May 2nd: Tazria/Metzorah
THIS WEEK IN THE TORAH
Rabbi David E. Ostrich
Recently, in the Centre Daily Times Clergy Column, my colleague Reverend Jes Kast (Faith United Church of Christ) wrote about her deep Christian faith despite the foibles and failures of religion. She mourns that some people-of-faith “bow down to power and prestige,” that they “have a hard time extending God’s love to others,” and that “people can be very mean in the name of their faith.” Nonetheless, when she goes “to the heart” of her faith, she feels “the essential truth” of her religion and relationship with God.
She reminds me of another colleague of mine, Kathleen Cotter Cauley, a family therapist and lay leader in the Roman Catholic Church who has been a part of the Church’s investigation into and adjudication of many clergy abuse cases. Well aware of so many of the Church’s failures and missteps in this tragic process, she is nonetheless a faithful and pious Catholic. She is still convinced of the essential truth of her faith and of the message of God’s Presence it can convey. Despite the Church’s failings, she believes in the essential message of her faith, and she is helping to structure her faith’s teshuvah.
These two colleagues are self-critical of Christianity, but there are plenty of mea culpas to go around. Our own Judaism does not a have a perfect record, and we see egregious ungodliness in the name of so many other religions as well. Religion is supposed to be good, but too often it fails.
Our Torah portion this week deals with diseases—leprosy and mildew and other contagious outbreaks—and the ways we can diagnose them, heal from them, and be purified. The Rabbis, however, see the Biblical diseases as metaphors for spiritual and social sicknesses. Thus do their comments on Tzara’at/Leprosy transcend the ancient science and attempt to address the spiritual and moral rot that can take hold in the human soul. We can make terrible mistakes. We can misread people and situations and misremember facts. We can give in to our most rank impulses and prejudices. We can join mobs to do evil. And we can misread the Word of God—and act as though God commands us to do terrible things.
Some of this may come from the ambiguity of God. Though most religions speak of knowing God’s Will, psychologist and philosopher William James understands religiosity from a more practical perspective. For him, religion is the human response to an undifferentiated sense of reality—to the “more” (an undefinable, non-empirical feeling of a Presence). Though all religions base themselves on revelations of God’s Will, James suggests that they be more accurately seen as attempts by humans to perceive, understand, and live in relationship with this Presence. As such, there is a lot of room for interpretation and creativity—and, of course, inaccuracy, selfishness, and self-righteousness. The goals and possibilities of religion are wonderful, but sometimes it falls (we fall) short of the mark.
Of course, sometimes it does not. As Rabbi Chaim Stern counsels, “If there is goodness at the heart of life, then its power, like the power of evil, is real.” Falling short of the mark need not be the end of the story. It can be the beginning of improvement, and it is for this reason that the Torah teaches us about atonement, repentance, and ethical cleansing.
We are bidden throughout our Tradition to look deep within ourselves and our communities and ascertain our level of godliness.
When we have done well, we should feel good. As Ben Azzai said, “One mitzvah leads to another…the reward for performing a mitzvah is that it is easier to perform the next mitzvah…” (Avot 4.2) Being in sync with God has its own kind of moral and spiritual inertia. And there is great fulfillment in such moments of life—a kind of cosmic fulfillment. In the words of the Rabbi Stern, it is a blessing when “I make of my life an act of reverence—a prayer that is its own answer.” (Gates of Prayer, page 215)
However, when we have fallen short—committing Chillul Hashem/a profanation of the Divine Name and bringing on a moral and spiritual Tzara’at/Leprosy, we are called to heal ourselves:
(1) to ask God for forgiveness,
(2) to ask those whom we have wronged for forgiveness,
(3) to make up for the damage we have done, and
(4) to perform Gemilut Chasadim/Deeds of Lovingkindness.
As Rabbi Jacob said, “Better is one hour of repentance and good deeds in this world than all the life of the world to come.” (Avot 4.17) We can reclaim closeness to God, but we must bridge the gulf. And the first step in bridging it is in realizing that we have strayed. Even if a religious message has led us astray, God is waiting and beckoning us to return to godliness.
Some believers are troubled when they think of religion as merely a human interpretation of God’s Will. They worry that it decreases their connection to the Divine. But it is a fact that there are thousands of different interpretations out there, and understanding the human component helps to explain why. It also explains those moments when our human religious leaders make mistakes—or miss the mark of godliness. Remember: we do not worship religion. We do not worship the messengers of God. We do not even worship Scripture. We worship God, and our mission is to ascertain and follow God’s ways.
Faith, like bodies, can get sick. Faith can fail to get the proper nutrition, can be exposed to unhealthy contaminants, and can get run down and fail to thrive. But, like our bodies, faith can be healed, and the best in religion calls on us to rehabilitate ourselves and our faith and become the blessings we were created to be. Religion can access God and bring God’s Presence into the world. It is our most noble aspiration.