Jeremy Rosen
Making Sense of the Bible: Can its Ancient Text be Relevant Today? Leviticus 12

Jeremy Rosen - Making Sense of the Bible: Can its Ancient Text be Relevant Today? Leviticus 12

- Happy New Year to everybody, or Happy Secular New Year to everybody. I hope you celebrated and enjoyed because we have to grab anything positive that we can with all the problems swirling around. But an easy way to take one’s mind off things is to study. But today, we are dealing with a very, very difficult, problematic subject, the subject of purity and impurity. And it’s a problem because when you and I normally talk about pure and impure, normally we think of dirty and clean, and the fact is that nothing could be further from the truth because the Bible is concerned, as so many ancient civilizations are concerned, with two issues. One of them is the different states that we go through when we are sick, when we are well, when our body functions normally, when our body does not function normally. And all the debate about purity and impurity is about the difference between the usual, the normal, so to speak, and the abnormal, and the question of how we deal with this. And that’s where the link comes in between purity and impurity and the priesthood. The priesthood in ancient times, functioned not only for the rituals of religion, but also as the paid agents of welfare, health, dealing with people and human problems. That was the reason why the community supported them and made sure that they were able to function effectively. Now, the priests therefore, would always come along when somebody was sick or disturbed, or there was a problem of some kind, in other words, the doctors and the psychiatrists of that period of time, and they would try to deal in two ways. One of them was medically, physically, but at the same time, they were always living in a holistic world where everything was interconnected.

And so the medical counted just as much in a spiritual sense as it did in a physical sense, in the way that nowadays, a lot of people rely on faith healing. And even those who don’t rely on faith healing, know that a person’s mindset, or intellectual state, or desire to live, or desire to fight, as opposed to giving up, play a very important part in curing and putting things right. So this so-called Book of Purity, Leviticus, the third book which is called in Hebrew, Torat Kohanim, which is the functioning of the priesthood, is dealing with this general role of the priests to solve problems. And then it moves from there into the role of individuals, because in one sense, the Bible keeps on emphasising we are all priests, we are all capable of functioning on these different levels. Of course, since the temple has gone, the temple functioning of priests has gone out of the window. But nevertheless, the issues of physical health, the physical and the spiritual that come together are very, very important. And as I mentioned last week when we spoke about Mary Douglas and her study of anthropology to explain the technology of sacrifices and how there was a method to the madness, there was a priority, there was the base, the middle, and the top, like Mount Sinai, or like Noah’s flood, Noah’s arc, there are always these different levels in society, levels of people functioning. And many of the traditions that are going to be mentioned now in the part that we’re going to study are based on earlier traditions. Nothing comes from nowhere, everything comes from something else that was there earlier that was then adapted.

So as we’ve mentioned, the Hammurabi Code has lots of laws that we find in the Bible, but they are adapted to a new monotheistic way of looking at things. So the first example we have of bodily disconnect or dislocation, inevitably is the question of birth, the question of the woman’s body functioning in different ways, the way that it functions normally during the month, whatever normal is, and then for a period of time, functions in a different manner. Now these differences of course, are very positive, they’re very important. Without them, there wouldn’t be birth, there wouldn’t be children. But also, they affect the body. They affect the body during the period of pregnancy, they affect the body during the process of birth, in the way that the body is affected every month if you are a woman. And marking these differences just as we mark the differences between the days of the week, the months of the year, the years and the festivals within them, so these differences in the body, in the human body, are dealt with here. And so we start very briefly, with Chapter 12 of Leviticus. So Chapter 12 on the screen, , “And God speaks to Moses and He says,” , “I want you to speak to the children of Israel and say this…” When a woman, Tazria, this is a strange term, zara means the seed, produces a child, , and she gives birth to a male, , she then becomes in a different state. We use the word ta'mah, ta'may, which sometimes can be used in a negative way, but can equally be used in a positive way.

She is in a different state, and so I want to emphasise this term difference, a different state for seven days, which are the normal time of her period. So periods tend to last for, as a general rule, for seven days, and that is then transmitted into Jewish law later on. So that as in Jewish law, we now have the custom that when a period is over and a woman moves into a different state, she goes to the mikvah. Now the mikvah has got nothing to do with cleanliness because you have to be perfectly clean before you go anywhere near it, it is a symbolic way of starting a new phase, just as Noah’s flood covered the earth and started a new phase. And the tradition developed later on, that when we take plates or anything that we are going to use within a religious context, it also goes through this process of water. And so, in the same way, we’re going to see, do men, when their body goes through different changes. But at this moment, we’re talking about the idea of giving birth. And when we talk about the idea of giving birth, if it is a male of course, we know that there’s on the eighth day, going to be this process of circumcision. So we are linking the idea of childbirth with the idea of a covenant, of a covenant between us and God, which is expressed through the male. Now you may well ask, you know, this is ridiculous, why just pick on males for this? Why not females? And in some societies, there is such a thing as female circumcision, but in the case of female circumcision, you are completely removing an organ and you are reducing the possibility of pleasure in life, whereas in circumcision, you are not. No matter what its enemies may suggest, I’ve never heard anybody complain within Judaism, that being circumcised reduces in itself the pleasure one may get. But there is this connection again, between the physical process of the body and then the spiritual element of this covenant with God.

And then what happens is that for 33 days, she remains bid'me ta'ho'rah, in this situation where she is dedicated. Ta'hor is the opposite of ta'mah, it means you have transitioned into another state. But during this time, she should not be coming into the public arena, into the temple. So it’s not that she can’t carry on normally her normal life and her normal relationships, but she cannot get involved in anything to do with the temple. And because men and women went into the temple together regularly all the time, whenever they wanted to, as well as when there were official ceremonies, she was out of the temple. Some people say that this is why she also not to be in the synagogue, but nobody has said that in official Jewish law, although there are superstitions, but that’s a different matter. But if here we have, if ne'qe'bah, she gives birth to a girl, , then it’s not just one week, but it’s two weeks remaining in this special state. And then what happens? That sis'sim yo'wm we'se'set ya'mim, for then 66 days, she remains in this state of purification. And at the end of this period of purification, whether it’s for a son or for a female, at the end of that period, she brings a sin offering to the tabernacle. And this is in itself, an interesting question, why do you bring a sin offering? Let me first of all say, the question of why waiting double the amount for the female can only be explained, again, going back to Mary Douglas in terms of the idea of the bud, the female element, being something so special because of its role of reproduction. And the fact is that if you produce a girl, you are producing more producers for the next generation, whereas the male is in a sense, quite passive in this, but it’s the woman who goes through all the work, and the strain, and the pressure of giving birth.

And therefore, in that sense, the double time waiting for a girl before she can return to the… The mother can return to normal sexual activity again, is not just a question of her recuperating, it’s a question of recognising the significance of the female. And therefore, in that sense, is something holier because the longer you spend in a state of holiness, which this is, than the greater your, shall we say, significance. But then, why bring a sin offering? Now, sin offerings are offered for all kinds of different reasons. They are offered, in a sense, as thanksgiving for having come through a terribly difficult time. But when you come through a difficult time, you are very likely to, in pain, curse, or get angry, or regret, or swear, “I’m never going to go through this again. I’m not going to have any more children.” And therefore, pain sometimes brings out in us, a certain element that might be a negative element. And so that is how, if you like, anthropologically, this sort of process is explained, and I believe it’s drawing on earlier examples, but the issue here is to add the spiritual dimension in a monotheistic format rather than in some other format. So this is the question of offering this sacrifice. In Verse 7, we'hiq’re'bow, she brings this sacrifice to atone to go through the process of transition, and this is the law that applies to a woman who gives birth, male or female. And if they are poor and they can’t afford a big sacrifice, then two little birdies will do, a couple of doves and pigeons, and that is enough for this whole issue. And then in Chapter 13, we are moving into a totally different area altogether, but there is some connection. In other words, we’re going into the issue of illness, sickness.

How do we deal with illness? Now, much of the next couple of chapters is going to be dealt with with something that is often understood as being to do with what we now call leprosy. But this can’t be leprosy, and the reason why it can’t be leprosy is because although it’s true we start off with what happens to the skin, the skin goes through various phases, we’ve all had rashes of some sort at some stage or another. But we’re going to talk about the leprosy, if we are going to use that word, of clothes. Clothes don’t have the leprosy we understand, of Schweitzer’s Centre Lumière in Africa for curing lepers. And not only that, but we are also going to see that it affects houses, stones, buildings as well. So it can’t be what we call leprosy, but it can cover all kinds of things that go wrong in the human body, that go wrong in material, that houses can suffer from things that are dangerous, whether it’s rot of some kind or some sort of decay. And therefore, here comes the priest where something goes wrong, to come in and try and put things right. And so the actual text, if you look at it, the actual text, we start off in Verse 1 with, again, , “God speaks to Moses and to Aaron together.” And notice, when we were talking about childbirth, he talked just to Moses and not Aaron, but now in Chapter 13, where we’re talking about the role of the priest specifically, we are coming on to Moses and Aaron.

And says this, that when a person finds that something’s wrong with his skin, of different kinds, whether it’s the colour of the skin, whether it’s the swelling of the skin, it’s something that is affecting the body and the… In Hebrew, it says, le'ne'ga sa'ra'at, and sa'ra'at is the word that normally is used for leprosy and that’s how sometimes, the translation treats it. But really, sa'ra'at has a root that’s similar but not exact to sa'ra, meaning pain, the first couple of letters, and therefore it is what we would call infection, an infection of some kind, but not necessarily what we call leprosy. So you then come to the priest, to Aaron the high priest, or any one of his sons, any one of the priests, they’re expert in these things, and they’re trained, they’ve gone to medical school, and they have a look at this, and they see in Verse 3 what it is, and they see how it is changing and how it affects the skin to see how deeply this issue is. And if there is a serious issue, then he says, we'tim'me o'tow, he pronounces him impure. But again, impure simply means there is a difference here, and we have to treat this differently to the way we normally treat things. So we’re not going to immediately throw the guy into quarantine or say, you know, you’ve got to be isolated, we want to first of all examine and see what the nature of the problem is. And we give some clues as to when it looks serious or when it doesn’t look serious, and how it affects the skin and the hairs of the skin. And then if it only appears superficially, then the priest will isolate that person for seven days.

And the whole question of isolation is a fascinating one. If you are interested in this whole question of isolation, I would recommend you to a blog called, Talmudology, Talmudology by Dr. Brown, who comes from England, now lives in America, and a big scholar as well as a great rabbi, and he produces these amazing blogs every now and again, or articles on Talmudic themes. And because the Talmud has recently been dealing with laws of infection and isolation, he has written an excellent article from a scientific point of view, examining what the difference is between a medical perspective and a Talmudic perspective, and whether there are in fact, interesting connections between them, and sometimes contradictions. But anyway, when we look at this and we see he’s been in isolation for seven days, on the seventh day, the priest comes along and he has a look and see if there has been no spreading whatsoever, and no spread of any kind, then he goes through another seven days, but then at the end of that period, everything is cleared up and he becomes back to normal. And then you have to go through a process of washing, of cleaning the clothes to make sure nothing attaches to it, or the infection or anything like that.

And that in itself is a fascinating idea, because the idea of spreading infection through clothes is indeed something that happened in the past and it has to be taken into consideration. So he goes through this period, basically it’s a 14 day period. But if then, the rash still spreads and it’s something that looks like really, really serious, then he decides that this is, it says leprosy, but it means something wider than that, this is something that is really, really serious. And such a person then, has to come before the priest again, to a greater, if you like, a greater medical expert, and once again, he has to see what’s happening, and they examine, they go over several times. You have this idea of different opinions being repeated, you don’t just have one medical opinion, you have others. But if it is really bad and it’s really getting serious, then he has… And it’s spreading right throughout the body, he’s into this state of almost permanent isolation until such time as the flesh returns. And then if, Verse 16, Verse 17, the flesh does return and everything gets back to normal, then we are back to a usual skin, a usual state. And then there are other examples of inflammation of the skin, and all these other items are subject to the same process. And once again, I emphasise, this is a process which combines the medical with a ritual, so that they all come together. Now I want to then, just go on, having dealt with all that, I’m moving on to Chapter 14, to sort of still on Chapter 13, but on to Verse 47. Verse 47, going through all these different processes of purification, of shaving hair when it’s necessary on the face or of the head, all of these examples of when things can go wrong, but then it goes on to move from that to something different.

And so I’d like you to look now at Chapter 13, Verse 47. Verse 47… I’m sorry, Verse 46, I just mentioned, that what they specify is that somebody who is consistently effective should live outside of the camp of everybody else, either until he is cured or until they decide that the infection is no longer a risk to other people. So it’s not forever, but it is for a while. Verse 47 talks about what happens to a garment when a garment is stricken with sa'ra'at, with leprosy, whether it’s wool, or whether it’s flax, or whether it’s in a different form within the garment. Is it in the actual weave or is it superficial to the weave? And does it change the colour of the garment? Is that making a difference? And once again, if this happens, then you have to isolate the object, not just the person. So this is an important distinction that this is not a personal thing, this is a superficial thing, but it is garments. And I’m told by medical experts, there’s no such thing as leprosy in garments, that doesn’t make any sense, and therefore, this is an example again, of how we are talking about medical issues beyond that. And similarly, I want you to move on to Chapter 14, Verse 34. Chapter 14, Verse 34. Here we are, Chapter 13. 14. No, let’s start with 33. “And God said to Moses and Aaron, saying…” “When you come into the land of Canaan,” “which I’m giving you as an inheritance,” “there will be very often, plagues in the homes where you are living.” Now this is interesting. First of all, because you use the word sa'ra'at, which is leprosy, to mean applying to the homes.

Now does that mean that it’s automatically going to happen? Or is it going, as God implies, that God will intervene and impose this sickness? Now it’s very interesting, because there’s a general rule in Talmudic interpretation, when you are dealing with a subject and several other subjects, and they share something in common, like we are all dealing here with what we call an affliction of some kind, and in one situation, you apply a qualifying factor, that qualifying factor applies back to all the other subjects we’ve been talking about. So we are saying two things here, that we haven’t said before. The first thing is that this applies to the land of Canaan, and secondly, that it’s a God thing that’s happening. So in one sense, the God thing that’s happening is another way of saying, everything that happens on earth happens as part of the Divine system, as part of how the world functions according to its rules and its regulations. And therefore, we should accept that this is a natural feature of life. So that if somebody gets sick, it’s not necessarily because they’ve done something wrong, it’s not because they’re bad, sickness, illness can affect us all in different ways, that’s part of the natural world. But it also implies that these laws are only supposed to apply to the land of Israel. That if a house goes wrong somewhere else, it doesn’t matter. And this can be understood in two ways. In one way, it could be understood that just as a nation, we are supposed to raise our level spiritually. And coming back to the idea of what does it mean by holy, holiness.

And holiness, I said before, forgive me for repeating again, does not mean better or worse, it means different, trying to be different, but different of course, in a positive way. So when we have a land of our own, we are expected to make it a holy land, and therefore, to pay extra attention to everything that goes on within it. And therefore, if something has gone wrong in a house, just as with our bodies, it might mean we’ve not been paying enough attention. Part of it could be the natural force of events the things that happen, that buildings decline and decay, that we decline and decay. But it could also mean that we might be failing in our ensuring that everything is common for as best as it possibly can be. So here you have something wrong in the house, and so the priest comes along to the house in Verse 35. And also, once again, he has a go to look to see what’s going wrong. And when he sees what’s going wrong, he clears out the house, takes everything out, maybe the house is going to collapse, maybe it’s something in the structure of the house, or maybe it’s some other kind of fungus that’s going to have an effect. He then tries his best to remove that from the building and goes through again, a process of taking things down, taking things apart, putting it back together, and making sure that whether it’s in the stone or the wood, it should be taken care of. And similarly, people who have been living in this house for a while also have to try and clarify and make sure that they’re fine, their clothes are fine, there’s no must and stuff happening to their clothes. And they also then, have at the end, to bring something that is an atonement.

But I want you to look at this word 49, in Chapter 14, Verse 49, you have a fascinating word that is an important one, when I talk about words in the Bible having different meanings that are in opposition to itself. So what we say is, up to now, the house has to be cleansed, everything cleaned out, everything doing fine, and then the priest comes in, lehate et habbayit, to purge or to clean, to purify the house, and doing so, again, with a special sacrifice. Now the word used to purify is lehate. Now, lehate, hate, is the same word as to sin, but it is used in the Torah to purify the house, to purify an altar after it is been, if you like, dirtied up with sacrifices and with blood and everything like that. And so the same word, lehate, which means to sin or to do something bad, also means to do something good, which again means it’s an easy switch, we can switch it, it depends on how we treat it. And so you then take a much more complicated process of purification in the sacrifice than any one we had before, which involves interestingly, cedarwood, and plants, and spices, all things that create a kind of a deodorant effect, if you like, in the house, similar to the way we have our deodorant sprays. And so you take all this wood and this hyssop and this crimson stuff, and of course there’s a little birdie that comes in as well, unfortunately, the purification, and this then purifies or at least transfers the building out of a state of being either uninhabitable or dangerous into one that it is habitable.

And so of the birds that are taken, one is purified and the other is sent to fly away into the countryside and live happily ever after. And those of you who remember the biblical explanation of… Or, sorry, system, of what happens on the Day of Atonement, on Yom Kippur, is the two goats that represent the goats of sin or wrongdoing, one of them is sacrificed and the other one is sent away into the desert. So here too, the process of purification has this ambivalence, this ambiguity, the one that dies, the one that lives, maybe only for a while, that we have, if you like, the past and the future in ourselves, whatever we did, now go through a different phase, and that is the end of that particular process. In Chapter 15, we have a new feature. A new feature, and this is important because this shows that we’ve talked about infection and we’ve talked about when a woman has to go through a process of purification, and now we talk about a man going through a process of purification. He also has to go to the mikvah, Verse 15. Although nowadays, it’s a few like custom rather than obligation, but nevertheless, the principle that the Bible is letting out here at this stage when we are dealing with biblical purity and impurity, says this in Verse 1 of Chapter 15, “And God says to Moses and to Aaron, speak to the children of Israel,” When a man has issues, something comes out of him which is unusual. Now, we know what comes out of this, there’s urine, there’s sperm, these things come out, and normally we can control them, but there are sometimes things where we can’t control our bodies, and therefore, just in the same way that childbirth is something that we can’t control in the way that it works out, maybe in the initiation of it, but in the way it works out, so when something goes wrong, there’s a state of what is called zav, and zav applies to male and to females alike.

This is when something goes wrong, not externally on the body, but internally, something is not functioning effectively internally. And this applies also, actually, after having sex. And so anything that then goes through this process of coming into contact with an unusual discharge, also involves cleansing and washing. But notice, washing can mean in water, but also beforehand, has to be washing before you even go anywhere near the water. And this can affect anything that somebody touches in this state of what’s called flux or discharge, it’s called in Hebrew, zav. And so the zav also is a case of somebody who has to go through a similar process to leprosy, or when you have childbirth, going through this process of returning to a normal state in a symbolic form. So this is the last of the issues of purity and impurity that we’ve been dealing up to now, and the subject ends at that particular point. And now we start a completely new chapter altogether, Chapter 16, which talks about initially, the deaths… Harks back to the deaths of the two sons of Aaron when they brought forth something into the tabernacle they shouldn’t have done. And you wonder why again, does that not come consistently? When we previously learned about the deaths of the two sons of Aaron last week, why don’t they put these things together?

Why do they bring them out in this way? Now, one way can be to reiterate the idea that a lot depends on how we be behave as to how we are supposed to deal with the things that we behave with, but also to understand the idea that everybody makes mistakes. Just like those two make mistakes, we don’t all suffer from fire coming out of heaven, but nevertheless, we do. And part of this sin offering that even priests have to go through, has part of this same similar idea. But now we are talking specifically about the preparation for Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. And in the Day of Atonement, these guys have to get dressed in nice clothes, and then they have to bring their atonement. And then you have in Verse 7, the reference to these two goats, these two goats that are sacrificed in the temple, in which in Verse 8 Aaron says, these two goats are then placed in a lottery. We find some sort of special way of dividing these, one goes to God and the other goes to az'azel. Now what this word az'azel means is very complicated. Those of you who know Hebrew will say la'az'azel is another way of saying go to hell. Now what the word az'azel means can be understood in a sense, in terms of words as, az as a goat, el, and going, a goat going out, as opposed to a goat going in. So the goat going in is sacrificed to God in the temple, the goat that goes out, goes out.

Some people say this is a reference to going to a terrible end, but then they both go to terrible ends in one way or another. And some people say it’s the name of some ancient God that somehow crept into the temple or became absorbed into ancient Israel tradition, but the truth of the matter is it’s not used anywhere else. If it would be that, you’d expect to find it somewhere else because many of the other gods, like Baal for example, are mentioned elsewhere, whereas this az'azel is specifically here. And again, it’s rather like we mentioned before on the two doves, the two doves that are brought as an atonement, when one’s done something wrong, one stays and the other one goes out into somewhere else. So we are mentioning again, this dual theme of the sin being something which is a Divine thing and something which is a human thing, something which is part of nature and something which is part of our decision making. And so they go through this process, they add on the question of incense to it, and they atone for everybody, the community in general, but also the priest himself has to go through atonement because the priest certainly will have done something wrong. And another important thing that is mentioned here, which is mentioned several times, is in Verse 21, that before the actual sacrifice, Aaron has to place his hands on the living goat and he has to confess for all the sins of the children of Israel, for all the things that they have done.

And then it gets sent out into the desert with some nice man who takes it through the temple, through the gates of Jerusalem, into the wilderness. So this idea of putting one’s hand on an animal before sacrificing it is very important, partially because I’ve mentioned previously, in regard to temple grand and the idea of having a personal relationship, in a sense, with the animal, of touching the animal, of making the animal calm down a little bit, of feeling there but for the grace of God, go I. And this then, in a sense, atones for the whole of the people. And yet the question is, can we atone for everybody? Surely, we have to atone for ourselves. And that’s why the term is mentioned here in Verse 21, we'hit'wad'dah, we have to confess, and that’s one of the reasons why on Yom Kippur, in the prayers that we have, we have this constant repetition of confessing. I confess, I confess, I confess, I know I’ve done wrong, and some of the things that I’m confessing to, I never did do. I didn’t kill anybody, I didn’t necessarily steal from anybody, I didn’t necessarily misbehave in the ways that are mentioned, but we are talking about doing this for the community. So there are two levels of atonement, there’s communal atonement, but that works for community, it doesn’t work for us as individuals.

For us as individuals, atonement can only come when we ourselves actually atone for that. And then, the poor little goat goes out into the wilderness, the whole question of purification carries on, and this day, Verse 30, becomes the Yom ha Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It is Shabbat, Shabbaton, a Sabbath of Sabbaths. And so it is a Sabbath, and I come back to something we’ve said before, that whether the Day of Atonement is more important than the Sabbath, or Sabbath more important than the Day of Atonement, it is both. And then the priest who is anointed does this and speaks to everybody on this specific occasion. So here we have the Day of Atonement coming as part of this general statement of atonement for what we are going to do. And we carry on with the purpose of the sacrifices, which says very specifically in Chapter 17, Verse 7, that… I don’t want you to sacrifice to all the other things, to other the images and the idols and the animals that other people do, this I’m restricting for you as a way of weaning you off, which is what says, is the purpose of the sacrifice. And not only that, but this is open to everybody. In Verse 8, it’s to the stranger, and anybody else who wants to come and join in this, can join in this whole system. And that includes the stranger who comes, and the question is, does that mean a convert? It doesn’t specify a convert, all that’s specified is hag'ger hag'gar, the stranger that comes and lives and this process goes on. And there, we stop. We are going to start again next week, Chapter 18, when we are going to turn now, to something entirely different. From the sacrificial system and from talking about the community in general, we are now going to come next week, to personal sexual behaviour. And on that happy note, I stop sharing and I come to look at the questions we have for today.

Q&A and Comments:

Q: Israel asked, you keep referring to difference, and I’ve always thought of as being spiritually different. The issue of spiritual status has always been fascinating to me, and I wondered whether the person felt the difference or was it only an external difference based on the criteria listed in the Torah?

A: That’s an excellent point, Israel. I think I hinted at it, but I do agree with you. Difference is on two levels, it’s on a physical level and a spiritual level, and many people are different physically and not spiritually. And this also explains why very often, you find people who are very religious behaving in a very non-religious way, which disturbs me, and I believe the two should be coming together. But nevertheless, the Torah is concerned with let’s at least get the right behaviour down, let’s get you behaving in a way that is likely to remind you of what you should be doing even though we know it often doesn’t work, but it’s aspirational, if you like, rather than in reality. And the whole of the Torah is predicated on this dream perfection world we should aspire to, the 40 days and 40 nights on Mount Sinai, whereas we know it doesn’t work that way.

Thank you, Romaine. But please, by the way, Israel, if you want to take this up with me by email, I’d be happy to take it further with you. Israel again, I’d like…

Oh, sorry, Paula or Sula? I’m not sure. Yes, Sula Shepept.

Q: Which of these diseases, they isolate the person, does it mention in the Bible that the person is infectious?

A: Yes, it does. It mentions the fact that in this state, they can affect other people, and that’s why by implication, the fact that they go into isolation means they may well be infectious, but not everything is infectious and that’s why we need the priest to clarify beforehand.

Q: So Israel, I would like to relate to the house along the same lines as my first question, what is a spiritual aspect of sa'ra'at in a house? You seem to dwell on the physical manifestation of the condition, and I also thought it was to a large extent, spiritual status of the house. What are your thoughts on this?

A: That’s an excellent question again, Israel. A brilliant question. Technically, when we look at this again, the infection is an infection of the physical, but it carries with it an implication that we have not done all we could have done to ensure the purity of the house. And therefore, that by implication, again comes back to the question of our spirituality is somehow infected. But just as in the case of the sickness, we emphasise that it doesn’t only happen because you have misbehaved. Remember, we are talking about the purity implied by God and the impurity, and that implied by man. And so what we’ve said is certain things that happen in this world are part of the natural system of this world. We don’t necessarily do anything wrong to cause an earthquake or to cause a tsunami. It’s wrong if we happen to get in the way of it, but that is the natural process of the world, how it’s the earth is designed to have volcanoes and they erupt and they cause a problem. So certain things happen because they’re part of the natural world, and certain things happen because we don’t take enough care to make sure we live in the right place and not on the San Andreas Fault.

Susan, thank you. I’m glad you found this interesting. I find it very difficult in a way, to talk about subjects of sacrifices and purity, because they’re not applicable anymore. They are interesting historically, but not everybody’s interested in the history, and to us moderns, it does sound pretty weird.

Thank you Carla B., a very happy 2024. And thank you Dawn Anne, to you, and to Clara, nice to hear from you.

Q: And from Carol’s iPad, is the fact that Jesus died for our sins comes from putting our sins on the goat and the sacrifice?

A: Oh, yes, I think that’s right. I think that’s how Christianity adapted it and implied this idea of dying for our sins in a way that we don’t. We don’t say that somebody can atone for somebody else, or somebody can die for somebody else. That’s very clear in Deuteronomy, we’re going to say very clearly, a person shouldn’t die for other people or to atone for other people.

Rita, thank you. Happy 2024 to everybody and to us all, and may the world be a better place.

Q: And finally, Marsha, is there some reason that Leviticus starts with verse 12 with childbirth, what is not an illness, and then moves on to diseases? What’s the significance?

A: Simply as I suggested, Marsha, our body goes through changes. Some of it’s natural, some of it’s part of the Divine will, that God mentioned that we should have children. So it’s not because one does something wrong or anything like that, but the body does, and the body needs time to recover and to recuperate, and women need time to recuperate, and shouldn’t be bounced on immediately by the male who wants to have another baby as quickly as possible. So I think that is the significance. And so on that, I will say goodbye to everybody, and please God, see you next week.