The Giving Of The Torah

Males and females, unblemished and blemished animals. For the Master said: The requirements of being unblemished and being male apply to a domesticated animal offered by the descendants of Noah, but the requirements of being unblemished and being male do not apply to a bird. And a domesticated animal is juxtaposed to a bird. Unblemished and blemished animals, this comes to exclude an animal that is missing a limb, which is not fit. Rabbi Elazar said: From where is it derived that an animal missing a limb is forbidden to the descendants of Noah? The verse states: "And of every living thing, of all flesh" (Genesis 6:19), meaning the Torah said: Bring an animal whose extremities of its limbs are alive. Rabbi Elazar of Modi'in says: He heard of the giving of the Torah and came. For when the Torah was given to Israel, His voice went forth from one end of the world to the other, and all the kings of the nations of the world were seized with trembling in their palaces, and they uttered song, as it is stated: "And in His palace all say, Glory" (Psalms 29:9). They all gathered around Balaam the wicked and said to him: What is the sound of the tumult that we have heard? He said to them: A good and precious treasure He has in His storehouse, which had been stored away with Him for nine hundred and seventy-four generations before the world was created, and He sought to give it to His children, as it is stated: "The LORD will give strength to His people" (Psalms 29:11). Immediately they all opened their mouths and said: "The LORD will bless His people with peace" (Psalms 29:11). Rabbi Eliezer says: He heard of the splitting of the Red Sea and came, as it is stated: "And it came to pass when all the kings of the Amorites heard" (Joshua 5:1).