Metzorah: re-entry

Metzorah: re-entry

The ritual described for the cured leper is filled with symbols that I do not understand.  I do not know the significance of hyssop, I do not even know what hyssop looks like.  I try to envision the ritual.

The most dramatic part of this celebration of survivorship is the bird rite.  A pot of  living water  is prepared.  A bird (pigeon or dove) is ritually slaughtered over the water.  The bird blood  mixes with the water. A second  bird of the same type, a matching bird, is immersed in the blood - living water mixture  (along with the wood,string and hyssop) and then released.  The bloody bird flies away free. 

The living bird is painted with the diluted blood of her dead brother. 

The ritual is a reminder of the escape from from death.  That escape paints the ensuing days of life and freedom.  Is this how a cancer survivor feels?  Is  her escape from death painted with traces of the  previous  blood transfusions  that she carries  in her body for the rest of her life?

The ritual anticipates the concentration camp selection and makes it clear that the life of one person depends on the death of another, either I die to become the source of blood or I am dipped in the blood of my brother. 

The ritual goes on to anoint the survivor with blood from the sacrificial animal. Blood in spotted on his  ear, thumb and great toe.  The blood on the ear means that everything she will hear is now through the filter of potential death.  The thumb manipulates the world, it creates- now in the context of a return from the abyss.  The toe provides direction, it determines where I go: away from death and toward life and  purpose.