Nidda and Zava
נידה וזבה
Throughout a woman’s fertile years, every month, at ovulation, a single egg is released from one of the ovaries toward the uterus, while the lining of the uterine wall thickens in order to receive the egg and support its development. If the egg is fertilized by the man’s seed, it will develop into a fetus; if it is not fertilized, about fourteen days after ovulation the uterine lining breaks down and flows out as menstrual blood. This is the monthly menstrual cycle. The Torah established that menstrual blood renders a woman impure with the impurity of nidda for seven days, after which she may immerse and become pure, as it is written: “When a woman has a discharge, and her discharge from her body is blood, she shall be in her nidda state for seven days” (Vayikra 15:19).
Rarely, an illness develops that causes bleeding beyond the monthly menstrual cycle. In such a case, if after the end of the seven days that began with the appearance of the menstrual period, during a period of eleven days, her blood flows for three consecutive days, the woman becomes impure with the impurity of a zava. To become purified from it, she must count seven clean days, and only then may she immerse and become pure, as it is written: “When a woman has a discharge of blood for many days, not at the time of her nidda, or if she has a discharge beyond her nidda period, all the days of her impure discharge she shall be as in the days of her nidda; she is impure…. When she becomes clean of her discharge, she shall count for herself seven days, and afterward she shall be pure” (ibid. 15:25-28). When the Temple stood, she also had to bring an offering afterward, as it is written: “On the eighth day she shall take for herself two turtledoves or two young pigeons…. The kohen shall offer one as a sin offering and the other as a burnt offering, and the kohen shall make atonement for her before the Lord for her impure discharge” (ibid. 15:29-30).
This impurity has two aspects. First, throughout this impurity it is forbidden to have marital relations and physical closeness, as it is written: “You shall not approach a woman in her impure nidda state to uncover her nakedness” (Vayikra 18:19). Second, with regard to the laws of the Temple and its sacred offerings: it is forbidden to enter the Temple Mount or to eat the meat of the sacrifices. Likewise, throughout the Land, it is a mitzva for members of kohanic families and their daughters to eat the teruma and ḥalla they receive from Israelites in purity, and they are forbidden to eat them in impurity; the Israelites who separated them also had to take care not to render them impure. Since the Destruction and the exile, the possibility of purification from corpse impurity by means of the ashes of the red heifer has been lost, and therefore kohanim may not eat teruma and ḥalla. Only within Jewish homes, in the love between husband and wife, is the holiness of the Temple revealed, and the laws of impurity and purity apply to marital relations and closeness between husband and wife, in order to direct, elevate, and sanctify their love.¹
Notes (1)
- The laws of impurity and purity explained in this book deal with the prohibition and permissibility of marital relations and closeness between husband and wife, not with impurity and purity in relation to the Temple and eating sacred foods and teharot (pure foods). However, at times, in order to understand the foundation of the halakha, laws of impurity relating to the Temple and teharot have been cited in order to clarify the similarities and differences between them and the laws of a woman’s impurity and purity with respect to her husband.
With respect to sacred foods and teharot, men have two impurities parallel to nidda and zava. (a) One who has emitted semen, whether voluntarily or involuntarily, contracts a light impurity: he renders foods and liquids impure but not people and vessels, and his purification is by immersion; at nightfall he may eat teruma and sacred foods. (b) A zav is a man who has an illness of the reproductive organs that causes the discharge of a certain fluid without an erection. One who sees such a discharge once has the status of one who has emitted semen. If he sees it twice in one day or over two days, he must count seven clean days and immerse in spring water (he is the only impure person who must immerse specifically in a spring). If he sees it three times over one, two, or three days, he must also bring an offering like a zava, two turtledoves or two young pigeons, one as a sin offering and one as a burnt offering. There is another impurity for one who has relations with a nidda: he becomes impure for seven days and must immerse at their end. (All impure people are forbidden to enter the maḥaneh Shekhina (Camp of the Divine Presence) at the center of the Temple Mount, and today everyone is considered impure. Only those whose impurity issues from their bodies are forbidden to enter the maḥaneh leviya (Levite Camp), which is the Temple Mount.)