From The Bimah: Jewish Lessons For Life

"Something like a plague has appeared upon my house." Leviticus 14:35. With these words, the troubled homeowner in ancient Israel gives voice to a truth that is universal. Homes, like human beings, are living things. Organic. Alive. Just like a human being can have healthy or not healthy practices, so too a home, and our home life, can have healthy or not healthy practices. Just like a human being can change it up and become more healthy, so too a home life can get better. Just like a human being can be overcome by illness and leave the world, some homes cannot survive their painful dysfunction. All of these truths are in our portion this week, parshat metzora. When the Talmud encountered the case of the leprous house, it insisted that we not take these passages literally. That we interpret the leprous house as a metaphor and ask: what are the forces that strengthen home life? What are the forces that undermine home life? Can a bad home life be made good? Is that even possib