בס''ד
The birth of a child is a miraculous event full of joy and wonder. Can there be a moment of such extreme elation
as that compared to when a new soul enters the world and the journey of life
begins anew? The incredible nature of
this event therefore begs the question as to why it is that a lady who has been
through childbirth, the very source of this tremendous event, becomes impure as
a consequence? How can the creation of
such holiness result in defilement of this kind in the progenitor of this
precious gift?
The key to understanding this challenging
subject is by re-examining the term impurity, not as some people perceive it,
as something dirty and to be reviled, but as a natural spiritual consequence of
certain circumstances. In truth the
creation of this status in a person is not because there is anything negative
about that person, but simply due to the void that has been created when
something of such sanctity has departed.
In the case of death, which also brings with it spiritual impurity to
the deceased’s body, it is the soul’s departure from its earthly confines whereas
here ,with regard to a woman after childbirth, it is the sudden absence of the
life that was contained within her.
The vicissitudes and fluctuations of
life, with its troughs and peaks, occur both on a physical and spiritual
level. There are moments that we are
palpably in touch with our religious aspirations and focus on achieving them,
but there are times that we lose track of our true purpose and hence begin to
weaken in our resolve to perform the acts that have brought us closer to it. This is natural and expected but does not
mean it is something we should resign ourselves to. Be it a shiur that we have stopped attending,
an act of service to Hashem that we have lately given less thought to, or an
area of self-improvement that we have of late disregarded, the damage is not
just in not performing these deeds, but in the spiritual vacuum that is created
by no longer involving oneself in such holy endeavours. Do not just succumb to life’s valleys, but
rather take note of the decline one has taken and the gaps in one’s life and
start to ascend once again, safe in the knowledge that we have already scaled
its peaks before and can do so again.
May the purity of Shabbos fill our spiritual
voids this week.
לעילוי נשמת לאה
בת אברהם
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