Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>]

So much I know, that this is not the halacha (and Rashi says nothing about it), and hence all I say is but a vain intellectual exercise. Still, on the face of it one may want to discern here a process in time: birth -> seven days of exclusion -> circumcision -> thirty three days of restriction -> absolution. 

The Torah is indeed terse and concise: 17 pages from the creation of the world to Abraham.

In any event, the whole thing is of a dim and mysterious background rooted in very old habits and traditions.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Apr 13, 2013, at 11:59 PM, Zalman Romanoff wrote:

That's a good question, but the context is not enough as a reason to read the paragraph as stating that circumcision removes any hindrance to intimacy (at least not as פשט). Are you relying here on any מפרשים? Not that that would be enough either (for this forum), but just curious, as your reading of the verse is on the level of an inference, and therefore a דרש.

Noam Eitan,

Brooklyn, NY

On Sat, Apr 13, 2013 at 10:53 PM, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu> wrote:

Why the insertion וביום השמיני ימול בשר ערלתו "And in the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised" if it has nothing to do with her? 

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Apr 13, 2013, at 10:21 PM, Zalman Romanoff wrote:

Where in this paragraph do you read that circumcision removes any hindrance to intimacy? From the context?

Noam Eitan,

Brooklyn, NY

On Sat, Apr 13, 2013 at 8:19 PM, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu> wrote:

I vaguely recall that a short while ago we had a discussion here on the enigmatic incident at the inn on the way to Egypt, as described in Ex. 4:25

ותיקח צפורה צור ותכרות את ערלת בנה ותגע לרגליו ותאמר כי חתן דמים אתה לי

"Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet, and said, Surely a bloody husband art thou to me"

Reading today Lev. 12:2-4

אשה כי תזריע וילדה זכר וטמאה שבעת ימים כימי נדת דותה תטמא וביום השמיני ימול בשר ערלתו ושלשים יום ושלשת ימים תשב בדמי טהרה בכל קדש לא תגע ואל המקדש לא תבא עד מלאת ימי טהרה

"If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child then she shall be unclean seven days according to the days of the separation for her infirmity shall she be unclean And in the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised And she shall then continue in the blood of her purifying three and thirty days she shall touch no hallowed thing nor come into the sanctuary until the days of her purifying be fulfilled"

It occurred to me that this is a possible resolution to the puzzling חתן דמים XATAN DAMIYM, namely, that a birth giving woman was prohibited to her husband until the circumcision of her new born son on day eight. To remove this overdue hindrance at the hotel, where they were together at leisure, the enterprising, far from squeamish, Ziporah did what she had to do, threw the foreskin at her husband's feet (as was the custom?) to remind him of his conjugal obligations as her XATAN.  

Isaac Fried, Boston University

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