When Noach was born he reversed the עצבון ידינו the sadness of his generation's hands. According to Rashi this conveys that Noach invented the plough improving agricultural work from hand to using utensils. However the Yalkut Reuveini explains that until Noach everyone since Adam Harishon was born with web hands making Man's hands non dexterous and clumsy. Noach was the first human to be born with open fingers without a web connecting them. Noach whose fingers were dexterous was then capable of creating tools such as the plow which changed agriculture into a much easier and quicker task.
Adam can be assumed to have had separated fingers as he was created by Hashem in perfection. Why then did humanity after Adam develop web fingers? We suggest that this change came about because of the Aitz Hadaas. Man was created with five senses, smell, touch, taste, seeing and hearing. Through these senses Man has gateways to experience the world outside of him and afterwards to send messages and thoughts to our minds, intellect and sense. These thoughts can be used for good and evil motivating positive or negative actions and behaviors.
Adam sinned against his creator through his senses. The pessukim take us through the five senses which seduced Chava to partake from the forbidden fruit. The passuk says ותרא אותו כי טוב העץ למאכל she saw it was good and tasty to eat, תאוה הוא לעינים it was lustful to her eyes, she listened to the words of slander that the Nachash spoke against on Hashem concerning the tree, ותקח מפריו she touched and took the fruit in her hands and ate it. Obviously she also smelled the fragrance of the fruit for without smell, tasting what one eats is dramatically compromised. Plus, when you chew and swallow, volatile aroma molecules from the food travel from the back of your throat up into your nasal cavity known as retro nasal olfaction.
We see from the description of the Torah that the cataclysmic chait of the Aitz Hadaas was brought about by the lack of Chava's and Adam's controlling and disciplining his or her five senses. By merely allowing one to see and hear everything his heart desires one's sense of wisdom and morality quickly deteriorates, becomes distorted and corrupt. His once sense of clear judgement becomes run by these five hooligans who cloud up his sense of righteousness and virtue.
Now we can bring the second installment to understand why the hands of Man became webbed. Rabbeinu Bechaye ויקרא ח כג explains how the five human fingers are connected to the five senses. He states that, of course, every organ and body part has a specific purpose, and nothing in God’s design is superfluous. (Classic case: for decades it was thought that the appendix is useless and an unnecessary “vestigial organ” that can be removed without a second thought. Today we know that the appendix does, in fact, play an important role in the digestive system.) The sense of taste requires the mouth and Rabbeinu Bechaye points out that people typically clean their teeth and mouth with their thumbs or thumb-nails. The sense of smell is in the nose, and people typically clean their nose with their index finger. The sense of touch is associated mostly with our hands, and people tend to feel things and sense textures by using their middle finger (or rubbing something between the thumb and middle finger) It is also the longest finger that touches the object first. The ring finger is commonly used to clean and rub one’s eyes. Finally, the small pinky finger is the right size to clean the ear. In this way, every finger is connected to one of the five senses, and every finger can be used to clean the organ of that particular sense!
After Adam ate from the Aitz Hadaas his senses were diminished because they caused him to sin against Hashem. For instance, Hashem asked Adam where are you and he responded את קולך שמעתי בגן ואירא ואחבא I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid and hid. At Matan Torah the passuk testifies וכל העם רואים את הקולות that they saw the voices and not just heard them. Surely Adam before the chait was also on that wholesome madraigah. However after the chait his acute senses became compromised and he could only hear Hashem's voice. When he realized that he could only hear your voice and not see it as before I became terribly frightened for then I realized that I just lost my divine stature and former spiritual dimensions.
Likewise before the chait he could see from one end of the world to the other. If he lost his sight of the seeing the letters he probably lost seeing unlimited from one part of the earth to the other. All five senses participated in the chait and they were compromised. Each individual sense had its own individuality but now they became stuck together like a paddle blended and attached to a group. No longer could they use each finger to clean the organ to which they corresponded. Adam was no longer the same quality spiritual giant that Hashem created an hour or two ago prior to his chait. Now we can understand why when we say על חטא ואשמנו we hit our hearts with our fists. The depth of this act is to convey that our senses get always get us into trouble with Hashem. We look at things that we should not look at. We hear things that we should not hear. We touch things we should not touch. We eat and taste things which are questionable. We smell what we should not smell לא תנאף perfumes לא תהנה אף .
The word ,תשובה is תשוב ה to return the Five Senses to their proper usage which is to enlighten us with Hashem's presence and mitzvos in the world. We say אשמנו by banging on our hearts with our five fingers together because it is the five senses that unravel our relationship with our Creator and cause us to go astray. It is incumbent upon us to constantly work on our mastery over our senses, being always close to the reins in order to pull them back whenever necessary.
When Shabbos comes we have an extra siyata dishmaya from the neshama yesairah to keep the Big Five in check and we take charge over them. This is hinted in the acronym of the Five Senses חושים שמיעה מישוש ראיה טעם ריח עה"כ equals יום שבת.
Noach in the Zohar is called שבת as his name aligns itself to יום מנוחה. He is the first person that the Torah describes with spiritual titles .איש צדיק תמים The gematriah of צדיק תמים with its eight letters equals .שבת He demonstrated his ability to control the Big Five which brought Adam Harishon and Chava down. Hence the name of "rest" נח concerning his five senses applies rightfully to him since they were under his subjugation. Every Motzei Shabbos by Havdalah we bring our five fingers to the light as a tefillah that just as by Shabbos we used our senses for Hashem so too during the coming week we should merit to do the same.
Noach was the second human since creation who possessed non webbed fingers for he was in total control of his Five Senses. This manifested itself by not having the webbed fingers like everyone else but rather individual fingers, each one with their own mission. This is hinted in the first passuk .אלה תולדות נח נח איש צדיק תמים The word אלה is two words אל ה concerning the five (senses), תולדות נח they were given birth to by Noach under his charge and not vice versa that Noach was under their charge.
Many of us think that since Noach we all today have rid ourselves from webbed fingers. However since 1989 the world changed when the World Wide Web was invented. Most of humanity today possess webbed addictive fingers busy busy busy. It is the gateway to all our captive senses, entertaining and demoralizing us at the same time. Only 36 years have passed since that invention and take a look at the destruction of ruined lives it leaves in its daily path. After Adam ate from the Aitz Hadaas Hashem asked him a one word question איכה Where are you now? Is humanity and the world better off after you introduced to it a web called the new Aitz Hadaas. איכה is gematriah 36. It's 36 years since the new Aitz Hadaas was introduced to keep our senses glued to inappropriate music or non tzenius gatherings. Is it not now the time to ask ourselves ?איכה Examine your marriage, children, job place and ask has the new Aitz Hadaas united or untied your relationships that you care about.
And even more in particular, איכה is two words איך ה how are the Big Five doing in your life? Can you pull yourself away from looking at something you shouldn't be looking at? Can you pull yourself away from a juicy story of Lashon Harah?
The webbed fingers was a curse brought about by Adam and Chava. It is time to take control of our Five senses which correspond to the Five Chumashim and tie ourselves to it which corresponds to the five knots on the Tzitzis and וראיתם אותו and see Hashem and His purpose in His creation, settling for nothing less. Every day when we cover our eyes with our five fingers to say the Shema, we are accepting upon ourselves to subject and direct our five senses to Hashem's will. I bet you did not realize that.