Rabbi Steven Bayar
This week’s Torah portion is Tazria-Metzora: Leviticus 12:1 — 15:33
Studying Parshat Tazria can be difficult — even repugnant: we learn about how the community is to respond to diseases of the body. There is quarantine and judgment, and a timeline is determined as to when (and if) the stricken one can return to the community.
But this is an important foundational text because it establishes a set dynamic for the community to follow. We see this at the beginning of the parsha:
“When a person has … a swelling a rash or a discoloration … it shall be reported to Aaron the priest … ”
The phrase “it shall be reported,” implies that the afflicted person may not be forthcoming on their own. So, whoever notices these symptoms has an obligation to report it.
In my experience, if family members or friends followed this teaching, much heartache could be avoided. Too many times, a person flees into denial with disastrous consequences.
Sometimes we don’t want to get involved or we do not want to destroy a relationship. Sometimes it’s because we don’t know how to help — but disregarding a friend in need means you are not really friends.
And now that you have read this article, you cannot claim ignorance as an excuse.
Parshat Metzora teaches how we identify and deal with leprosy in our community. It is a portion that is rarely studied or scrutinized because of its content. Yet, at its core, it contains some foundational principles for our tradition.
For instance, we read, “The Lord spoke to Moses, saying ‘This shall be the ritual for a leper at the time that he is to be cleansed.’”
Think what this verse implies: a leper can be cleansed. There is in fact a ritual to facilitate this. In a society that regarded leprosy as an abomination, any person afflicted was literally marked for life. Yet, God tells Moses that there will be a ritual for cleansing lepers. This means that we have to recognize the expectation that there will be a cleansing — and we must be prepared for that time.
Lepers, the outcasts of society, will eventually be brought back into the community that expelled them.
Think of how a person stricken with leprosy must have felt when the sentence was pronounced. Think of how the words must have sounded when the Kohen said, “You have leprosy and must be cast out of the community.” Think of how these words destroyed a person’s life, when in the span of a few weeks they had lost every piece of status, every shred of humanity they possessed.
Yet think of the gift they were given — the gift of hope — when they realize there is a ritual to bring them back into the community. It meant they could not be summarily dismissed or forgotten. It meant that they were still part of the community, distanced but not abandoned.
Our society has numerous outcasts: the ill, the hungry and the homeless, to name only a few. Yet they should not be forgotten — they are still a part of us, and we have a responsibility to keep them as members of our community.
And we have rituals that bring them back — rituals in the form of mitzvot (commandments): tzedakah (charity), hachnasat orchim (hospitality) and al ta’amod (do not stand idly by).
Performing these mitzvot sends a message no one is every forgotten and gives them perhaps the greatest gift of all, hope.
Steven Bayar is the rabbi emeritus at Congregation B’nai Israel in Millburn, New Jersey, and currently serves as rabbi at B’nai Tzedek in Potomac, Maryland. He is the author of several books and curricula on tikkun olam.
