This week’s portion – Taz’ree’ah, literally, “[a woman] who shall be impregnated” (more about that in a minute) – appears at first glance to be a seamless continuation of past weeks’ portions: a detailed, somewhat tedious account of ordinances relating to all sorts of body conditions – from a mere bad rash to a full blown leprosy. And yet, just like in those earlier portions, a deeper look into this week’s portion may reveal many thought-provoking insights. In my post today I want to discuss three in particular: the notion of the portion’s title; the notion of Judaism as a complete and all-encompassing religion; and a quick remark on what is the role of religion. Let us begin.
I. What’s in a Name (of a Portion)?
Each week, the portion’s title reveals to us something about its subject matter. Taz’ree’ah is a Hebrew word related to seed or sperm, but in this week’s portion it appears in relation to a woman. Most translations understandably took the easy route, simply reading the text as where “a woman gives birth,” “a woman is with a child,” or, closer still, “a woman has conceived seed.” Only one translation of the eleven I examined, the Douay-Rheims Bible, chose to confront the Hebrew original head-on by writing: “If a woman having received seed shall bear a [male] child” (they wrote “man-child”). In any event, this week’s portion begins with pregnancy – the beginning of human life. More on this in a moment.
Importantly, however, this week’s portion is named – as in every other week during the year – after the first meaningful word in the opening section. By “Meaningful” I do not mean that it has a meaning – all words in the bible have meaning; rather, it is meaningful in the sense that it is not a part of the formal introduction to the portion (as in “So said God,” or “Then God has spoken,” or, more to the point in recent weeks “And God spoke to Moses and told him: Tell the children of Israel to do the following,” and so on). What is interesting to note, however, is that the first of these meaningful words this week is not Taz’ree’ah, but rather “a woman.” Despite that, the sages chose not to name this portion, as it should have been called, “woman,” but went instead to the next meaningful word. That is an unfortunate result. Just think for a moment what would happen to Judaism – in particular to Jewish women, but also to Jewish men and to all Jewish people around the world – if one of the Torah portions were to be named (appropriately) “a woman.” Unfortunately, at this point it seems a bit too late to change that reality; nevertheless, the point should be taken into account every year anew when we read the portion.
II. The Totality of Judaism
Read in the lowest level of abstraction, this week’s portion – as the one read next week (Met’zorah) – deals heavily with skin conditions, rashes, and diseases. Perhaps such issues were of great interest in the desert, during the long marches in the sun. Perhaps they required an elaborated set of ordinances, with the priests playing the role of physicians. But perhaps there is something deeper here. Allow me to surmise.
About twenty years ago, the Israeli Supreme Court was heavily divided around a major jurisprudential (legal philosophy) question: Is the law ubiquitous? Is it everywhere, all the time, all around us, whenever we go? Or does the law have a limited role, intervening in our lives only when we do (or attempt to do) something wrong? On the one end of the spectrum stood the Vice Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, a noted Torah scholar and a prolific jurist, Justice Menachem Elon. He vehemently opposed the idea of “the law is everything.” To him, (and I cite from memory, twenty years after the fact), “the law has nothing to say about love, dancing, playing with my grandchildren, and many other activities. The law is not everywhere, and the law is not everything.” On the other end of the spectrum stood Aharon Barak, then an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and later to become Israel’s most influential Chief Justice of all time (think in terms of an Israeli Chief Justice Marshall). Even back then, during his early tenure on the Supreme Court, there was no dispute about Barak’s legal brilliance. To him, (and again, citation from memory only) “the law is not everything, but it is everywhere; everything can be examined through a legal lens.” The fact that we can “dance, love, and play with our children,” Barak explained, exists only because “the law allows it.” More concretely, “the law sometimes allows, sometimes restricts, but is always present, in every action (or omission) we take.” Thus, at times the law chooses to intervene through restrictions (“You shall not murder”; “You shall not drive over 65 mph,” etc.), and at times the law prefers – and it is a legal choice – to leave “blank spaces” in the regulation blanket (such as “in relationship, do whatever you want to do [as long as you don’t violate the law otherwise (such as sexually harassing your partner)]”).
The debate was never firmly resolved. But reading this week’s portion and thinking of the debate between these two giants – the noted Torah scholar on the one hand and the brilliant jurist on the other – it seems that the Torah itself leans towards the latter (the jurist), at least in its perspective on Jewish law.
Indeed, this week’s portion takes us through a long journey of human life (“the circle of life” to reminisce on Elton John’s beautiful song), and not necessarily through the glorious stops on that journey (to be more exact, it takes us through the legal rules or decrees we have to follow in those stops): From pregnancy to post-birth “impurity”; from circumcision (an eighth-day decree that the Rambam himself emphasizes comes from this portion and not from the elaborate discussion in Genesis on the Compact between Avraham and God; see Leviticus 12:3) to a variety of skin diseases in all shapes and sizes; from hair and beard infections to baldness; from contaminated clothes (and proper rules of laundry) to leprosy; from women’s menstrual cycle to men’s inadvertent semen discharge – and many, many more conditions, variances, and maladies.
While tedious at times, this legal journey is fascinating in the sense that it shows, on the one hand, the ubiquity of the rules of Judaism – how it may govern every aspect of our lives, from birth to death and everything in between. But it also makes another important point, which often escapes theological observers, especially non-religious ones. And that point would be my last for today.
III. What Is the Role of Religion in our Lives?
When we talk about religion – every religion, but ours in particular – we usually think about very spiritual, dignified issues: Shabbat (or Sunday, or Friday, to others), Praying, the notion of God, the Holidays (note that these are – or should be – “holy” days), going to Shul (or church, or musque), and similar “respected” issues. Very few people, I assume, think about issues such as women’s cycle, skin diseases, proper laundry rules, and similar “dirty” conditions when asked “what religion means to you.” This week’s portion, however, makes the very profound point that religion – every religion, but ours in particular – is not only about those unique (or “holy,” which, as I have explained elsewhere, is also “unique,” or “special”) moments in life, but also about every single moment in life, from birth to death. Thus, when a person receives upon themselves the obligation of religion – the yoke of Torah and Mitzvot, in the case of Judaism – they are placing an enormous responsibility on their lives. It is the responsibility to live and act like a Jewish person at all times. [The Shulchan Aruch, one of Judaism’s profound documents, takes this point to the extreme, ordering a Jewish person what to do from the moment they wake up until the moment they go to sleep again, every single day.] Indeed, the laws of Judaism are all around us, all the time, and not only when we light the Shabbat candles. That is the message of this week’s portion. And that is its special power.
Shabbat Shalom,
Doron
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