Rabbi Tuchman addresses the challenges with Leviticus 21 from the perspective of a blind rabbi. She states that society tends to claim that individuals with disabilities are no longer impacted by these passages because we have evolved. Yet we have not really evolved. Such individuals are still marginalized. She questions: “are we to assume that a supposed broken body equals a broken person?
The laws regarding the condition of tamei are complex and challenging to understand. Rabbi Sacks quotes Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai: “It is not that death defies or the waters purity. Rather, God say, I have ordained a statue and issue a decree and you have no permission to transgress it.” Even the sages didn’t understand the rules. The logic is in the concept of the holy. God is beyond time and space, yet God created them and the physical entities that occupy them.
Rabbi Barenblat quotes the beginning of the parashah, “y’all shall be holy, for I your God am holy”…emphasizing the plural. In other words, to be holy is for the society, not the individual. In a righteous society, we must ensure justice.
Rabbi Kaplan addresses the meaning of being holy: the text elaborates on forbidden sexual relations and sinful thoughts, many of which emphasize the male. Yet, human interactions involve multiple parties. How can we address the ancient laws regarding sexual ethics in light of contemporary values?
Rabbi Sacks considers the apparent disconnect between the different laws in Leviticus 19 – in fact, they are about limits, order, and boundaries. Reality has a structure whose integrity must be honored. When the order is violated, then chaos results.
Rabbi Barenblat writes that tum’ah means having a different spiritual frequency, rather than “unclean” vs “clean”. She cites the Talmudic teaching that in public, people should cry out “tamei, tamei”, which seems the be shaming, yet the intention is not to shame to afflicted person. Rather, it should evoke in us compassion for our fellow community members, and lead us to take helpful action.
Alan Cooper writes about the impurity of a “perceived deviation from a ’normal’ state”, requiring rituals to return the person or article from “deviant” to “normal”. As he writes, the responsibility of the kohen is to determine whether the condition causes impurity, not to identify it. Therefore, the definition of tzaarat as leprosy is not accurate.
Rabbi Sacks introduces the challenges in these parashiot: impurity that occurs because of our human physicality. He references Rambam, who wrote about the opposing lifestyles of the ascetic and the hedonist. The former denies the goodness of God’s world while the latter denies God. As Jews, we celebrate both the Creator and creation.
The iconic Shlomo Carlebach and contemporary singer Eli Levin join together in an unforgettable music video transporting viewers to the streets of Jerusalem where the eternal promise of redemption hovers tantalizingly in the air.
Rabbi Barenblat blogs about the beginning of the Holocaust. Please follow the link below to read the full article: