אמר רבה אשתעו לי נחותי ימא בין גלא לגלא תלת מאה פרסי ורומא דגלא תלת מאה פרסי זימנא חדא הוה אזלינן באורחא ודלינן גלא עד דחזינן בי מרבעתיה דכוכבא זוטא והויא לי כמבזר ארבעין גריוי בזרא דחרדלא ואי דלינן טפי הוה מקלינן מהבליה
ורמי לה גלא קלא לחברתה חבירתי שבקת מידי בעלמא דלא שטפתיה דניתי אנא ונאבדיה א"ל פוק חזי גבורתא דמריך מלא חוטא חלא ולא עברי שנאמר (ירמיהו ה, כב) האותי לא תיראו נאם ה' אם מפני לא תחילו אשר שמתי חול גבול לים חוק עולם ולא יעברנהו
Rabba said: Seafarers related to me that in a certain place between one wave and the next wave there are three hundred parasangs, and the height of a wave is three hundred parasangs. Once, seafarers recounted, we were traveling along the route and a wave lifted us up until we saw the resting place of a small star, and it appeared to me the size of the area needed for scattering forty se’a of mustard seeds. And if it had lifted us higher, we would have been scorched by the heat of the star.
And the wave raised its voice and shouted to another wave: My friend, did you leave anything in the world that you did not wash away, that I may come and destroy it? The second wave said to it: Go out and see the greatness of your Master, God, as even when there is as much as a string of sand on the land I cannot pass, as it is stated: “Will you not fear Me, said the Lord; will you not tremble at My presence? Who has placed the sand for the bound of the sea, an everlasting ordinance, which it cannot pass?” (Jeremiah 5:22).
Seeing the wave action
To get a sense of wind-created waves, simply blow over a bowl of liquid, for instance. A series of waves will follow your exhalation's path
Even when wind is blowing out to sea, waves still come ashore as a result of the shape of the ocean basins.
"That's the general motion of the ocean, if you will — it pushes water toward the shore," said Presnell. Envision the sloshing in a bathtub, Presnell explained: When some force is added to the water, the sloshing heads toward the edge of the tub and then goes into a back-and-forth motion.
About all that sand
"Sand is basically the material you get when you get a breakdown in rocks, when the rocks weather and decompose over hundreds of thousands and millions of years," said Jeff Williams, senior scientist emeritus for the U.S. Geological Survey Woods Hole Science Center."
Guiding Questions:
1. What questions does the sugya from Baba Batra ask about the waves and the sand? What are the readers supposed to take away from this story?
2. What questions does science (as reported in source 2) ask about the waves and the sand? What are the readers supposed to take away from this article?
3. What are some advantages to the approach of the Talmud (Source 1)? What are some disadvantages?
4. What are some advantages to the approach of science (Source 2)? What are some disadvantages?
5. What advantages are there to attempting to hold on to both approaches at the same time? What challenges are there to this approach?