Mindful Torah...and more

This week we read the double parashah/portion of Tazria-Metzora (Vayikra/Leviticus 12:1-15:33). The parashah introduces the various categories of tumah (ritual or spiritual “impurity”, for lack of a better word) emanating from human beings. The parashah describes in great detail the varying and numerous manifestations of the disease called tzara'at.  Although it has been commonly mistranslated as leprosy, this disease has little resemblance to any bodily ailment transmitted through normal exposure. Rather, tzara'at appears to be some kind of growth that can occur on a house or on clothing (like mold or fungus) or on a person's body. Tradition views the disease as being the physical manifestation of a spiritual malaise, a punishment from God primarily for the sin of speaking lashon hara (evil speech). Known as a metzora, someone afflicted by a tzaraat-like patch on their skin is subject to a series of examinations by a Kohen (high priest), who declares the patient...

Today is the seventh day of the festival of Pesakh/Passover, the feast celebrating the redemption from Egyptian slavery. According to tradition, this is the day when the Israelites crossed Yam Suf /the Sea of Reeds (or Red Sea, if you prefer the older translations). Most of us are familiar with this event from Bible stories we have read or movies we have seen, and yet there is much more contained within this story than meets the eye. According to midrash (rabbinic lore) the seas split not merely because Moses raised his staff over the water, but because one man dare to enter the waters on his own without waiting for Moses or anyone else to take action. This man, Nachshon ben Aminadav, understood that in order to achieve freedom and salvation we must not merely wait around or pray for it, but we must act as partners with God in order to make it happen! It was Nachshon’s bravery and his faith in the divine-human partnership that enabled him to enter the raging waters ...