’t question this?)

Some have suggested that the foreign detour was meant to instill a foundational sense of compassion in our people. (Go us for turning lemons into lemonade?) Surely there was a less dramatic and shorter-term way to do that! And a way that did not exact such a horrific cost on the Egyptians.

But then we wouldn’t have quite the same kind of Pesach re-enactment and all that we gain from the seder rituals.

We could view as anachronisms or editing errors these and other textual curiosities in our Hebrew bible (Tanach). Rather, we gain more by seeing them as impetus for deeper exploration of, at very least, why, for millennia, we’ve maintained these tellings the way they are.

It’s our story, and we’re sticking to it!

Shabbat shalom ! שבת שלום