Shabbat Shalom ! , ...... A Torah Cycle Review with associate pastor, George Wheeler !

Shabbat Shalom !

Baruch HaShem, Our Living God leaves us a Biblical Centeredness and

' Kingdom Unifying '  annual and cyclical  'Torah Cycle Reading Plan' which,

if Followed, keeps US ALL on the Same Page in continual and contextual

Biblical Remembrance of Adonai's ' Original Words ' which provide the

Necessary 'FULLNESS' , to Spiritually attain 'HIS Blessings' of Spiritual

CORRECTNESS and KINGDOM UNITY.

G.

Tazira (תַזְרִיעַ) “She conceives” #2232

Metzora (מְּצֹרָע) “One being Diseased” #6879

Leviticus 12:1 – 15:33

2 Kings 4:42 – 5:19, and 7:3-20

Luke 7:18-35 and Matthew 23:16 – 24:31

This week Parsha is a double portion Since there are 54 Torah portions in a year and a the varying number of weeks in the lunar cycle sometimes two parsha are combined, in 5780 (2020) the parsha Tazria and Metzora are combined. The first part of Tazria concerns purification after childbirth and the second part as well as all of Metzora is instruction concerning leprosy, first in the skin, then in one’s garment, and finally in one’s house.

Leviticus 13:45-46 (Complete Jewish Bible)

⁴⁵ “Everyone who has tzara‘at sores is to wear torn clothes and unbound hair, cover his upper lip and cry, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ ⁴⁶ As long as he has sores, he will be unclean; since he is unclean, he must live in isolation; he must live outside the camp.

These verses cause me to draw parallels with our current situation, with social distancing and wearing masks. Rabbis often connect leprosy in the skin with the sin of “speaking evil” a clear example of this is in Numbers 12:1-12 where Miriam is stricken with leprosy after she and Ahron spoke out against Moshe.

(צרעת) Tazar’at “Stricken” #6883, what we call leprosy comes from the root word (צר) Tsar #6862 - #6865, meaning a rock, a flint, or a narrow place (literally both a rock and a hard place) from this root word we get words for distress, a wasp and to be stung (as by a wasp), also the Hebrew name for Egypt itself (מִצְרַיִם‎) Mizraim #4714, I wonder if the People and land of Egypt were called this before the exodus. I also wonder if this name came from them being stricken, or because for the Israelites, Egypt had become a hard place.