Cordoned Off
In Europe, we have a political term that I always paid attention to in the news: ‘cordon sanitaire’. In my emerging teenage political consciousness, this term started being used in the 1990’s when the first stirrings of far-right electoral activism became evident. Other political parties, committed to liberal democracy, would form a ‘cordon sanitaire’ – a coalition, essentially – to shut out white supremacist and ultra-nationalist groups.
The tactics of this remain to be debated given the rise of the far right in much of Europe, but that is beyond the scope of the sermon. I am a rabbi, after all, and not a political analyst. Still, that term lodged in my brain; it had an epidemiological quality to it, a notion of wanting to prevent the spread of a particular type of social contagion. If only one could cordon off racism and bigotry so easily. Unfortunately, bigotry is a virus that mutates all too effectively, often sneaking past our societal defenses.
In the context of Parashat Tazria-Metzora, this idea of ‘social contagion’ seems worth interrogating. These are not parshiyot that usually inspire (insert well-worn joke about Tazria-Metzora and long-suffering B-Mitzvah kids) but I remember during the early days of COVID, the epidemiological and purity practices of Leviticus took on a new gloss.
This time, I would like to return to that idea of social contagion. Societies ancient and modern have identified different forms of social ills throughout history and reacted vigorously, sometimes with desirable outcomes (such as the Civil Rights movement circumscribing segregation and anti-Black racism) and sometimes with devastating effect (like the anti-Japanese hysteria during WW2 which caused 120,000 Japanese Americans to be detained in camps, or the days of McCarthy which ruined many an American’s career and life by casting them as communist suspects). Of course, what is deemed a contagion is in the eye of the beholder and dependent on how we define our moral concerns. We struggle mightily with this today as evidenced in discourse around ‘ideological purity’ and ‘political litmus tests.’
Both the purveyors of social contagion and their detractors tend to succumb to a binary, to a formation of an in-group and an out-group. Sometimes, this is justified: after all, I am thankful that European political parties try to resist far right nationalists and Neo Nazis from entering governance. We should have no tolerance for the wide array of bigotries that plague (another medical metaphor!) our society. Drawing a line in the sand based on our values and principles is a moral courage we all need to hone.
However, there are also instances where this purity-impurity binary causes great harm. Like the Levitical Priest and his patient, both subject and object risk becoming isolated from each other. The Levitical Priest assigned the ‘metzora’ (the person suffering from the Biblical condition of tzara’at) a period of quarantine, removing that person from the rhythms of public life and discourse. If I read this Torah portion critically rather than generously (like I have done in the past), I’d argue that this isolation risks dehumanization. What if the ‘contagion’ isn’t real? What if the container has a nefarious or harmful agenda? What if the ‘contagion’ pathologizes necessary social dissent from the status quo? Dividing our world in binaries and shutting away people is a dangerous trajectory indeed.
We see this today all too often, both on the political left and the political right. Litmus tests and notions of ideological purity shut down necessary questions and healthy debate. Cordoning off political opponents or – in scare quotes – “socially undesirable” people invariably lead to their dehumanization. Circling the wagons and reaffirming our own self-righteousness brings us a shrinkage of our own worldview. All too often, the dividing line becomes an impenetrable wall.
We see this in American society today with the language used around populations easy to cordon off: people with disabilities, trans folks, autistics, immigrants, Muslims, Palestinians or pro-Palestine student activists. But in other sectors of American society, other groups are targeted: pro-lifers, Republicans, pro-Israel Jews, socially conservative rural folks or those without a college education. Each of us is potentially vulnerable to be cordoned off – and also to do the cordoning off itself. Perhaps the social contagion is not just the undesirable or immutable characteristics we accuse others of having, but is also made manifest in the accusing.
Such isolation causes incredible loneliness. I had the blessing to attend a pro-immigrant, anti-deportation demonstration yesterday, with many congregants. As an immigrant myself (albeit a much more privileged one), I was both heartened and disheartened by the speeches (many of them in Spanish, and understandable to me since I speak the language). There were stories of heartbreak and isolation, of fear and anxiety. A jolting moment at a traffic stop. A cruel or cutting remark. A fear of a family member no longer coming home. The callous cordoning of immigrants without due process or specified charges, irrespective of their status. The worry that folks will ‘disappear’, like social stains scrubbed and cleansed away. It is a terrible and harrowing image.
And yet, the same Torah that rattles us with these problematic images of the so-called pure and impure, that perhaps condemns its own cruel practices, also redeems itself through its solutions. In Leviticus, Levitical Priest and patient do reconcile and reintegrate. The ‘metzora’ is welcomed back into the community and made whole before God and the people. The Priest, in turn, is held accountable by due process and a watchful community. For all of its binaries, the Torah does strive to be holistic, restorative and integrative, deeply concerned with ‘shleimut’, wholeness.
That is my prayer for us too: to integrate, restore and reintegrate, to redemptively make whole, to eliminate the false dichotomies and cruel essentialisms that keep us cordoned off. To remind us when we are the ones contained, isolated or judged, and to remind us when we are the ones containing, isolating or judging. To hold up a mirror to us as individuals and a collective what the cost of such binaries is, and to be mindful, always, to resist dehumanization.
May we merit, all of us, to break down walls and open doors and build a Torat Chesed, a Torah of expansive compassion, that shows us a better way.
