Parshat Hashavua
From Far And Near
We can reach God by engaging with the world around us and connecting to others and the earth.
A New Look At Philanthropy
The commandment to leave behind some of the harvest for the poor challenges our assumptions about to whom the food belongs in the first place.
The Threat And Promise Of Conformity
We can learn from and adopt only those practices foreign to Judaism that enhance and strengthen Jewish practice.
Sensitivity To Speech
Rabbinic interpreters regarded leprosy as punishment for the sin of careless speech.
Parental Sacrifice
The burnt offering and the sin offering that a woman brings after childbirth symbolize the dual nature of parenting.
Recipe For Purity
An internal process of repentance must accompany the external, physical cleansing for leprosy.
Better Than God?
The ritual of circumcision allows us to partner with God in the covenant and also in perfecting creation.
Cycles Of Life, Death, And Purification
The cycle of life and death represented by leprosy encourages us to bring acts of purity into our lives even when we have become impure.
The Cursed House
The image of a house afflicted with a plague encourages us to examine what real and metaphorical plagues afflict our own homes and societies.
Parashat Metzora: Summary
God describes the purification ritual for people and homes afflicted with leprosy; God also instructs Moses and Aaron regarding the laws of the emission of bodily fluids.