There’s a cartoon that goes like this:
Moshe Rabbenu (Moses our Teacher) is on his way down Har Sinai (Mount Sinai) with the Aseret HaDibrot (the Ten Commandments). A hippie-looking man with long hair, the funky tinted shades, and sandals comes up to him and says, “Moses, could you redefine those commandments of yours so as to make them more meaningful to the youth of today?”
The Ten Commandments have JUST. BEEN. GIVEN!!! And yet our communal passion for novelty already considers them old. When Jewish educators are told to make Jewish teachings more “relatable” they are being asked to bring the teachings “down.” What about bringing ourselves up?
I was thinking about that cartoon while learning about this parsha. This particular parsha (or parshiyot because we have a double portion) is one of those that is very specific and, on the surface, not totally accessible today.
Operative words: “on the surface.” Thanks so some very smart, insightful people who write very smart, insightful things on the parsha, I have learned some deep stuff and I’m delighted to share that stuff with you!
Like I said before, this week we have one of our special double portions! (Does anyone else hear “Daily Double” pew pew pew pew from Jeopardy?) The parshas are: Tazria and Metzora — both have to do largely with the laws of ritual purity and impurity. More specifically with a skin condition called “tzaraat” which appears when people commit certain interpersonal sins, such as lashon hara, gossip (lit. the evil tongue).
When someone is “diagnosed” with tzaraat, they are considered ritually impure or tameh / טמֵא. After a quarantine period, if the infection hasn’t spread, they are deemed tahor / טהור.
But “pure” and “impure” really don’t do the translation justice. (Which is a super annoying, gate-keeper-y thing to say, but I mean it in regard to how we perceive them in English.) Pure is morally good, right? And impure is morally bad, then. But these words shouldn’t have a moral value — they’re supposed to be neutral words that describe something objectively.
This relates to one of the reasons people got tzaraat (the skin condition): lashon hara (or gossip). Lots of things that we may not really consider gossip, actually are. For example, sharing something that is objectively true is still considered lashon hara if not shared for a meaningful reason. This is why it’s still gossip. Because if something is shared “objectively,” unfortunately, as much as we try not to interpret things in a subjective way, we still do take it that way.
So these words “pure” and “impure” leave a subjective taste of either good or bad. Which is not good!
To break it down further, purity is holiness, vitality, life, potential. While impurity is the opposite: a reduction of holiness, death, absence of potential. Simple as that. A “lack” versus a “have.”
The most simple example is a dead body. Dead bodies are an example of the reduction of holiness, reduction of life, reduction of vitality, and therefore they are impure.
Actions such as gossip (lashon hara) are also a reduction of holiness, and therefore: impure (tameh).
But plenty of people speak lashon hara today! So why don’t we have it today? Entire communities would be walking around with white spots if we were still afflicted by this!
Tzaraat is sometimes mistakenly referred to as “leprosy.” But this is incorrect because leprosy still exists, unfortunately. And leprosy can only exist on the body, while tzaraat can infect clothing and even houses. Tzaraat has nothing to do with bodily health, but rather spiritual health. (cont'd)
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