Shabbat Parashat Tazria 5784

Parashat Hashavua: On Body, Spirit, and the Connection between Them

The end of Parashat Shemini views the matter of what we put into our mouths, which is a real question from a physical perspective, as a spiritual matter as well. Rav Yisraeli taught us that what we put into our mouths affects what comes out of them. Proper food helps us sanctify ourselves. The Torah presents issues that come up in Parshiyot Tazria & Metzora, dealing with different maladies and secretions of the body, as spiritual issues as well. Tazria starts with brit mila, which turns the most physical organ in the body into the key to making a person spiritually holy. 

The physical connection between a husband and wife needs sanctification and to be part of a real connection. This is the closest thing to the connection between Am Yisrael and Hashem, which is why the gemara (Sota 17a) says that if a couple succeeds in their relationship, the Divine Presence is between them.

The wounds and lesions that comprise tzara’at (roughly, leprosy) in a person’s body, which would seem to indicate a physiological problem, have an important spiritual connection. They are related to the question the person can be asked: “What came out of your mouth – divrei Torah or lashon hara?”

In the last few years, effort has been focused on producing cultured meat, at a price that people can afford. Now that it seems practical, we will have to see how it will affect the Jewish kitchen. In our tenth volume of Bemareh Habazak (which came out a few weeks ago), we wrote about halachic elements of this technology; let us review the spiritual background as well.

Only after the Flood, did it become permitted to take the life of a living being and eat it, as previously only “vegetable” foods were permitted to mankind (see Bereishit 1:29). Hashem permitted Noach and his descendants to eat meat (without blood) (ibid. 9:3). At that time, there was a need to reinforce that murder of fellow humans would remain strictly forbidden (ibid. 6). At that time, it also became forbidden to be cruel to animals and eat a limb when the animal was still alive (see Sanhedrin 57a, based on Bereishit 9:4). The development of “meat handling” raised moral questions, mainly in regard to cruelty to animals (see Bava Metzia 32a). These issues follow us, as Jews and as human beings.

The matter of bal tashchit, not causing unnecessary damage to the world around us, which Hashem so wonderfully granted us, also relates to the opportunity to make food that is effectively meat, but does not negatively impact the ecology.

Success in producing cultured meat, which might be pareve even on the level of Rabbinic law, will be revolutionary for the Jewish kitchen and the difficulty of separating between meat and milk. This will require us to widen halachic discussion on the status of this “meat,” and we will also look with interest to see what becomes accepted, not only rabbinically but also in the grass roots. We pray that cultured meat will be incorporated into an improving world. This can provide a boost, which we hope will encompass the relationships between man and his fellow man and man and the world around him.

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