A thought on Parshios Tazria, Metzora

"...toras ha'metzora..."
"...the laws affecting the metzora..." (14:2)

 

Many are the forms and manifestations of impurity, tum'a. There is a cleansing remedy for each of them. When it comes to tzaras, however, the Torah devotes the majority of our two joinedparshios in discussing the ordeal to which the afflicted metzora is subjected and the complex formula for his recovery. He is quarantined, isolated socially, shaven, scrubbed, cleansed, immersed, and then brings some offerings. The offerings begin with two birds, one of which is killed and buried and the other which is released, which means they are not really sacrificial offerings at all. Then comes a guilt offering, a sin offering and a burnt offering. What makes this form of tum'a so demanding, so different, in the way the afflicted one is handled, and later rehabilitated into the community?

 

The Ralbag explains that a key distinction between this form of impurity and the many other forms rests in the philosophical distinction between substance and function. Our substance is physical matter, what we "are." Our bodies, for example, comprise our substantive nature. Our function, in contrast, is our behavior, our actions. It is who we are as manifest in how we are, what we "do."

 

Most of the forms of impurity which people contract are reflected by a change in body function. An emission, a secretion, a contraction or a contagion, all are manifest in either or both an alteration in body function or as a consequence of a specific behavior.

 

Tzaras is different. The affliction is not so much a change of body function but rather a decay or eroding of the body itself. It is a change at the structural level. It is manifest at the substantive level. It signifies that the person has alienated himself or herself from the community of human beings. He has isolated himself in a way which is reflected in the core and substance of his existence. His iniquity runs deeper than a misplaced act or a function which was misdirected. He has, in essence, allowed his humanity to die through scorning or mistreating others. The tum'a  hits him at a level which he shares with the dead, namely at the level of physical decay. The dead no longer function, but rot. This person is not impaired through affliction of a body function but through the rot and decay of the flesh itself.

 

The formula for recovery, the Ralbag explains, is also unique. One bird is killed and buried, the other sent away. This is not a matter of sacrifice, for there is no "offering" taking place. Nobody benefits from these birds. They are not eaten, they are not sacrificed (and in that sense, HaShem does not "accept"  either bird as an offering.) This lack of pleasure and benefit further identifies the errors of the metzora, who has acted in ways which please neither the Divine nor the fellow mortal.

 

Even with the closing of his cleansing ritual, when we would expect him to bring forth an olah, a burnt offering, the Torah instructs him to first demonstrate his regret, through an asham, and his contrition, through a chatas. His purification is not an automatic process which might require the mere setting of the sun or immersion. Rather, his purification hinges on his asserting his regret over having rejected the camaraderie of the living, and his apology for having fallen short of Divine expectations. Only then can he offer his olah, and prepare to enter again into the covenant of conformity and devotion to the Divine.

 

Positively wishing you a good Shabbos. D Fox