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How Do We Make Sense of the Insensible? Rabbi Avi Novis-Deutsch on Parshat Tazria-Metzora

Parshat Tazria-Metzora offers a confusing depiction of skin afflictions and potential treatments that, for many people, have little connection to modern life.

Rabbi Avi Novis-Deutsch, Dean of the Schechter Rabbinical Seminary, suggests that the perplexing descriptions like “a white discoloration on the skin of his body which does not appear to be deeper than the skin and the hair in it has not turned white” (Lev. 13:4) may offer the modern reader an opportunity for self-examination about our relationships with God.

Watch the video below:

Avi Novis-Deutsch is the former Dean of the Schechter Rabbinical Seminary. Ordained as a Masorti rabbi by the SRS in 2003, Rabbi  Novis-Deutsch also holds an MA in Jewish Studies from JTS. He served for nine years as a pulpit rabbi at two Masorti congregations in Israel, most recently, at Haminyan Hamishpachti Masorti Kfar Veradim. Rabbi Novis-Deutsch also worked for two years as a Jewish educator in Berkeley in the Bay Area, California.  He is married to Dr. Nurit Novis-Deutsch. They and their three children live on Kibbutz Hanaton.

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