Torah Study Blog

The current pandemic has caused Rabbi Jaech to ponder social isolation from community and, specifically, to look at how people suffering from leprosy were isolated from their communities in biblical times. As a reminder, biblical leprosy is not the Hansen’s Disease that we know about today, but it is any type of white, scaly skin infliction. This infliction might have been short-lived or life-lasting. In biblical times, people believed that inflictions were a sign of God’s displeasure. The infliction was concrete proof that the person must have sinned in some way. It would have been imperative to keep God’s displeasure away from the entire community, so those suffering from the skin affliction were forced to live apart from their communities until they no longer showed signs of the disease.

Just as it was the job of a priest to examine a patient and pronounce if a person does or does not have leprosy, it was also the job of the priest to announce if a person had been healed (Leviticus 14). Because the infliction must have originally come from God, there needed to be some sort of ritual to reset the balance and acknowledge God’s part in the cure. When the patient was declared healed, a ritual involving two birds was performed: one bird was sacrificed to God and its blood would mingle with water. The second bird would be dipped in the bloody water and released – we can envision the infliction being carried away on the bird as it flies away.

Leviticus 16 tells us about the ritual of the scape-goat, which has echoes with this bird ritual and is used to remove the sins of the entire community. Two male goats were offered and, through a drawing of lots, one was selected to be sacrificed. The other goat was left alive and the priest, “shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat and confess over it all the iniquities and transgressions of the Israelites, whatever the sins, putting them on the head of the goat; and it shall be sent off to the wilderness through a designated man. Thus the goat shall carry on it all their iniquities to an inaccessible region; and the goat shall be set free in the wilderness” (Leviticus 16:21-22).

The Mishnah contains a passage, from around 200 CE, that the scapegoat is actually pushed over a cliff, although that detail is not in the Bible. We can imagine that the people would not have wanted the goat that the sins and inequities of the community had been heaped upon to find its way back.

In traditional Jewish communities, the scapegoat passage from Leviticus is read at the Jewish New Year. Interestingly, as our scholar-in-residence, David Sperling, reminds us, we should never assume that what we see in the Bible was unique to Judaism. In 8th century BCE Babylon there was a New Year ritual where a priest would slaughter a ram in an effort to purify the sanctuary. The priest was then supposed to take the body of the ram and go out into the open country and throw the body into the river.

Although we are in an age of science, the fact is that some superstitions become codified into the normal pattern of life. There are, undoubtedly, people who want to try to assign blame for this pandemic. “Is this God’s way of showing his anger with us?” Or, “Is this Mother Nature’s response to human transgression?”

Ritual provides comfort. Because of the current pandemic, the structure of our normal days has been overturned and we have entered a time of tragedy and rupture. It is human nature to turn to ritual to guide us in times of uncertainty. Six months ago, if we had experienced the tragedy of a death in the family, we would be surrounded by family and friends offering the warm embrace of comfort and the abundance of love provided in the form of gifts of food. Rabbi Jaech acknowledges that a Zoom funeral is better than nothing, but it is not the same feeling as the literal embrace of the community.

Rabbi Jaech asked what kind of rituals we have found helpful during this pandemic. Some have found keeping to a schedule to be helpful. Some have found continuing with regular activities – like Saturday Torah Study – to be helpful, even though we are doing so over Zoom. Some have found an outlet through beautiful art – thank you for sharing your art, Jeffrey Schrier.

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Misquotes or misunderstandings in what Rabbi Jaech taught us are the responsibility of Tara Keiter