T orah P ortion
The Unbearable Lightness of
Tazria-Metzora BY RABBI GLENN ETTMAN
Parshat Tazria-Metzora
I HAVE TAZRIA! Great! I
am the rabbi that gets to write
about the diseases of the Bible.

Even though, in a year like
this one, we can connect even
deeper with the idea of infec-
tious diseases, Tazria-Metzora,
the double Torah portion for this
week, is challenging. Someone
with tzaraat (this disease) has to
be banished from the commu-
nity, to quarantine and to stay
safe in order to protect the
sanctity of the larger community.

This idea sounds familiar,
doesn’t it? For a whole year, we
have dealt with the challenges
of quarantine. But also, for
a whole year we have begun
to see some of the beautiful
elements of slowing down,
looking around and embracing
elements of newness in our
lives. Tazria-Metzora gives us
an opportunity to see things a
little differently.

In the beginning of the
parsha, we read about what
happens when someone has
tzaraat and the causes to be
put outside of the community.

Many of us know all too well
the anxiety of being away, not
allowed to be with a group and
isolated from what is comfort-
able, known and familiar.

Maybe there is a reason
in being outside other than
quarantining the illnesses of
the community. Maimonides
explains that tzaraat is not a
natural phenomenon but a sign
to warn the people of Israel not
to say evil things about each
other. The time outside of the
community was a time for the
person to think about what s/he
has said or done.

When we find ourselves
outside our world of comfort
or regular life, we are not lost;
rather, we are in something
called liminal space. The
concept of liminal space was
most famously posited by the
cultural anthropologist, Victor
Turner, who writes extensively
about the need for humans
to strive to find a commu-
nity of like mindedness and
togetherness. Vacillating on the idea of
liminality, or the feeling of being
in-between and lost, and the need
for communitas, the deep sense
of what a community provides,
Turner shows that humans are
programmed to strive to find
togetherness. When we find
ourselves in this liminal space,
however, we are more open to
realize the beauty and newness
of what is around us.

Tazria is liminal space.

Perhaps Maimonides is onto
something that being outside
our camp of comfort is the time
we are forced to stop and think,
to take stock of what is going on
and pause the frantic rhythms
of our lives.

It is kind of like the Israelites,
wandering in the desert. They
are neither here nor there, but
they are somewhere. Sure, they
kvetch about missing the fish
and cucumbers of oppression
and they yearn for the savory
milk and honey of freedom and
complain that they feel like they
are nowhere, but they are not.

They are actually somewhere.

And that somewhere is a
wondrous place.

They are in a desert of
possibility — both literal and
metaphoric. A place of reds and
yellows and oranges reflecting
off of the horizon. A cool
breeze bringing on the evening
crispness. The blossoming of
something new. A white flower
blooming on the coarse cactus
which reveals the possibilities if
you look at it right.

The liminal space, and the
darkness of feeling nowhere
in the desert, can really be the
illumination of being somewhere.

I used to think about this a
lot in the airport. People come
and people go; people are never
really there. They are always
moving from one place to the
next — going home. Coming
back from vacation. Stuck in the
seemingly non-space of a sterile
terminal. Anxiously awaiting
the next leg of your journey.

CAN DL E L IGHTIN G
April 16
April 23
But while you are not physi-
cally at home or actually at your
final destination, you are not
nowhere. You are somewhere.

Looking at the numbers at the
gate allows you to take time
from your frantic running and
important emails.

Marveling at the beauty of
what is beyond the windows gives
us a chance to think and realize.

The “non-space” of transit, this
liminal moment is really only
in our minds. The perceived
non-space is the actualized
somewhere of great possibility.

Where so much can happen.

The Israelites are in the
desert which, while it can be
liminal space, is the place of
revelation, inspiration and
realization. God did not reveal
Torah to the people in Egypt or
in the Promised Land. It was in
the desert, this liminal space,
that we received the Torah!
This Torah portion reminds
us that it is OK to enter into the
non-space and encounter the
liminal moments in our lives in
order to have these revelations.

While the laws concerning
quarantining skin disease, in
the Bible, and in our personal
recent experience, can seem
like a sentence of separation,
we need to realize that value of
what Maimonides has taught us
because it forces us to stop, and
think, and evaluate.

Tazria-Metzora comes at the
7:22 p.m.

7:30 p.m.

right time for each of us as
we now are beginning to see
new hope on the horizon with
vaccines, but we must never lose
sight of what we have learned
and what we can use in our
future. It is about perspective.

Being outside our respective
camps of comfort of everyday
life has helped many people
see greater beauty and have a
greater connection to others.

These are the lessons that
we must continue to take with
us as live our lives boldly in
the coming weeks. Ask yourself,
how are you going to handle the
“outside”? How are you going to
cope with the difficult and the
liminal? Are you ready for the
new to be revealed?
The darkness of an
encroaching ending is really the
illumination of a new begin-
ning. It is all in how you look at
it. I have Tazria! Great! l
Rabbi Glenn Ettman is the senior
rabbi at Congregation Or Ami in
Lafayette Hill. The Board of Rabbis
of Greater Philadelphia is proud to
provide diverse perspectives on
Torah commentary for the Jewish
Exponent. The opinions expressed
in this column are the author’s own
and do not reflect the view of the
Board of Rabbis.

Be heard.

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APRIL 15, 2021
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