Metzora

Leviticus 14:1-15:33

Dvar Torah by ROBERT TORNBERG for ReformJudasim.org

M'tzora, the name of this week's parashah, refers to a person or a house afflicted with a skin condition called tzaraat. Often mistranslated as "leprosy," tzaraat is something totally different than what we, today, call leprosy. Most years, M'tzora is read as a double portion, combining last week's very difficult concepts with this week's equally challenging ideas.

M'tzora can be divided into three distinct, but related sections:

• Part 1 (Leviticus 14:1-32) picks up from the previous parashah, Tazria, which discusses the rituals surrounding those found to have various skin ailments. Someone afflicted with tzaraat was considered tamei1, ritually "impure," and was temporarily banished from the community (Leviticus 13:46). M'tzora outlines the rituals of purification for a person who is found by a priest to be free from tzaraat. We are told in detail about the process and the rituals by which the person may again become part of the general population once he or she is considered tahor 2, ritually "pure."
• Part 2 (Leviticus 14:33-57) discusses in similar detail what happens when a house develops a scaly outbreak on its walls or elsewhere. As with a person, there is quarantine process. No one may enter the house, and specific rituals are outlined for declaring the house tahor once the scaly growth has been permanently removed. In the case of a home that cannot be rid of the outbreak, the entire structure is destroyed.
• Part 3 (Leviticus 15:1-33) tells us that genital discharges (from men and women), abnormal discharges, "normal" seminal emissions, and menstruation also make one tamei. The laws concerning the ways in which people with discharges or emissions can return to a tahor state are also specified.

If, when reading this parashah you find it difficult to relate, you are not alone. Our greatest commentators also found it complicated and wandered far from the p'shat, the "plain meaning" of the text, to make these ideas somewhat comprehensible.

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