After all the study, all the podcasts, all the articles, all the commentary, something just isn't clicking - from these sources - regarding tamei and tahara. I even did something which I've never done before in the midst of Torah study - internet research - and came across an article which I was excited to read since it seemed to agree with my reading, only to find that it said the exact opposite.
My reading, especially after these sixth and seventh aliyot of Metzora, is that tamei and tahara are wildly misunderstood and mistranslated as impurity/uncleanness/unholiness and purity/cleanness/holiness, respectively. Yes, me, a non-rabbi internet blogger who spends a few hours a day at most on Torah study - I am still suggesting that tamei must be a reference to a direct encounter with G-d's Creative Energy and tahara is some sort of both physical and spiritual space outside of that direct Energy. To me, this is not a rationalization, or a modernist approach, or a revisionary reductivism, or whatever - to me, it is the only possible reading that can make sense of these two portions and the wide variety of life experiences that can cause someone to be tamei, and what the Torah says to do about it.
This is especially true given the extended period of tamei a woman, per Torah, experiences as opposed to a man. Again, I've read all the commentaries (okay, not all, but many), and the mental gymnastics utilized in discussing why it is longer for women make me quite emotional, and not in a good way. And, while I certainly don't mean to speak on behalf of or for any women, the fact that so many women buy into this line of what I see as oppressive thinking raises my emotions to even greater heights.
So, turning to these aliyot, the period of tamei for female discharge is a minimum of 7 days (and the Torah distinguishes between irregular and regular ones) while "all" a man has to do is wash "his flesh . . . and clothing."
Under my interpretation - which, again, I fully admit is based truly and only on my untrained, subjective, and personal reading, as far as I know - this is because a woman's experience is much more intense - and much more divine, in terms of an encounter with actual creation - than a man's. When I look at my children, I do on an objective and intuitive level understand that I contributed "half" to them. But I did not conceive, grow, and nurture them. My love for them - while endless - cannot, I believe, rise to the level of an encounter with direct Creative Energy that my wife's did. So it would make sense that such an encounter, for her, would mean a longer period of tamei than mine. In modern parlance, a longer period to cool off, separate, reflect, and process the deep spiritual meaning of the encounter. This is simply the objective reality of the human body which H' placed within us and within the Universe.
I see that there are allegedly a few views of my posts, and I'm not one to ask for comments or feedback needlessly, but if anyone can possibly send me any support for my interpretation/understanding of tamei and tahara, please send me an email anytime at dailykabbalist@gmail.com.
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