Even More Boxes. . . .

Old testament laws! At the end of last term, my old Testament Professor said something that I can't stop thinking about.

I found it highly metaphoric.

When you look at all the laws about leprosy and what animals are clean and when people are and aren't clean....
It is about keeping things in their boxes. "Unclean" doesn't necessarily mean "bad," it has more of a connotation of the "secular," that is, not appropriate to be near holy things. Holy HAD to be kept separate from secular. "Appropriate" had to be kept clearly separate from "inappropriate."
There were also elaborate rituals to recognize and sanctify moving from one box to the other, such as the ritual cleansing of a woman after her period, and the ritual dedication of a house after it has been cured of leprosy.

Leprosy? How can a house have leprosy?
She said that "leprosy" was what they called any compromise of a boundary. Scaly skin, and a flaking and peeling plaster or daub wall surface---all was lumped under "leprosy." There is a huge body of laws all around the detection and diagnosis of "leprosy," and elaborate rituals around either the restoring of "integrity" or the cutting off of the leprous person or thing.

Judgments about skin conditions on holy terms.

She says, all the animals that don't "fit" their stereotype---all the animals that are different, are considered unclean. Fish are supposed to have scales, so what the heck is an eel? Ew! Unclean.
Animals that chew the cud should also have cloven hoofs, etc. Weird things, different things---stay away from them!
It reminds me of schoolyard socialization rules. Goodness and badness is decided based on looking right and acting right. Kids are excluded for being chubby or having glasses, or being ethnically different.....
Sure, Swedenborgian exegetical theory says that these laws are there because they correspond to internal laws, and really have little to do with animals and houses. But I bet they are also written the way they are written because THAT IS WHAT WE DO. Our first ideas of sacred vs. dangerous are this primitive. Some of us never move past this type of categorization that is skin-deep.

I had never, ever looked at the laws this way. It seems remarkably descriptive of the human condition and primitive spirituality.