by Rabbi Avi Billet
A man who was afflicted with tzaraas was given clearance by the Kohen, but even after washing his clothes, shaving his hair and dunking in a mikveh, and returning to the camp, וְיָשַׁ֛ב מִח֥וּץ לְאָהֳל֖וֹ שִׁבְעַ֥ת יָמִֽים. He still needs to camp outside his own tent for a week.
He’s almost there! He’s gone through the transformation! He’s examined his deeds, he’s merited to have the tzaraas disappear. He can go home! His job is done!
But he has to wait outside his tent for another week! How could this be?
The Alshikh explains that it’s true he went through an important process, but the most important process begins when he is on the threshold of his house when he is barred from entry. Because it’s only אחר רבוי ימים יתחיל לתקן העבירות. After a slightly extended period of days, he can truly begin to make a tikkun (corrective) for his sins. A process is one thing to begin. But if a real transformation in a person’s approach hasn’t occurred there is no home to which one can return. Externals are wonderful. "I’m not demonstrably speaking lashon hara. I am not exhibiting signs of stinginess. But has my heart changed as well?"
When there is no internal change, there is nothing to talk about. (Think of Hamas and their supporters. As long as they maintain their charter and have their eyes on the land of Israel being completely Judenrein, there is nothing to talk about. They can “say” whatever they like. But if there isn’t an internal change as well, it is worthless.)
The Alshikh further explains: when a person merits to return to the camp – this is the Holy Camp. However, he is not ready to re-enter his own domain. It’s one thing to settle one’s score with others. In a way it is much easier. But how does one settle the score with oneself? The soul needs its own personal tikkun.
Remember how Yaakov worked 7 years to marry Rachel? And the Torah describes those years as if they were days (ויהיו בעיניו כימים אחדים)? The Alshikh employs a reverse equation here. That ימי שנותיו שבעים שנה are alluded to in this seven day period. When the seven day period is over, it becomes, in a sense, a rebirth for the person. 70 years – a lifetime! – has passed. You’re outside your home. You see day to day life going on, and you can’t be a part of it. Its almost like the final scene in Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town.” You’re watching life go on, but you’re not in it – it is passing you by and you’re at best just a fly on the wall.
Seven days feels like an eternity. But in truth, that seven day period – which is a day of further introspection, of furthering our commitment to changing beyond the externals and changing the heart – can is very liberating. When we finally understand why we’re waiting outside, we know who we are, and we see what real change needs to take place in order to return home. "What must I do? And what can I expect of others in order to achieve that coveted return to the home?"
Some of the commentaries utilize the gemaras in Moed Katan 15 and Krisus 8 that say his being forbidden from returning home is a metaphor to returning to his wife. In other words, his inability to return home means that marital relations are forbidden for another week.
The Vilna Gaon [as seen in the ktav v’hakabbalah] points to the Mishnah in the last chapter of Negaim that says he is both מנודה מביתו שבעת ימים ואסור בתשמיש המטה. He may not enter his house, and marital relations are also forbidden. In simple terms, this means his wife can’t visit him outside either.
Some point out the disparity. If it were a woman who had tzaraas, the prohibition against marital relations would not apply – it says מחוץ לאהלו and not מחוץ לאהלה. It’s only the man who was a metzora who had this prohibition. The Torah Temimah suggests a reason, that perhaps the 7-days that the man waits outside is reminiscent of the 7 days the woman waits in her taharah reality before she actually goes to the mikveh. It is a precautionary preventative to avoid a prohibition. It’s to be sure that in case a relapse occurs – in the metzora’s case through the return of tzaraas – they will not have been living in sin. He was tameh for a while, now he is having 7 pure days to prepare for their reunion.
Why is the additional week-long prohibition only on the man when he had tzaraas, and not on the woman if she had tzaraas? The Torah Temimah explains, because we don’t want her to become further denigrated in the eyes of her husband.
Why should there be a difference? Don’t the marital relations involve both parties anyway? Perhaps the Torah is suggesting a sociological reality. All of the laws of tzaraat are addressed in the masculine. Except when it said in last week’s parsha that if a “man or a woman” has the mark. Both could get tzaraas, but it may be more likely that a man would get it.
Could it be that the attainment of tzaraas was more common in men than in women? It could be that it’s basically expected that a man will go through this process. But a woman? Could a woman be as guilty as a man?
Speaking in generalities – the sins which the gemara claim caused tzaraas are lashon hora (slander and gossip), murder, swearing in vain, immorality, haughtiness, theft, and stinginess. Surely women can do these too, but it can be argued anecdotally (and perhaps statistically) that men have cornered the majority in most of these markets.
A man will deal with the embarrassment, the stigma, and may even roll his eyes when it comes around again. He looks good bald and he doesn’t mind having no eyebrows. For her, however, the ordeal itself, plus the removal of the eyebrows is devastating enough! Don’t further bring her down through keeping her separated from her husband, who she, of all people, really needs after her ordeal, to help her cope with her new reality. This is a wonderful example of the Torah showing sensitivity to a woman’s needs.
Most men, on the other hand, don’t put as much stock in their looks as their female counterparts. And if they need to go rugged another week, they accept it as the price to pay, and understand that the transformation is not complete without this week. And so this week becomes a time of thought, introspection, commitment, and real change.
No matter the arena in which one sees a seven-day waiting period being utilized, the final 7 day period, of being so close and yet so far, is meant to drive home the idea that just because a negative ordeal seems over, it is not over yet until the person has gone through the complete process that was the purpose of the project to begin with.
This is the problem with every “ceasefire” deal in Israel. It is the complication in every discussion surrounding the future of some ephemeral “Palestine” when there is no acknowledging the pervasive attitude that wants all the Jews dead, and for Israel to no longer exist.
For a former metzora, it is understanding the real nature of the act that put the tzaraas ordeal in motion and making a real move to change.
For a husband, it’s a different kind of appreciation of his wife.
For a wife, her emotional needs become increasingly clear to her husband.
And perhaps, to stretch the thought to the coming holiday, the 7 day period when we are out of our comfort zone – with no hametz – maybe it is to help us appreciate what we have throughout the year just a little more.
No comments:
Post a Comment