Parsha for Kids: Metzora 2023
Below is the transcript for this week’s episode of Parsha for Kids, Metzora 2023.
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Season 3 Episode 5:
Hello! My name is Chana and this is Parsha for Kids. The Parsha of the week is Metzora. Metzora means “a person who has tzaraat, a spiritual skin condition.”
Once again, some of the ideas in this week’s podcast are taken from The Little Midrash Says.
Our parsha opens with the question of how a metzora ultimately becomes pure, tahor, again. As we already know, there are a variety of sins that can cause tzaraat. One of the main ones is lashon hara, evil speech. The Midrash notes that the very word metzora, someone who has tzaraat, can hint to the words motzi ra, someone who speaks evil.
Once the metzora does teshuva, God made the white spots on their skin disappear. A kohen would be called to examine the metzora. The kohen would walk all the way outside the camp (or in the time of the Beit Hamikdash, outside the walled city) to examine the individual. If the kohen no longer found signs of tumah, spiritual impurity, he would say, “We will now start to make you tahor, pure. Today is the first day of your tahara. On the eighth day of this tahara process you will become completely pure and you can go back inside of the camp and join your family.”
The kohen ordered an earthenware bowl filled with fresh spring water to be brought to him. He asked to be given two birds of the same species. He killed the first bird over the spring water and squeezed its blood into the bowl. He then buried this slaughtered bird.
The kohen took a stick of cedarwood, an ezov, which means a hyssop branch, and a red string. He used the red string to tie the cedarwood and hyssop branch together. He took the second bird, which wawa still alive, and dipped it and the tied branches into the bloody water. He sprinkled some of the water seven times on the back of the metzora’s hand. He sent the living bird away. If it came back, he sent it away again until it flew away and didn’t come back anymore.
The kohen shaved all the hair on the metzora’s body. The metzora dipped himself and his clothes in a mikvah, which means a natural body of water (like a stream or rainwater).
The metzora counted seven days and on the seventh day the kohen shaved him a second time. Again, the metzora dipped himself and his clothes in a mikvah. Finally, on the eighth day the metzora offered special korbanot. He had to bring a chatas, an asham, an olah and a mincha. The kohen put some blood of the asham offering and some oil on the metzora.
After all of this was concluded, the Jew was no longer a metzora and was able to return to his family. He felt extremely happy because he was again able to be with people he loved and to return to the community.
This person would probably be extra careful not to speak lashon hara again, given how severe and impactful the consequences he experienced were.
TRANSITION
The procedure to transition a metzora from being tamei to being tahor was very unusual. Why did the kohen need to bundle together wood from a cedar tree and from a hyssop bush, and tie both with a red thread? Why did he need to kill one bird, spilling its blood into the bucket of water, but let the other bird go free?
There is a lot of symbolism in this offering.
The Talmud notes that birds needed to be used to purify the metzora because a bird chirps constantly. God was hinting to the metzora, “You acted like a bird! You talked and talked without watching your speech or thinking about the harm it might cause.”
Rashi notes that wood from a cedar tree and wood from a hyssop bush are opposites. A cedar tree is tall and symbolizes might, haughtiness and arrogance. A hyssop bush is low to the ground and symbolizes humility. The red string that binds them received its red color from berries on a bush that was infested with worms. Rashi understands the symbolism here as God saying to the metzora, “You thought you were so high and mighty that you could commit a sin because you were better than another person. For example, maybe you spoke lashon hara because you looked down on someone else and thought they were beneath you. But what you need to learn is to be humble, like the lowly worm or hyssop bush.” That transformation from being arrogant to being humble is symbolized by these items.
Rabbi Ari Kahn is the Director of an overseas program at Bar-Ilan University, where he also teaches. He lives in Givat Ze’ev, where he serves as Rabbi of the Mishkan Etrog community. Rabbi Kahn studied with Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik and Rabbi Aaron Lichtenstein. He is the author of a number of fascinating books, including a series on the parsha called Echoes of Eden. He also has his own podcast series on Apple Podcasts and YUTorah called YU Torah R’ Ari Kahn. In Rabbi Kahn’s explanation of the metzora’s korban, he notes something else. The items used in the purification of the metzora- cedar wood, hyssop wood and blood- are also used when a kohen purifies someone who came into contact with the dead, through offering a korban called the Parah Adumah, or Red Cow.
Several of these items also appeared in Egypt when we offered the Korban Pesach. There was the blood of the lamb offering, which we smeared on the doorposts using bundles of hyssop. Here too there is a connection to death, where smearing the blood on the doorposts would make God pass over the Jewish houses and not kill their firstborn children.
A metzora is compared to a dead person. And part of his remedy- the transformation during which he rejoins the community- involves the killing of one bird while the other one goes free. The bird that is killed hints to the metzora, “If you speak lashon hara, you cause other people trouble and maybe even death.” But the bird that stays alive and is sent free hints to the idea that everyone is capable of returning to God. Rabbi Kahn explains that the bird used was a special bird called a dror that used to nest outside of the Beit Hamikdash, or Temple. Thus, the same way the bird went back to God, the metzora could return to God.
TRANSITION
Our parsha now shifts to teach us that not only can tzaraat come upon people or clothing, but it can also come upon houses. Why would God cause tzaraat spots to appear upon the walls of houses?
The Midrash offers several answers.
It was a punishment for a Jew who refused to be generous. This Jew would not open his home to those who needed food, tzedaka, a loan or any other kind of help. God therefore caused Tzaraat to break out on the walls of the home. The house had to be locked up by the kohen, so the owner could not enter his own house, just like he had closed his doors to other people who needed help.
This was a smaller punishment before the Jew might receive tzaraat on his own skin. Perhaps just having tzaraat on the house would be enough to encourage this Jew to do teshuva, repent and return to God.
It helped make Eretz Yisrael a land of kedusha, holiness. When Bnei Yisrael originally settled in the land of Canaan, some of them just moved into homes that had previously belonged to idolaters and that had been built in honor of those idols. God wanted those homes destroyed so He made tzaraat break out on the walls of those homes.
Surprisingly, tzaraat on the walls could sometimes be a reward. This was because the Canaanites would sometimes brick up their gold, silver and precious objects in the walls when they heard Bnei Yisrael were coming to conquer the land of Israel. When tzaraat spots appeared on the walls, the stones had to be removed- and the Jew would discover hidden treasure!
What exactly happened when a house had tzaraat?
When a Jew found a red or green spot on his wall he called a kohen and told him about it. Before the kohen arrived, the Jew had to clear all of his and his family’s belongings out of their home. That way the belongings would not become tamei if the kohen needed to lock up the house.
If the home was tamei, the kohen would lock up the house for seven days. After seven days, he would check again. If the spots had disappeared or turned lighter, the kohen would say the house was pure. If not, however, the kohen had to lock up the house for a second week. But first they would need to cut out all the stones with spots and replace them with new ones.
If the tzaraat returned to the new stones at the end of the second week, the kohen locked up the house for a third week, but only after the owner had removed the spotted stones again and replaced them with fresh stones. If at the end of the third week, the spots had appeared again, the entire house needed to be destroyed.
If the spots did not come back, the owner could go back to his home, but first it needed to be cleansed. This was done in the same way a metzora became pure. Two birds were taken, one of which was slaughtered and the other sent away to freedom. Some of the slaughtered bird’s blood was mixed with spring water in a bowl. A cedar stick and a hyssop branch were tied together with a red string and dipped in the bloody water. Then the bloody water was sprinkled seven times on the doorposts of the house.
TRANSITION
So here’s what we learned this week!
Sometimes when people sin, it is because they think they are better than other human beings. When someone is arrogant, that is not a good thing. The way to fix this is to become more humble.
There is a lot of symbolism in the process through which a metzora becomes pure.
There are many reasons someone’s house might have tzaraat. One of the more surprising ones is that God actually wants to reward the person by having them discover hidden treasure! This is a good lesson that sometimes a situation that seems bad may actually be for a person’s benefit.
If you have any questions or comments on this week’s episode, please email me at parsha4kids@gmail.com. That’s parsha the number 4 kids at gmail.com. Good Shabbos!