Parshas Tazria
By Rabbi Dovid Zauderer
“Being a Dad isn’t just about eating a huge bag of gummy-bears as your wife gives birth. It means being comfortable with the word hero.” - Ryan Reynolds.
As this week’s Torah portion begins with a discussion of the laws of childbirth, I figured I would share with you three interesting factoids or insights relating to Torah and childbirth.
Look, I’m no expert at childbirth, but I did attend eight childbirths in my life ... if only just to tell my wife to tone it down so that I could hear the T.V. show in the room next door....Just kidding!
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(1) Melaveh Malkeh – literally, “escorting the queen” – is the term used to describe the post-Shabbos meal. Yes, you heard that correctly. In addition to the three Shabbos meals, it is proper to honor the departure of Shabbos with a meal, just as one would honor a departing queen. It is befitting that one should set his table properly, with a tablecloth. It is commendable to eat this meal every Saturday evening after Shabbos ends (or later that night, if necessary).
Eating the Melaveh Malkah meal is propitious for one’s health and livelihood. It also protects a person’s body after death. In addition, the Sages teach that every person has a bone called luz, which, according to many authorities, is found in the spine. This bone derives nourishment only from food eaten on Saturday evening at the Melaveh Malkah meal, and remains intact until techiyas hameisim, the “resurrection of the dead”. At that time, this bone will help the entire body return to life. Therefore, even if one is satiated from all the food he ate on Shabbos, he should try his utmost to eat this meal.
It is said in the name of the Rebbe Reb Elimelech of Lizhensk ZT”L that a woman who eats Melaveh Malkah every Saturday evening after Shabbos will merit easy childbirth. When eating Melaveh Malkah, she should say, “I am eating this for Melaveh Malkeh.”
(2) There is a fascinating mesorah (tradition) handed down from the Vilna Gaon (1720-1797) that all the “curses” recorded in the Bible that mankind was cursed after Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden, will be reverted and changed back to normal towards the “end of time”, except for the curse of the Serpent, who represents the evil force of Amalek, and whose curse shall remain in place until his utter and total destruction. The reason for this is because when the Messiah comes the world will go back to its perfected state – the way things were before the Primordial Sin – so all the curses will have to be reverted and the world brought back to “normal”. Amazingly, we see the Vilna Gaon’s “prediction” coming true in our own times, as many of the curses mentioned in the Bible have already disappeared. Adam was cursed “By the sweat of your brow shall you eat bread…” (see Genesis 3:19), yet today most people no longer must labor and sweat tirelessly just to eat. Food is produced in abundance with machines that allow just a few people to operate massive farms with ease. And even people who don’t work at all need not starve, as food banks and charities abound, and governments provide welfare.
At the same time, Eve’s curses also seem to have been reverted. She was cursed to have pain during pregnancy, childbirth, and raising the children (see Genesis 3:16), yet the pains of pregnancy and childbearing have been significantly eased in our times thanks to modern medicine and inventions like the epidural anesthetic (although labor and childbirth is still not exactly a walk in the park.)
While in the past it was very common for women to die in labor, it is now very rare in modern hospitals. Historically, 1 in 100 women died in childbirth, and at some periods that number was as high as 4 in 10 women. Today, that number is 1 in nearly 50,000 in many Western countries! As well, Eve was “cursed” that her husband should “rule over her” (see Genesis ibid), yet with the Women’s’ Rights movement this has changed in a big way.
Another ancient Biblical curse that seems to have reverted back to normal is Noah’s curse of his son Ham that his descendants (who lived in Africa) shall be slaves to the descendants of Shem and Japheth (who lived in Europe and Asia) - see Genesis 9:25 – as slavery in the modern area has been virtually abolished, and even racial discrimination has been greatly diminished thanks to the Civil Rights movement. So we see that as we get closer and closer to the Messianic Era when the world will go back to a perfected state, curses are reverting all around us – just as the Vilna Gaon predicted.
Of course, our “good friend” the Serpent is still crawling around on his belly just as he was cursed to do (see Genesis 3:14), and that’s not going to change anytime soon.
(3) The Talmud in Niddah 31b discusses the laws of childbirth and the spiritual impurity that is associated with it, as mentioned in the beginning of this week’s Torah portion, Parshas Tazria (see Leviticus 12:1-8). The Torah law is that due to the woman’s impure state, a husband may not resume marital relations with his wife for seven days following the birth of a boy, and for fourteen days following the birth of a girl.
The Talmud asks why there is a discrepancy between the birth of a boy and a girl in regard to the period of time that the husband and wife are forbidden to each other after childbirth, and offers the following explanation:
Rabbi Shimon explains: “When a woman gives birth to a boy, with whom everyone is happy, she regrets her oath after only seven days. [In the pain of childbirth, women would often swear to never again become pregnant.] But in the case of a girl, with whom everyone is sad, she regrets her oath only after fourteen days.
Maharsh”a, one of the great 16th-century commentators on the Talmud, writes that the reason why people are often sad when a girl is born is because they know that in the not too distant future this girl will suffer the agony of childbirth as her mother just did. [This was especially true in Talmudic times when girls often married in their early teens - and there were also no epidurals!]
There is an interesting parallel between childbirth and the time leading up to the coming of the Messiah. The Sages of the Talmud (in Sanhedrin 97a) record an ancient tradition regarding the Pre-Messianic Era: Rabbi Yochanan said, “In the generation when the son of David [the Messiah] will come, the number of Torah scholars will dwindle, and as for the rest of the people, their eyes will be wearied through anguish and grief. Every day will bring new adversities and harsh decrees. No sooner is one trouble over than another one appears.”
The great Kabbalistic work, the Zohar, in Book 1 25a and 119a states: And the sons of Yishmael [the Arabs] in that time [the pre-Messianic era] will fire the entire world to rise up against Jerusalem. And all the nations will band together against the Jews to ‘remove’ them from [the Land and] the world. About this era it is written: “It will be a time of trouble for Jacob [the Jews], but he shall be saved from it” (Jeremiah 30:7).
These harsh decrees and difficult times that were foretold by the great Kabbalists, as well as by the Sages of the Talmud - and that seem to be coming to fruition in our own times when each day brings with it a new suicide bombing, stabbing or rocket attack - are collectively referred in the Jewish tradition as Chevlei Mashiach, the “Birth Pangs” of the Messiah.
In their usage of the term Chevlei Mashiach, the Sages are teaching us that the period leading up to the coming of the Messiah bears an exact parallel to the pregnancy and birth pangs of a woman expecting her baby to be born. Just as the labor pains of a woman in childbirth increase in intensity as the child is about to be born, so, too, will the “birth pangs” and agony of the Jewish people increase in intensity right before the Messiah comes and the Jewish people will be “reborn” and redeemed.
We can add an additional layer to the parallel between childbirth and the pre-Messianic Era based on the aforementioned commentary of Maharsh”a that people are saddened at the birth of a girl because of the pain of childbirth that she herself will have to endure in the future. The Midrash Tanchuma (Beshalach 10) lists ten great songs of faith which highlight Jewish history. Of these songs, Psalm 98 of King David’s Psalms, which begins “Sing to G-d a shir chadash (a new song)…”, is destined to be the tenth and final song the Jewish people will sing – the song of the Ultimate Redemption.
The Midrash Tanchuma enumerates the first nine songs:
(1) The song the Jews sang in their homes on the first night of Passover when they were about to leave Egypt;
(2) The Song of the Sea, when the waters split to allow Israel to cross, and then drowned the Egyptians (see Exodus 15:1-21);
(3) The song the Jews sang in praise of Miriam’s well (see Numbers: 21:17-20);
(4) The song of Ha’azinu - Moses’ final song before his death (see Deuteronomy Chapter 32);
(5) Joshua’s song of victory (see Joshua 10:12);
(6) Deborah’s song of victory (see Judges Chapter 5);
(7) King David’s song of salvation from his enemies and other troubles (see Samuel II Chapter 22 and Psalms 18);
(8) King David’s song for the inauguration of the Holy Temple (see Psalms 30);
(9) King Solomon’s Song of Songs (one of the twenty-four books of Scripture).
The Midrash (Shemos Rabbah 23:11) points out that throughout Scripture, the Hebrew word for song is shirah (which is the feminine form), whereas the new song of the future is referred to as shir (which is the masculine form).
Rash”i, in his commentary to Arachin 13b, explains that in this world of struggle and hardship, every brief period of triumph and song is followed by a new tragedy, and, as such, is tinged with a measure of sadness. As this pattern resembles the female cycle of pregnancy and childbirth followed by subsequent pregnancy and childbirth, song takes the feminine form.
However, the song the Jewish people will sing in the future is in the masculine form because it describes the Messianic song of ultimate triumph after which no further calamities will be born (just like a male who cannot give birth).
May it be G-d’s will that we all merit to be there when the Messiah finally arrives and the Jewish people get to sing their final song without all that childbirth pain!
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