Some people studying the Torah portion תזריע Tazria (“she will conceive,” Leviticus 12–13) enjoy picking apart the descriptions of the צָרַעַת Tzaraat, commonly translated as “leprosy,” to see how they similar to or different from skin ailments that are known in our modern age.
But such speculations distract us from the most important lesson of Tzaraat: It was primarily a spiritual disease, not a physical ailment. God used it to correct those with לשון הרע lashon ha-ra the “evil tongue”: gossips and slanderers. Those actions came either temporarily, as He did to Miriam, the sister of Moses, or as a life sentence as he did to King Uzziah and Gehazi, the servant of Elisha.
