Or HaChaim on Leviticus 12:2/אור החיים על ויקרא י״ב:ב׳

1 דבר …לאמור. "Speak…to say." Why does the word לאמור have to be repeated here, seeing verse 1 ended with the word לאמור, "to say?" Perhaps the reason is that this commandment is addressed primarily to women. The word לאמור after "the children of Israel," is a warning to the women to pay special attention to this legislation. We may also explain this extra word לאמור in accordance with Torat Kohanim on this verse which explains the words בני ישראל as excluding Gentiles. The word לאמור stresses that it is a privilege for Jewish women to be given this legislation. Had they not been on a spiritually higher level than their non-Jewish counterparts they would not have been considered as having suffered impurity through such a natural process as giving birth. [seeing that their spiritual level had been temporarily eclipsed by the need to focus on purely bodily functions, the mothers need to purify their bodies to make it fit again for their spiritual functions. Ed.]

2אשה כי תזריע וילדה זכר, a woman who brings forth seed by giving birth to a male child, etc. Why did the Torah not simply write: אשה כי תלד זכר, "when a woman gives birth to a male child, etc.?" The words כי תזריע appear superfluous. Our sages disagree about the reason. Torat Kohanim on our verse writes that these words tell us that contrary to expectations a woman who was already pregnant before this legislation was revealed to the people is also subject to it, whereas she does not contract impurity if she gave birth just before this legislation was revealed. Anonymous sages state that when the baby is delivered by caesarean incision the mother does not contract impurity. The fetus has to exit from the same place where the seed entered. Rabbi Shimon holds that even if an indeterminate mass is delivered, i.e. some fetus clearly unable to live, the mother does contract impurity and has to bring the required offerings. He does not accept the view that if a woman gives "birth" by caesarean incision that she is not subject to the legislation in our chapter. Why did the Torah use the future tense in the words כי תזריע, and switch to the past tense writing וילדה instead of ותלד? We find that the Torah does use the word ותלד when describing the birth of a female child in verse 5! Although there are numerous instances when a form of the past tense of the verb is used by the Torah to describe something in the future, the Torah does not switch tenses unnecessarily without trying to draw our attention to some additional meaning. Furthermore, why does the Torah write וילדה, "she gave birth," instead of אם ילדה זכר, "if she gave birth to a male child as a result," seeing there is no certainty that she will indeed give birth to a male child rather than to a girl? One could answer the last question by saying that the word כי in כי תזריע is equivalent to the word אם, "if," and that this word belongs to the latter half of the verse. This is a forced explanation, however.

3Our sages in Niddah 31 as well as in Berachot 60 are of the opinion that if the woman achieves orgasm first during marital intercourse the baby born from such a union will be male, and that the Torah here informs us of this biological fact. This is why the Torah wrote וילדה זכר as something that is definite. While it is true that Rabbi Tzadok arrived at this conclusion exegetically from Genesis 46,15 ואת דינה בתו, the fact is that the Torah made the birth of a male child dependent on an experience of the mother, and the birth of a female child on the experience of the father during their union. The verse in Genesis does not provide a reason for this linkage to the respective experience of father and mother during their union. [The author of Torah Temimah comments on that verse that the scientific aspect of the matter was an established fact for our sages; they knew that when two factors have to combine to create something it is the last factor which determines the nature of the product. Hence, if the male has spent his reproductive effort before the woman, the result will be a female child corresponding to the reproductive power of the woman. We do not "learn" this from that verse; the verse only alludes to something already known. Ed.] In our verse the Torah explains the reason for this fact of life, namely that the crucial factor is who spends his reproductive power first. The Torah did not need to add the word "first" in our verse for even if the mother were not to expend her reproductive power first she does have to spend it in order to produce a child of either gender. This is why the Torah also had to write the verse in Genesis 46,15 so that from the two verses combined we would know what factors determine the sex of a baby. [The word ואת, "and in addition," in that verse in Genesis indicates that Leah was last in spending her reproductive power during the union that led to the birth of Dinah. Hence the child was a female. Ed.].

4The Torah managed to include still more information in these few words. In Psalms 139,5 David says: "you have created me both last and first." This line is explained by Bereshit Rabbah 8,1 as referring to two separate creations of man. His body was created at the very end of the six days of creation whereas his spirit had been created already in the first verse of the Torah prior to the creation of the light, when the Torah described the spirit of the Lord as hovering over the deep. We are told by the Zohar Kedoshim page 80 that the nature of the soul or personality of a baby is determined by the thoughts of the father and mother during marital union. If the parents entertain unworthy thoughts during such a union the personality of the baby will tend to be attracted to spiritually negative forces, whereas if the thoughts of the parents during their physical union are worthy this will be reflected in the children of such unions. Consider carefully what we are told in Berachot 10 and the Jerusalem Talmud Sanhedrin 10,2 about what happened to the children of the pious king Chizkiyah who had married the daughter of the prophet Isaiah. [the regular text of the Talmud does not have this; parts are found in Eyn Yaakov Ed.) According to the Talmud there the reason that Menashe and Ravshoke, the sons of that union, became such heretics was some unworthy thoughts entertained by Chiskiyah's wife at the time the child was conceived. (supposedly she fantasized about the servants of Merodach Baladon king of Babylon) If we accept this, the most important part of the "birth," i.e. the fusion of soul and body takes place already at the time of conception. Not only that, but the thought which precedes ejaculation of the semen has a determining influence on the tendency of the baby's character development. This would be the mystical aspect of the words כי תזריע וילדה, the nature of what will be born is determined at the time of conception. After that period it is already too late to reverse what occurred at the time of the union between father and mother. The term לידה, birth, is therefore applicable to a process which is a long way from becoming visible. Once we have appreciated this we will have a better understanding of Genesis 12,5 where the Torah speaks of personalities נפש which Abram and Sarai made in Charan, i.e. due to their union as man and wife. Although Sarai had not given birth to a physical child in those years, the thoughts that she and her husband entertained while they tried to conceive children produced the kinds of souls which became G'd fearing individuals in other bodies. This does not contradict the truth of the statement that the sex of the child is determined at the time of conception. The Torah wrote the word זכר, male, as a hint that already during the moments when the bodies of the parents join in marital union they have it within their power to determine the sex of the child which will be the result of such a union by dint of the thoughts which they entertain at that time. These will enable them to draw down from heaven a male soul. (or "a soul from the part of heaven inhabited by male souls").

5The verse contains an allusion to other psychological factors which are part of the process of conception, i.e. the physical union between man and wife. A woman is neither obligated to have children, nor does she as a rule volunteer to beconme pregnant, an experience she finds often painful, fraught with many discomforts and danger to her health culminating in the excruciatingly painful experience of giving birth. In fact, there are women who avoid getting married in order to avoid the experience of pregnancy and birth. If the woman does get married, the feelings she entertains during marital intercourse are frequently limited to gratifying her physical pleasure during such intercourse. According to Gittin 49 a woman's desire in this respect is greater than that of her husband. [according to the author this is the meaning of the statement in the Talmud that "her urge to get married is greater than that of her husband." Ed.] In our verse the Torah hints that if a woman enters marriage although she is not commanded to do so, this will be accounted for her as a meritorious deed, as if she were a male and had fulfilled the commandment to procreate incumbent upon the male. The Torah writes: אשה כי תזריע, that when a woman is active in joining in an activity which will result in the birth of a baby, i.e. she engages in intercourse in order to have children, and not in order to satisfy her biological urge, she may have a son. If the Torah had merely written אשה כי תלד זכר," when a woman gives birth to a male child, etc," we would have understood that the process described above occurs as a result of any mating between husband and wife irrespective of their thoughts at the time. As it is, the Torah teaches how a woman can acquire the stature of a זכר, male. The reason the Torah has to add the word וילדה is to tell us that she attains that level only if the thoughts she entertained during intercourse also result in the actual birth of a child. Perhaps this is also part of the meaning of the word לאמור in verse 2, the need for which we had questioned earlier. The sequence of לאמור אשה, suggests that Moses was to tell the women how a woman may attain a spiritually superior niveau; she will do so by volunteering to have children and by entertaining lofty thoughts during the process of conception. Perhaps this is the mystical dimension of Proverbs 10,1; בן כסיל תוגת אמו; "a foolish son is his mother's sorrow." A son who is not up to the expectations of his mother may well be the outcome of the kind of thoughts the mother did not entertain when she conceived him.

6The verse also contains an allusion to the כנסת ישראל, the Jewish people as a conceptual entity. We find that this term is applied to women in such verses as Isaiah 54,5: כי בעליך עושיך, "for He who has made you will espouse you;" the prophet also continues: ואשת נעורים, "and the wife of your youth;" the prophet Hoseah describes the relationship of G'd and כנסת ישראל in Hoseah 2,21: וארשתיך לי לעולם, (G'd speaking to His bride) "I will betroth Myself to you forever, etc." Isaiah 50,1: "where is the bill of divorce I have given you?" There are more such verses to be found scattered throughout the Books of the Prophets. וילדה זכר, "and she gives birth to a male child, etc." when viewed from a moral-ethical vantage-point, the Torah reveals that when the מזריע the initiative for the husband-wife relationship with G'd originates with the Jewish people, the כנסת ישראל, then the product of such an initiative will be a male child, זכר, the entire nation will attain the highest spiritual level. The word זכר, male, is hyperbole for the highest moral-ethical achievenment. In Sanhedrin 98 and Shemot Rabbah 15 the superiority of the ultimate redemption to the redemption at the time of the Exodus from Egypt is described. The ultimate redemption is perceived there as the corollary of Israel distinguishing itself by the performance of good deeds, etc. The prophet described the Exodus in terms of Israel being "naked and nude" (Ezekiel 16,7). Clothing is perceived as a layer of מצות and good deeds covering our bodies. The inadequacy of the Jewish people at the time of the Exodus is underlined in Deut. 4,34 where G'd describes the Exodus as wrenching one people from the midst of the same people, something that made it legally difficult for G'd to justify taking the Israelites out of Egypt when He did. That redemption has been described only in female terms and that is why it did not endure in the end and the Temple was destroyed. Not so the redemption of the future which will occur as a direct result of Israel's merits. First and foremost among those merits is Israel's preoccupation with Torah as described in Deut. 31,21 something that will never be forgotten even during a protracted period of exile. The Torah continues: וטמאה, the mother contracts ritual impurity as a result of giving birth. Here the Torah alludes to the way G'd initiates a process which culminates in the rehabilitation of Israel so that it will attain a spiritual level that qualifies for the description זכר. The "days" mentioned here are to be understood as seven years similar to Genesis 24,55 where Laban and his mother wanted Rebeccah to delay her departure by ימים, i.e. a year. The years which are viewed as the חבלי משיח, the birth-pangs of the Messiah, last for seven years during which Israel will be refined spiritually in preparation of his arrival. He will make his appearance during the eighth year. On the eighth day, at the beginning of the eighth day (year), the baby is to have its foreskin removed, i.e. the concept of a foreskin which acts as a barrier between man and G'd will be removed from the universe. We read in Zachariah 13,2 that G'd will destroy the spirit of impurity from the earth. This will occur during the eighth year. It is well known that conceptually the foreskin is identical with the forces of the קליפה, the spiritually negative emanations. When the Torah wrote the word וטמאה, describing the state of the mother, this is a simile for the afflictions experienced during the birth-pangs of the Messiah.