פָּרָשַׁת תַזְרִיעַ

Parshat Tazria is about tumah (ritual impurity) and taharah (purity) that come upon the person himself: after childbirth, and through tzaraat, the spiritual affliction of the skin that only a kohen (priest) can judge. It opens with a woman who gives birth. After a boy she is tamei (impure) for seven days, the boy has his brit milah (circumcision) on the eighth day, and she waits thirty-three more days before she may touch anything holy or enter the Mikdash (the sanctuary); after a girl, two weeks and sixty-six days. At the end she brings a lamb as a korban olah (burnt offering) and a pigeon or a turtledove as a korban chatat (sin offering), or two birds if she cannot afford a lamb.

Most of the parsha is the law of tzaraat, which is not leprosy. A swelling, a scab or a white spot on the skin is shown to the kohen, who looks for white hair, a mark deeper than the skin, raw flesh, or spreading. When the signs are unclear he puts the person in hesger (isolation) for seven days, sometimes seven more, and then declares him tamei or tahor. The same applies to healed boils, burns, marks on the head or the beard, and bald patches. The metzora (the person with tzaraat) tears his garments, lets his hair grow, covers himself up to his lip, calls out "Tamei, tamei," and dwells alone outside the camp. The parsha ends with tzaraat on garments of wool, linen or leather, which are burned if the mark spreads or stays.

Only the kohen can decide if a person or a garment is tamei or tahor, and it only takes effect when he declares it. In most years Parshat Tazria is read together with Metzora as a double parsha.