Adam and Eve's punishment for their sin was anguish, as it says: "To the woman He said, 'I will greatly increase your anguish and your pregnancy. With anguish you will give birth to children....' To Adam He said, 'You listened to your wife, and ate from the tree regarding which I specifically gave you orders, saying, "Do not eat from it." The ground will therefore be cursed because of you. You will derive food from it with anguish all the days of your life. It will bring forth thorns and thistles for you.'" (Genesis 3:16-18)



Noah relieved some of that anguish. That is why he was named Noah, which means "relief": "[His father] named him Noah, saying, 'This one will bring us relief from our work and the anguish of our hands, from the soil that God has cursed.'" (5:29)



Rashi comments: "'He will give us rest from the toil of our hands': Prior to Noah, they had no plow and he invented it for them. The earth had been producing thorns and thistles when wheat was sown as a result of Adam's curse and this ceased in the days of Noah."



The invention of an animal-driven plow made man's life easier. Previously, agricultural work had been difficult and frustrating. Farmers would sow wheat and come up with thorns. Yet, joy did not yet return to him. Noah himself would drink wine as a way of fleeing the difficult reality in which he lived: "Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard. He drank some of the wine, making himself drunk, and uncovered himself in the tent." (9:21)



Abraham, G-d's intimate and elect, was kindness personified. Only within him were restored the joy and laughter of Adam in Eden before the sin. As it says, "Abraham fell on his face and laughed [va'yitzchak]." (17:17) The Targum comments, "The word 'yitzchak' here refers [not to disbelief at the angels' report that Sarah would bear a son, but] to joy. In fact, G-d commanded him to call his son Yitzchak [Isaac]." (17:19)



Through Abraham and his seed after him came rectification of Adam's sin, the sin that brought anguish to the world. With Abraham, we move from the 2,000 years of chaos and anguish to 2,000 years of Torah. That, in turn, stands in preparation for the 2,000 years of the Messiah, at the height of which, joy will return to the Jewish People and to the entire world. As it says, "Everlasting joy shall be upon their heads." (Isaiah 35:10. See Shabbat 88a) This idea is hinted at by the Hebrew letters of the word Mashiach [Messiah], which are the same letters as in the word simchah [joy].



Today, mankind's goal is to emerge from the anguish that has hung over it since the days of Adam to the enormous joy that will characterize the human race in general, and Israel, the eternal People, in particular, at the End of Days. As it says, "The ransomed of the L-rd shall return, and come with singing unto Zion, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads. They shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away." (Isaiah 35:10)



In our own generation, as in Adam's generation, we bear witness to enormous technological development that ostensibly makes Man's life easier, as in Noah's day. Yet, however advanced and sophisticated the world may be, that does not suffice to fill Man's heart with true joy. For joy to return to the human race and to every individual, we have to rectify the sin of Adam, who followed his passions and evil impulse. Man has to return to himself as a man, from a moral- and values-oriented standpoint. He must follow in G-d's pathways and do charity and justice, as it says of Abraham:



"I have given him special attention so that he will command his children and his household after him, and they will keep God's way, doing charity and justice. God will then bring about for Abraham everything He promised." (Genesis 18:19) As a result, "Abraham is will certainly become a great and mighty nation, and through him all the nations of the world will be blessed." (verse 18)



All those anguished years in which G-d concealed His face from us will be transformed to joy, as it says, "Gladden us in accordance with Your having afflicted us, in accordance with the years in which we saw evil." (Psalm 90:15)