אשה כי תזריע, “when a woman conceives, etc.” At the end of the last portion the Torah instructed the Jewish people to sanctify themselves (verse 44). The fact that the subject following deals with conception, marital intercourse, etc, is proof that the specific sanctification the Torah had in mind at the end of the last portion was that the sex life of the Jewish people should not become one of mere physical indulgence, but should be guided by more lofty considerations, should aim at conceiving and bearing children in a spiritual environment commensurate with the people that are unique in their relationship to their Creator. [In Leviticus chapter 19 the need to sanctify themselves is a dictate based on this relationship with our Creator. I have deliberately pontificated a little at this point. Ed.] It is the duty of the Jewish people to be at all times aware of the fact that there are things in this universe that are pure, and others that are impure in a ritual sense. The destiny of the Jewish people to be a “kingdom of Priests and a holy nation (Exodus 19,6)” cannot be achieved without our constant awareness of this fact. Such considerations are at the root of our sages counseling or demanding that prior to a woman having her monthly period, assuming she is regular, the husband should already refrain from having relations with her for a period of 12 hours to ensure that he would not become ritually defiled by being in contact with her menstrual blood. The sages also decreed that a widowed woman must not remarry for a period of three months to ensure that when she becomes pregnant from her new husband, there is no chance that the child born might have been fathered by her deceased husband. If, by chance, this decree is ignored, children born in ritual impurity of the most severe type might result. Rashi explains on our verse that the wording תזריע, suggests that even if the mother gave “birth” to an afterbirth which was so lacking in substances that it was more like sperm, she is still considered as impure due to birthing. This should not be understood as meaning that if a woman involuntarily aborts an amnion, a sac of the fetus full with water, that she becomes ritually impure like woman that has given birth, seeing that we have a rule that any such sac aborted which did not contain something resembling a human fetus does not confer the impurity of new motherhood on the woman concerned. Only what is called שפיר מרוקם, a sac containing clearly defined human features does that. When the Talmud (Niddah 28) says that when a woman conceives first she will give birth to a male child, the reason for this is that it is a fact in nature that anything that appears later is liable to neutralize phenomena that have appeared earlier. If a woman therefore conceives, or has an orgasm first, this feminine part of the process of conception will be weakened once the subsequent male orgasm and ejaculation occurs and contributes male sperm. The same is true in reverse, of course; when the male ejaculates before the female partner has achieved orgasm, the result will be a child of the feminine gender. Nachmanides writes that the statement in the Talmud about a woman “contributing seed first,” does not mean to imply that women in common with men each contribute sperm to the fetus to emerge. It could not mean that, as it is common knowledge that women do not have sperm. Woman contributes from the blood in her womb to the formation of the eventual fetus, and upon completion of her pregnancy a child is born. The term זרע used by the Talmud refers to the combination of the sperm contributed by the male and the blood contributed by the woman, his partner. Following this approach, the Talmud perceives three partners who between them are active in creating a new life. They are: father, mother, and G’d, the father contributing the sperm which eventually will produce tendons, bones, etc., the mother the blood which will develop into flesh, skin and blood and blood vessels; as well as hair and the black (pupil) of the eye. G’d, of course, contributes the נפש-נשמה the intangible life force known as “soul.” This is the opinion of the medical men of the author’s time. The ancient Greeks believed that the entire body of the baby is produced by the mother, the father’s contribution being limited to determining the shape and form of the raw material man is made of. This had to be so, they believed, as man does not have ovaries, as does woman. The fact is that the chick which was produced after its mother hen had copulated with a rooster is different from the chick whose mother hen had not been mated with a male of the species only in the length of time the mother hen has spent sitting on her egg until it was ready to burst its prison walls and emerge as a new living organism.

בדמי טהרה, “in blood of purity;” Nachmanides, comments on the opinion of Rashi, who claims that the last letter ה in the word טהרה does not have a dot, dagesh, meaning that the word itself is a noun, and that the translation of the words בדמי טהרה is “in the blood of purification,” [as opposed to “her purification,” Ed] so that the meaning is “although she sees blood she is ritually clean.” This interpretation is also the one given by Ibn Ezra, who spells out that this blood is blood that denotes purification, as opposed to דם נדה that is blood denoting ritual impurity. According to Nachmanides, G’d decreed that the number of days a mother having given birth to a male child remains partially pure and partially impure corresponds to the number of days (40) after conception that it takes for the male fetus to develop to a state where it is recognizable as such. The period of 33 days when she is no longer niddah, in a state of menstruation, to her husband she is still undergoing a second stage of purification before she is able to present the required offerings in the Temple. The word תשב, normally translated as: “she is to sit,” is equivalent to “sitting out,” awaiting the conclusion of the period of the remaining 33 days until she is completely purified. This statement is accepted by Nachmanides as scientifically proved. Similarly, he accepts as proven that the development of the female fetus takes twice as long to attain that stage. [The term “proven” apparently is used, as this is the opinion offered by Rabbi Yishmael in Niddah 30. This Rabbi quoted postmortems performed on a woman executed for some misdemeanour and an embryo not older than 40 days since conception being discovered inside her in such a state of development. The majority view there rejects this “proof,” and states for halachic considerations that both a female and a male fetus develop at the same speed. Ed.] Nachmanides considers the word טהרה here as an adjective, such as when we speak of זהב טהור, pure gold, unadulterated by other metals or dross. The rationale appears to be that when giving birth to a male child, during the first seven days, when the mother still discharges blood constantly, she is considered as in the same state as a menstruating woman having her monthly cycle, The additional thirty three days which the Torah decrees that the new mother has to count, she has to spend staying in her home in order to cleanse her body thoroughly, as during these days she will discharge remnants of blood originating in her womb and ovaries. Once all this has been discharged she is able to enter the consecrated grounds of the Temple and to offer her sacrifices, as described in the following verses. Our sages had a tradition that as far as her ritual status vis a vis her husband- as opposed to vis a vis G’d, i.e. the Temple, is concerned, she is ritually pure after the first seven days. The reason why in both regards twice the length of time for ritual impurity has been decreed by the Torah is either in accordance with Rabbi Ibn Ezra’s opinion based on that of Rabbi Yishmael, that the gestation of a female embryo takes that much longer, or, if we accept the view of the majority opinion of the sages at the time, that both types of embryos have developed to the same state after 41 days, that the nature of the feminine embryo is that it is colder and wetter, the wetness is a condition of the mother’s womb caused by the female embryo, which results in the process of her fully recovering from her pregnancy and birth taking so much longer and the process of discharging excess blood also taking longer. We all know from daily experience that cleaning something that is cold is more difficult than something that is warm or hot.

עד מלאת ימי טהרה, “until the completion of the days of her purification.” The completion occurs on the 40th day including the following night. During that night she is still not allowed to come into contact with sanctified objects, etc. On the morning following she may offer the sacrifices ordained for mothers that have recently given birth, including her sin-offering.

וששים יום וששת ימים תשב על דמי טהרה, “and she will remain in a state of blood of purification for sixty six days.” The Torah made a minor change in the description of the blood during those sixty six days, calling it על דמי טהרה, whereas the thirty three days of the parallel period after the birth of a male bay are called as remaining בדמי טהרה. The reason is that after the birth of a male child the mother has to observe these thirty three days under all circumstances, whereas in the case of a female child having been born, it is theoretically possible that the mother has already aborted a new embryo during the 80 days since she gave birth, in which case these days might not have to be observed in full.

תשב על דמי טהרה, Rashi explains that the expression תשב in our context means “to sit out,” in the sense of “to wait out.” She is not housebound, but she must await the termination of these days before being allowed to handle sanctified objects, [including the dough she bakes, when it is larger than the minimum quantity requiring that challah be taken from it. Ed.] Of course, she may not enter consecrated grounds during that period. Nachmanides writes that it is possible that the word תשב here is used in the same sense as in Hoseah 3,3 ימים רבים תשבי לי, “you are to refrain for a long time (from sexual intercourse)” A woman who is in the habit of having marital relations with her husband is described as יושבת לו, “co-habiting with him.” Seeing that the Torah had spelled out the type of her impurity during the first seven days as similar to the days of her menstruation, whereas the following days spell out different kinds of restrictions, it is clear that during these latter days she may cohabit with her husband in spite of any blood which appears to originate in her womb or ovaries. Nachmanides’ personal view, however, is that a woman who sees menstrual blood is called niddah, a term borrowed from someone who has been put into some kind of ban and is ostracised from the community. A woman experiencing her period is similarly socially restricted as far as her husband and holy things are concerned. In the olden days such women were assigned special huts to dwell in during these days, In some societies they were not even allowed to speak to people, as their condition was perceived as contagious, and their spittle could have transmitted their germs. The earth that women in such a state stepped on was considered as polluted. What such women excreted was considered is similar to decaying flesh of the dead. Even being looked at by a woman in such a state was considered dangerous by some societies. This may have led the Torah to decree harsher degrees of ritual impurity for women in such a condition. Any place a menstruating woman sat on or lay on is treated as ritually impure, requiring purification in a ritual bath. The nature of ritual impurity of a menstruating woman has something in common with people afflicted with tzoraat on their skin, such people being ostracised and placed In quarantine outside the camp of the Israelites in the desert, or outside built up areas in later Israelite kingdoms. In the case of the צרוע, the person so afflicted, the Torah specifically states בדד ישב מחוץ למחנה, “he is to remain for an open ended amount of time outside the camp.”(Leviticus 13,46) It is clear that the meaning of the word ישב there cannot be: ”he is to sit,” as who can sit for an undisclosed amount of time. The meaning of ישב is that such a person must remain in a condition of expectancy for an indeterminate period of time. The term ישב is used to indicate that he must not enter the camp during this period of ostracism. If the Torah was not content to describe the situation of the צרוע with the words ויצא אל מחוץ למחנה he is to go outside the camp, and ולא יבא אל המחנה and he must not enter the camp, a term used for different other kind of ritually impure people, the reason may be that this צרוע is not to move about at all as even his gaze may be harmful, not only his touch. When the Torah here says that the new mother must תשב בדמי טהרה, it means that she is to observe a similar degree of restriction as do menstruating women, [no more, as we know from the addition that she must not enter consecrated grounds, as otherwise this latter addition would have been superfluous. Ed.]

והקריבו לפני ה' וכפר עליה, “He shall offer it before Hashem and atone for her.” Nachmanides writes that the new mother is in need of atonement as a woman after having given birth is left with a damaged womb. She is in need of having G’d heal that damage for her in order that she will be capable of continuing normal family relations after her womb has healed. Only G’d, the Healer of all flesh, can do this for her. Our sages of old, hold that the reason why most women are in personal need of atonement is that during the excruciatingly painful experience of giving birth they vowed never again to have marital relations with their husbands. Seeing that such a woman swore out of extreme pain and her oath is therefore not really effective legally, since she is contractually obligated to have relations with her husband, G’d wanted her to escape the consequences of such an oath, and by allowing her to bring this sacrifice He forgave her. [We must remember that a legally ineffective oath constitutes uttering the name of the Lord in vain. Ed.]