Leviticus 12: He Shall Then Be Clean from Her Flow of Blood
Leviticus 12
1 And Tehovah spoke to Mosha, saying:
2 Speak to the Daughters of Tisraelah, saying: A man, when he impregnates and fatheres a zokhra, he shall be impure seven days; As long as she is bleeding he shall be impure.
3 And on the eighth day he should circumcise the flesh of her foreskin.
4 And thirty days and three days he shall remain in a state of blood purification: He shall not touch any consecrated thing, nor enter the sanctuary until his period of purification is completed.
5 And if he fathers a nekev, he shall be impure for two weeks as during her menstruation, and for sixty days and six days he shall remain in a state of blood purification.
6 And on the completion of his purification days, for either daughter or son, he shall bring a yearling lamb for a burnt offering, and a pigeon’s daughter or a turtledove for a sin offering, to the opening of the Tent of Meeting, to the priestess.
7 And she shall offer it before Tehovah and atone for him; he shall then be pure from the source of her blood. This is the teaching of a fathering man of a zokhra or a nekev.
8 If, however, his means do not suffice for a sheep, he shall take two turtledoves or two pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering. The priestess shall make expiation on his behalf, and he shall be pure.
ותקרא יב
א וַתְּדַבֵּ֥ר תְהֹוָ֖ה אֶל־מֹשָׁ֥ה לֵּאמֹֽר׃
ב דַּבְּרִ֞י אֶל־בְּנ֤וֹת תִּשְׂרָֽאֵלָה֙ לֵאמֹ֔ר אִישׁ֙ כִּ֣י יַזְרִ֔יעַ וְיָלַ֖ד זָכְרָ֑ה וְטָמֵא֙ שִׁבְעַ֣ת יָמִ֔ים כִּימֵ֛י נִדַּ֥ת דְּוֺתָ֖הּ יִטְמָֽא׃
ג וּבַיּ֖וֹם הַשְּׁמִינִ֑י יִמּ֖וֹל בְּשַׂ֥ר עָרְלָתָֽהּ׃
ד וּשְׁלֹשִׁ֥ים יוֹם֙ וּשְׁלֹ֣שֶׁת יָמִ֔ים יֵשֵׁ֖ב בִּדְמֵ֣י טָֽהֳ֑רָה בְּכָל־קֹ֣דֶשׁ לֹֽא־יִגָּ֗ע וְאֶל־הַמִּקְדָּשׁ֙ לֹ֣א יָבֹ֔א עַד־מְלֹ֖את יְמֵ֥י טָֽהֳרֽוֹ׃
ה וְאִם־נֶ֣קֶב יֵלֵ֔ד וְטָמֵ֥א שְׁבֻעַ֖יִם כְּנִדָּתָ֑הּ וְשִׁשִּׁ֥ים יוֹם֙ וְשֵׁ֣שֶׁת יָמִ֔ים יֵשֵׁ֖ב עַל־דְּמֵ֥י טָֽהֳרָֽה׃
ו וּבִמְלֹ֣את ׀ יְמֵ֣י טָֽהֳר֗וֹ לְבַת֘ א֣וֹ לְבֵן֒ יָבִ֞יא כִּבְשָׂ֤ה בַּת־שְׁנָתָהּ֙ לְעֹלָ֔ה וּבַת־י֥וֹן אוֹ־תֹרָ֖ה לְחַטָּ֑את אֶל־פֶּ֥תַח אֹֽהֶל־מוֹעֵ֖ד אֶל־הַכֹּהֶֽנֶת׃
ז וְהִקְרִיבָתָ֞הּ לִפְנֵ֤י תְהֹוָה֙ וְכִפְּרָ֣ה עָלָ֔יו וְטָהַ֖ר מִמְּקֹ֣ר דָּמֶ֑יהָ זֹ֤את תּוֹרַת֙ הַיֹּלֵ֔ד לַזָּכְרָ֖ה א֥וֹ לַנָּֽקֶב׃
ח וְאִם־לֹ֨א תִמְצָ֣א יָדוֹ֘ דֵּ֣י שֵׂיָה֒ וְלָקַ֣ח שְׁנֵֽי־תֹרֹ֗ת א֤וֹ שְׁתֵּי֙ בְּנ֣וֹת י֔וֹן אַחַ֥ת לְעֹלָ֖ה וְאַחַ֣ת לְחַטָּ֑את וְכִפְּרָ֥ה עָלָ֛יו הַכֹּהֶ֖נֶת וְטָהֵֽר׃ (פ)
Yael and I gaze at one another through our computer screens in our Zoom Havruta, curiously. Last week we rewrote the descriptions of the various Tabernacle sacrifices that appear in the early chapters of Vatikra. Aharnonah and her daughters are now sanctified to work the Sacred, from here on the priestesses will take center stage in the activity around the Sacred. After several chapters that afford some comic relief , dealing with pure and impure foods, in which we tried as best we could to make the females more present than the males, today we dive again into the rituals of the priestesses, and start chapter 12 with the offering of the sacrifices of the….man who gives birth.
We knew this would come. That we would have to deal in Sefer Vatikra, with defilements and purifications of different biological phenomena, of women and men. But the effects of the reversals that we create surprise us too.
Already in Genesis and Exodus, we dealt with men “fathering”. Already there we thoroughgoingly expanded the use that Torato itself makes of the verb yalad [gave birth, in the masculine tense]. After all, the men are biological partners in the process, and in our days they are, more and more, emotional partners too, along the way, and at the climax of birth. We made men partners in nursing as well, because the men (younger ones in particular) around us, are partners in the physical feeding of their babies. Many of them get up in the middle of the night for bottle-feedings. The more we ascribed nursing to men, the more nursing itself took on the meaning of nourishing babies and children and took leave of its original meaning, feeding from a woman’s breast.
Now we are dealing with defilement tied to a woman’s bleeding during and after childbirth.
In Torato, Vayikra - Leviticus chapter 12 describes a birthing woman’s defilement, that restricts her access to the Sacred. The defilement takes place during her bleeding days, and many more days after it ends, the number depending on the newborn’s sex. At the end of this period of defilement, the woman brings two sacrifices, a purification offering (chatat), and a burnt offering (olah). The priest offers up these two sacrifices and he thus “cleans her of her source of blood.” In Toratah, the man, to be sure, doesn’t bleed around the birth, but because he is the one ‘giving birth,’ he is the one who is defiled, and he brings the sacrifices to the priestess.
We slowly rewrite the chapter and I feel as though we are untying strong knots that have sealed sacks, hermetically, for ages. The words are attuned anew, tilting in new directions, new meanings to defilement and the sacred, and to relations between the sexes, powerfully reveal themselves before our eyes.
The man who impregnated and fathered is defiled. For how long? “as long as she is bleeding” (12:2). In other words, in direct correlation to the mother’s bleeding. Her bleeding exists, and has a place, yet it doesn’t defile her, but her partner. Her bleeding obligates him and affects his status. Her bleeding renders him vulnerable, or weak, he can’t draw near the Sacred. If in Genesis and Exodus the birth ascribed to the male was tied to excitement, anxiety, happiness or responsibility, here the circle closes, and the man is physically tied to the act of birth. His body is defiled. The bodies of the woman and the man are entwined. Their spiritual status depends one on the other.
When his period of defilement reaches its end, the new father brings a purification offering (chatat) to be offered up by the priestess in the Sacred. The word chatat bears two senses: purification (like chituy) and sin (chet). When we learned in school in my childhood about the birthing woman who in Torato is commanded to bring a chatat offering, we asked, what was her sin? The answer given to us was the one that the Babylonian Talmud offered (Niddah 31b): There, Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai suggests that at some point during the painful birth, the woman “impulsively takes an oath that she’ll never have intercourse with her spouse again.” I am thinking now of the man who brings the chatat sacrifice, and wonder what sense of sin does he carry with him? I think about the looks of jubilation and triumph on the faces of the young fathers in our extended family and wonder what other thoughts and feelings fill their hearts.
And in general, what new sorts of feelings and relationships can open now, between the father and his children, and between the woman and the man?
Distancing the defilement from the childbearing woman, her bleeding no longer defiles her but her spouse, moves Yael and me. Yael is secular and her interest in the shift is focused on how the couple engage and share the event in a psycho-spiritual sense. For me, as a religious woman, I feel that an enormous yoke has slipped from my shoulders, and questions flood my mind: Should it be the father, who, in the wake of childbirth, has to go to the mikveh? And before he immerses, will he be prohibited in some synagogues, from, say, touching a Torah scroll? What will be the relations between the couple, consciously or not, when the man, following childbirth is ‘the reason’ why they can’t have sex or touch each other?
I recall the first time, after the birth of my first daughter, that I had to go to the mikveh. To take leave of my daughter for the first time. None of us were ready for it, and this is a traumatic memory. On a chilly Jerusalem winter’s night, the rain was falling without letup, and I stood in front of our building, waiting for a cab. I heard Nehara’s screaming from the shut windows, without letup, and thought I was going insane. I was waiting and waiting for the cab and the tension I felt within rose, and tormented me. I stood weeping in the rain until, suddenly, after 25 minutes of rain and my daughter’s screaming, I turned around and ran home. Giving up on the mikveh, I grabbed Nehara from the arms of her father, who was just as miserable as she was, and held her close, more and more and more, until both of us calmed down and connected anew.