1. Leviticus: Tazria and Metsora

Tazria means “she conceives”. Metsora means “one being diseased”. There’s a lot of talk of cleanliness and uncleanliness. Leprosy, or whatever skin disease they’re actually referring to. Cleanliness of bodies, of houses. And a lot of sacrificing to become clean after being unclean.

The thing that I find kind of funny is that I often hear outrage about how women are determined to be unclean while they are menstruating. I guess it is kind of outrageous. But now that I’ve actually read this part of Torah, I’m less outraged. Because men are considered unclean when they ejaculate. I wonder what is meant by “unclean”. But, whatever is meant, both men and women are seen as unclean in similar circumstances, considering the differences between our bodies.

I find it more disturbing that women are unclean twice as long after giving birth to a girl over a boy. Does this smack of misogyny? Or whatever its opposite is? Either way, there is not equal billing for both boys and girls. I find it disconcerting that either gender was preferred over the other. This is at the root of the “battle of the sexes”.

We spent some time with family friends recently. Both of the parents are attorneys and they made multiple references to one of them winning over the other. Actually, it was the wife that made the references. It made me kinda sad.

The last thing that I want in my marriage is to feel like Steve and I are not on the same side. Even when we disagree, we are still on the same side. Clean or unclean, we seem to be in synch there as well.