Our Gemara on Amud Aleph records an interesting statement from Rabbi Chanina:

אָמַר רַבִּי חֲנִינָא: בֹּא וּרְאֵה שְׁאֵלַת הָרִאשׁוֹנִים.

Rabbi Ḥanina said to his students in excitement: Come and see that Sages from a later generation were able to ask a difficult question on par with the question of the earlier generations. Even I, Rabbi Ḥanina, asked this same question, which was posed by my elder, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi.

Rashi spells this out even more distinctly, 

לתלמידים בא וראה שהדור האחרון זוכה להתחכם כדורות הראשונים שאף אני הייתי שואל שאילה זו ועכשיו שאלה רבי יהושע בן לוי שהוא מן הראשונים

Rabbi Chanina said to his students, “Come and see that the last generation gets to be as clever as the first.  For I asked the same question that we see rabbi Yehoshua Ben Levi asked. 

This Gemara runs somewhat against the established traditional Jewish belief that each generation is less superior than the prior. This idea is expressed explicitly in two Gemaras:

Shabbos (112b)

Rabbi Zeira said that Rava bar Zimuna said: If the early generations are characterized as sons of angels, we are the sons of men. And if the early generations are characterized as the sons of men, we are akin to donkeys. And I do not mean that we are akin to either the donkey of Rabbi Ḥanina ben Dosa or the donkey of Rabbi Pinḥas ben Yair, who were both extraordinarily intelligent and pious donkeys; rather, we are akin to other typical donkeys.

And Eruvin (53a)

Rabbi Yoḥanan said: The hearts, i.e., the wisdom, of the early Sages were like the doorway to the Entrance Hall of the Temple, which was twenty by forty cubits, and the hearts of the later Sages were like the doorway to the Sanctuary, which was ten by twenty cubits. And we, i.e., our hearts, are like the eye of a fine needle.

Yet this principle is not absolute.  We find for example, the concept discussed by the Rishonim that the halacha is in accordance with the later authority.  Tosafos (Kiddushin 45b):

And wherever the master and the student disagree, the halakha is in accordance with the master. However, from the times of Abaye and Rava and on, the halakha is in accordance with the later authorities, who were careful to analyze and establish the halakha in its clearest manner.

But on the whole, there is a pervasive sentiment that we are inferior compared to the prior generations, which of course, is quite the opposite from secular beliefs.  This does beg the question, if so, of what use are we?  Why doesn’t God just pack His bags, fold up the Universe and say, “So long, and thanks for all the mitzvos.”

Rabbi Chaim Vital (שער הגלגולים לח:קנד) reports that he asked this of his rebbe, the Arizal. The Arizal answered him as follows:

The greatness of the soul does not depend only on a person’s deeds, but also based on the generation and the concerns of the times. A very small act in this generation is equivalent to a great deed in other generations because in these generations the kelipos (spiritual barriers) are growing infinitely, unlike the earlier generations.  “If I was in a previous generation”, said the Arizal, “my deeds and my wisdom would far excel numerous righteous persons of the past. Therefore, I do not feel any distress at all, for my soul undoubtedly has great virtue over many of the righteous from who long ago from the era of the Tannaim and Amoraim. "

Translations Courtesy of Sefaria, except when, sometimes, I disagree with the translation

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