PARSHAT TAZRIA THE MICROWAVE SYNDROME By Rabbi Michael Gold

"But if she bears a female child, then she shall be unclean two weeks, as in her menstruation; and she shall continue in the blood of her purifying sixty six days." (Leviticus 12:5) Greetings from New York City. I am running around the city with a group of High School students, some of whom have never been to New York. And it is frigid. We have been forced to change some of our plans because it is simply too cold. This week's portion speaks about a woman who gives birth. If she has a baby boy she must wait seven days, purify herself, and then can participate in the bris on the eighth day. After that she is ritually unclean for 32 more days. Forty days must go by before she can reenter the world. If she gives birth to a baby girl all the numbers are doubled. She must wait fourteen days before purifying herself but cannot enter the camp for another 66 days. Eighty days must go by before she can reenter the world. On the surface this seems like a misogynist law. Why so many days, and why double for a girl? But I read one commentary I really liked. The period of separation is a chance to bond with her baby, and

not rush to reenter the world. Maybe women need double the bonding with a baby daughter. When I meet women who give birth and go back to work a few days later, I wonder if we need to reintroduce this law. We are in such a hurry to accomplish everything in life, we often forget the fundamental fact - everything worth doing takes time. We live life in such a hurry. We want instant gratification. I often call this the microwave syndrome. Microwaves make everything instantaneous. My mother, may her memory be for a blessing, and I share the same weakness. We both love popcorn. She made it almost every night. I remember her putting oil in a pot, putting in the popcorn, and standing at the stove, sometimes for five minutes or more, shaking the pot. If she put the pot down the popcorn would burn. Meanwhile, she would melt a separate little pot of butter. On the other hand, when I want popcorn, I put a bag in the microwave, push two and a half minutes, walk away, and it is ready moments later. It is not just popcorn; we want our food instantaneously. We eat at fast food restaurants, and for those kosher like me, there are kosher versions of these fast food restaurants in many large cities. In parts of Israel you can get a kosher Big Mac. But our tradition speaks about leisurely meals, particularly on the Sabbath and major festivals. Good china is used, courses are served in a leisurely manner, guests are invited, and words of Torah are exchanged. Somehow, such leisurely, time consuming meals have fallen by the wayside.

It is not just food. Love and marriage used to involve a time consuming process called courtship. Young people took the time to really get to know one another; the idea of becoming sexually active early in a relationship was unseemly. Not so today. Young people do not date, they hook up. Often this means an instant sexually commitment before they know anything about the person they have just known intimately. But part of the dissolution of family life in our country is related to these hook-ups. People want instant religion. I have often told the story of a woman who came to me wanting something spiritual. I invited her to come as my guest to Yom Kippur services. She did come, but left after twenty minutes. I called her after Yom Kippur and asked her why she left. She answered me, "I sat in services waiting for something spiritual to happen. When nothing happened I decided to leave. Next time I will try the Kabbalah Center." Religion does not touch our souls instantaneously; any worthy religion takes time and commitment. I can think of numerous other examples from all life's experience. Last week I spoke about drinking, substance abuse, and the problems these create for our young people. Both drinking and drugs involved putting a chemical in our body for an instant high. If a chemical can make us feel good, why do anything else? But I come from a tradition that teaches that anything that makes us feel good about life takes time and effort. Often it takes a bit of pain. Ben Ha Ha taught

in Pirke Avot, "According to the suffering is the reward." (Avot 5:23) Or to put it in a more modern idiom, "no pain no gain."