פרשת מצורע תש"ג - נגעים

And the priest shall go forth out of the camp; and the priest shall look, and, behold, if the plague of leprosy be healed in the leper;

Scripture says God told… to indicate the beginning of a new section, dealing with the laws of self-purification. The grammarian Rabbi Yona ibn Janaḥ has said that the affliction of ṣara‘at has been cured of the person suffering ṣara‘at is backwards: Scripture should have said, “the person suffering ṣara‘at has been cured of the affliction of ṣara‘at”. But why should we reverse the words of the living God on account of our limited understanding? Does not Scripture elsewhere say, “the neteq has been cured: he is ritually pure” [13:37] as well as “the affliction has been cured” [:48]?

Because of this Hashem did this for me. This should be understood: “For the sake of this service—i.e. the eating of the matzoh and the refraining from leaven bread, which were the first commandments that B’nei Yisrael received—Hashem performed for us miracles and took us out of Egypt.” In other words, Hashem only took B’nei Yisrael out of Egypt in order that they should serve Him, in keeping with the verse, “When you bring the people out of Egypt—you will serve Elohim on this mountain” (Shemos 3:12).

then shall the priest command to take for him that is to be cleansed two living clean birds, and cedar-wood, and scarlet, and hyssop.

And the garment if there be in it a pock of tsaraat: This is not natural at all and it does not happen in the world; and so [too] pocks of houses. But since Israel are complete for God, the spirit of God is always upon them, to keep their bodies and clothing and houses in good appearance. And when sin and iniquity happen to one of them, his skin or his clothing or his home becomes ugly, to show that God has departed from him. And hence the verse states (Leviticus 14:34), "and I shall put a pock of tsaraat in the house in the land of your possession" - as it is a plague of God in that house. And behold, it is only practiced in the land that is the inheritance of the Lord, as it states (Leviticus 14:34), "When you come to the land of Canaan, that I give to you as a possession." And the reason for this is not because it is an obligation on the soil [of the land], but [rather] because this matter will only come in the chosen land that the glorious God will dwell within. And in Torat Kohanim (Sifra, Metsora 5:3), they also expounded that a house only becomes impure after the conquest and division of the land and [when] each and every one knows what is his. And the reason [for this] is that [only] then did their minds become settled about them - to know the Lord - and that the [Divine] presence should dwell among them. And so do I think with the pocks of clothing, that it is only practiced in the land, and [that] it was not necessary to [specifically] exclude outside the land from them, as they would never occur there. And because of this, they are also only practiced on white clothes, and not with colored ones - as maybe the dye released that ugliness in that place according to its nature, and it is not 'the finger of God.' And therefore, clothes that become colored by the Heavens, can become impure, like the words of Rabbi Shimon (Mishnah Negaim 11:3). And according to its simple understanding, it is because of this that Scripture goes back in each and every verse [to mention], "the garment or the skin or the warp or the woof," because the matter is a miracle. And our rabbis have homilies about them and they are all in Torat Kohanim.

והבגד כי יהיה בו נגע צרעת, when it is quite clear that this is not the kind of stain familiar to science and responsive to removing by chemical detergents. Discolouration of a garment in colours other than the ones that are work related due to the vocation of the wearer, are usually caused deliberately by the owner. What occurred here is due to some sin the owner was guilty of.
At any rate, our tradition has taught that the only discolouration of garments or cloths that are considered from a halachic point of view are garments which themselves are white and not coloured. Any coloured garment is not subject to this legislation at all, is not within the parameter of what is called נגע צרעת. The phenomenon of white garments or exterior walls of houses which are normally whitewashed breaking out in different colours is by itself a warning to the owner to examine his lifestyle and what he might have done wrong to rate such a warning.
Our sages in Kidushin 20 tell about how seriously a violation of a rule which is only peripheral to the Sh’mittah legislation is viewed. [the basic rules of sh’mittah relate to working the soil during that year. What I described here as “peripheral,” i.e. in Talmudic parlance as אבקה של שמטה, is the dealing in produce grown in violation of the sh’mittah laws. Ed.] The Talmud explains that violating the “peripheral” aspects of that legislation my result in the guilty party becoming impoverished. The process is gradual so that the guilty party had ample opportunity to ask himself why G’d had singled him out for this kind of punishment.
The same is true of the נגע צרעת legislation. Proof of the fact that this affliction is due to a well meaning Creator, One Who is concerned with the welfare of His Jewish subjects, is the fact that if the symptoms we know as נגע צרעת surface on the garments of gentile or houses of gentiles, these are not declared as ritually impure. Seeing that the gentiles as a rule do not have life in the hereafter to look forward to, G’d is not at such pains to warn them not to risk losing something they doe not to look forward to in any event. When a Jew is in danger of losing his claim to eternal life this is a far more serious matter, and G’d goes out of His way to afford the person potentially endangering his claim to eternal life an opportunity to repent and change his lifestyle before it is too late. In referring to this concept, Solomon in Proverbs 10,25 describes the צדיק, the Just, as the foundation of the universe. The whole idea of man having been created in G’d’s image, and G’d’s desire for man to become as much like Him as it is possible for a creature to become, lies at the source of this concern by G’d not to let man waste his opportunity to live up to his destiny.
Once man becomes aware of G’d’s concern for him he will have little difficulty in making his own will correspond to the revealed will of His Maker. He will begin to realise that by “listening” to the urgings of his body-dominated desires he risks losing his eternal life and the death of his body would also signal the death of his life force נפש, just as that of all the animals. >br> Even though we see many people defy G’d in their lifestyles, we can be sure in the words of G’d in Exodus 23,7 כי לא אצדיק רשע, “that I will not allow the wicked to appear as if he were a just person for ever.” [the author, in continuing this sermon, describes all the gentiles and most of the Jews of his time, as so oblivious to all this that they may be compared as existing in a permanent state of spiritual coma. Ed.] Nonetheless, if G’d chose the Jewish people as His special people it is because He entertains the fond hope that out of this nation there will emerge a nucleus of people who are aware of their destiny. When the Jewish people are predominantly in the state of spiritual coma the author just described, the symptoms described in our portion will not appear as it would be a waste of time to hope that the people thus afflicted would see in these symptoms a message from their G’d.

ופנו את הבית בטרם יבא, they can clear out the house before the priest’s arrival. In fact, that priest is warned not to arrive until all valuables have been cleared out of the house. During the time that this takes place the owners will be able to do teshuvah and pray and synchronise their prayer with that of the priest when he arrives. Simultaneous to this the priest will announce the period of isolation. In Vayikra Rabbah 17,7 we are told that our paragraph is an allusion to the eventual destruction of the first Temple, its rebuilding, as well as the destruction of the second Temple. The word וטהרו in our verse alludes to the ultimate rebuilding of the third Temple, this one not to be destroyed again.

ונתתי נגע צרעת [WHEN YOU COME TO THE LAND …]I WILL PUT THE PLAGUE OF THE LEPROSY — This was an announcement to them that these plagues would come upon them (Sifra, Metzora, Section 5 4; Horayot 10a), because the Amorites concealed treasures of gold in the walls of their houses during the whole 40 years the Israelites were in the wilderness in order that these might not possess them when they conquered Palestine, and in consequence of the plague they would pull down the house and discover them (Leviticus Rabbah 17:6).