Tag: childbirth

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Discussions Prophets and Writings Torah

Born separated from God, made pure: How Israel’s offerings for childbirth and ‘leprosy’ teach us about Messiah’s cleansing of humanity (Leviticus 12–13)

Born separated, made pure: How Israel's offerings for childbirth and leprosy' teach us about Messiah's cleansing of humanity (Leviticus 12-13). Adobe Firefly-generated artwork shows an ancient Israeli woman holding a newborn girl.

People are often repulsed by the Torah descriptions of “leprosy” and skin diseases in Torah readings Tazria (Leviticus 12–13) and Metzorah (Leviticus 14–15) because they focus only on the physical aspects and miss the weightier spiritual lessons. This study explores how “leprosy” here represented a condition of spiritual rot from separation from God.

While unpleasant to consider physically, examining it spiritually reveals how humanity is born in a state of separation since Eden — also taught via the sin offering for childbirth in Tazria — and God’s gracious provision to redeem and purify people through faith in him. Messiah (Christ) takes this spiritual rot and separation upon Himself to cleanse all who trust in Him as Heaven’s lifeline to the world.

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Discussions Torah

Leviticus 12–15: Dishing and spreading the dirt is easy; preventing its spread is hard

A closeup view of Mycobacterium leprae bacteria inside human body. The bacteria causes Hansen's disease, aka leprosy. (COMPOSITE OF FREEIMAGES.COM/ANDRZEJ POBIEDZIŃSKI & RDMAG.COM/AP)

What does childbirth have to do with leprosy? Why do new mothers and babies need sin offerings? How is leprosy connected to gossip and slander? In this study of Leviticus 12–15, we will be taking a step up and a step back the topics discussed. Some of it is unsettling, and it is easy to lose ourselves in some of the more distasteful details, while forgetting the important life lessons the Holy One of Yisra’el is communicating to us.

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Discussions Torah

Leviticus 12-13: Profanity makes one a leper

Cleansing of the Ten Lepers from the Codex Aureus Epternacensis (WIkimedia Commons image)

Life starts with contamination. It starts out dirty. Childbirth is messy. It’s not sinful; it’s just a fact of life.

The general Bible term for infections of skin and surfaces is “leprosy,” but it covers a host of conditions. It’s also a good parable for “rot” in our character — if the lesson isn’t taken too far.

The Torah reading תזריע Tazria (“she will conceive,” Leviticus 12–13) is concerned about what is physically dirty vs. clean, but the LORD’s lesson for us is more than skin-deep.

Categories
Discussions Torah

Leviticus 11-12 — ‘unclean’ vs. ‘abomination’ in meat; purification of women after childbirth

The phrase “unclean” and “abomination” are different words. The reason that God introduces certain animals clean and fit to eat versus unclean and unfit to eat is a lesson to us to look at the character of the animals. The length of a woman’s purification is twice as long for a female child as a male child. Liberals claim this is about a lack of thankfulness for the female child, but the real issue is the health of the mother after childbirth.