Friday Bible Study: Hebrew Purity & Holiness

By popular demand, this Friday's Bible study topic is Hebrew purity and holiness. More specifically, what is known as "ritual purity" prescribed in Leviticus. For the study itself, we'll be dancing through chapters 12, 14, 15, 17, and 18.

As before, a little briefing will be helpful in penetrating these chapters that might otherwise seem confusing, legalistic, boring, or ancient and "unenlightened". First, we need to look at the notion of being "unclean". The Hebrew word translated as "unclean" or "uncleanness" is tum'ah. There is no connection between tum'ah and one's physical sanitary condition; tum'ah strictly refers to one's ritual inpurity. There are four ways of being tum'ah: 1) contact with a corpse 2) affliction with tzara'at (erroneously translated "leprosy" when tzara'at could hardly be the same thing as the medical condition called that today) 3) contact with bodily fluids related to reproduction 4) childbirth. Rabbinic tradition adds a fifth, touching the Torah scrolls. This is why today Jews use a pointer and a mantle when reading from the Torah scrolls.

As one might gather from the list above, being tum'ah can not be connected to wrongdoing because burying the dead and giving birth are hardly sinful actions. The potential for this misunderstanding is the extensive regulations of what one can't do if one is tum'ah. Instead, one ought to see the connection of tum'ah and contact with a potent force that disqualifies one from worship in the assembly.

This does not make much sense unless one has an understanding of the concepts of natural holiness and stipulated holiness. Natural holiness is found in the miracles of pregnancy, birth and recovery from illness. Stipulated holiness is the designation of times, places, things and actions as sacred. Stipulated holiness allows one to come into contact with the divine in the everyday and as often as one may desire. Natural holiness is a rare and special time that brings one closer to God.

Tum'ah comes from reverence for the miracle of birth, the power of death and the mysteries of illness and recovery. We Episcopalians are very aware of the importance of seperation and the sacred. Just look at how we treat left over Body and Blood after Communion is over and think about the way the Church has prescribed as the proper ways to dispose of items that have been blessed. Unfortunately, the Hebrews of the Old Testament, just like Christians today, attached superstition to these reverent practices which have put up obstacles to a truer understanding of what is going on and the even more imporant reason why.