The AJR Center for Judaism and Science has an annual competition for the best student D’var Torah infused with science. Click here to view the entries that have won our לדעת חכמה (Lada’at Hokhmah) Award.
Parshiyot Tazria-Metzorah – 5786
April 14, 2026
Rabbi Rachel Posner
Protecting Our Garment of Light A D’var Torah for Parshiyot Tazria-Metzorah By Rabbi Dr. Rachel Posner Our skin is the largest organ of our body – and a remarkable one. The average adult’s skin covers about two square meters, hosts roughly 1,000 species of bacteria, and contains millions of receptors that sense touch, pressure, temperature, and pain, constantly sending signals to the brain about our environment. Our skin regulates body temperature, protects us from pathogens, and repairs itself with quiet efficiency: within minutes of injury, platelets begin clotting; within days, new skin cells migrate to cover the wound. We sometimes think of our skin as a boundary, a wall separating inside from outside. But like the walls of a home, it is both a border and an integral part of us. As someone who suffered from chronic hives, I know that skin disease cannot be hidden. When our skin erupts,...
Parshiyot Tazria-Metzorah 5783
April 17, 2023
Click here for an audio recording of this D’var Torah A D’var Torah for Parshiyot Tazria-Metzorah By Rabbi Matthew Goldstone Reading Parshiyot Tazria-Metzorah this year I can’t help but think about bodily autonomy and the conversations taking place across the United States about the legality of abortion and related procedures. The Torah establishes a system in which those in power, the priests, are tasked with looking at a part of a person’s body to dictate their ritual status. Based upon their determination, the person may be socially isolated and required to shave portions of their body. The voyeurism coupled with a religiously-imposed obligation to do something with, or to, one’s body, grates against modern notions of personal autonomy. And yet, at the same time, I realize that I actually do subscribe to certain bodily limitations and restrictions imposed by governing powers. להבדיל, I endorse vaccination requirements for people to enter certain spaces. Even beyond Covid-19, I expect public schools...
Parashiot Tazria-Metzorah 5781
April 16, 2021
Click HERE for an audio recording of this D’var Torah A D’var Torah for Tazria-Metzorah By Rabbi Marc Rudolph (’04)Not all Parshiyot are equally welcomed by rabbis – or by congregants! One could say these are the Parshiyot that we love to hate. Bar mitzvah boys and bat mitzvah girls cringe when they find out they need to write a D’var Torah on this week’s Torah portion, whose subject matter is skin diseases and emissions of fluids, both natural and pathological, from various orifices of the body. I suspect that their parents wish they had been savvy enough to check ahead of time to find out the subject matter of this week’s Torah reading before scheduling their child’s big day. For this is the week when this most obtuse of subjects is read from our holy Torah in synagogues across the world. We rabbis struggle to find meaning, to find significance, to come...
Parashat Tazria Metzora 5780
April 24, 2020
The Torah and Social Distancing A D’var Torah for Parashat Tazria Metzora By Rabbi Irwin Huberman (’10) Perhaps there has never been a better time to embrace — with open arms — a section of the Torah, which most years we tend to turn away from. The double portion of Tazria-Metzora speaks about those bodily conditions that often make us socially and physically uncomfortable: Rashes, skin diseases, bodily purification and leprosy, to name a few. But isn’t it remarkable, how, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, this week’s Parashah comes to life probably in a way it never has in our lifetime? During this unprecedented time, we can’t help but marvel at how our tradition appeared concerned with public health, long before the field of medicine became a sophisticated practice. Indeed, our tradition recognizes the importance of testing, treatment, quarantine, evaluation and re-integration as part of a communal approach to...
Parashat Tazria-Metzora
May 3, 2017
The double parshiyot of this week’s Torah reading, Tazria-Metzora, are for many commentators a challenge. Many parshiyot in the Book of Leviticus are challenging, but much of this week’s Torah reading reads like a zombie apocalypse in which people are still concerned whether they are pure or impure. One theme that keeps returning throughout the reading is that of isolation and loneliness. Law after law describes how people were to be isolated from the rest of the Israelite encampment and whose entry into the sanctuary was forbidden. She shall remain in a state of blood purification for thirty-three days: she shall not touch any consecrated thing, nor enter the sanctuary until her period of purification is completed. (Lev. 12:4) But if it is a white discoloration on the skin of his body which does not appear to be deeper than the skin and the hair in it has not turned...
