The natural superiority of women

As if this week's (double) parasha is not bad enough, to add insult to injury, it opens with a discussion of women's impurity and ends with women's impurity. What is that? Women are more impure? women are first and last in impurity? what in the world?

So I read the parasha very carefully and I noticed that other than the start and the finish, the rest of it is almost all in male form. Except for chapter 13 verse 38-39, which says 'a man or a woman' the whole parasha is written in male form (as we all know, in Hebrew, there is a distinct difference in the words used to speak to or about males and the ones used for females). Women's "impurities" are only mentioned at the beginning (regarding a natural, joyous event) and at the end (regarding another natural event and its variations). Most of the parasha talks about impurities caused by diseases that got interpreted as punishments for various transgressions (mostly gossip). Hmmm.

Male language includes females, you say? Don't get me started. There are plenty of occasions when the male form of the Torah's commands was used as a reason to exclude females. You can't have it both ways.

Well, well, well. What do you know? Women get impure by some natural things that happen anyway. Men get impure as punishment for gossip (and they say women are greater gossips than men. Huh!) And the process of purifying men is much more complicated than the process of purifying a woman after her monthly period or after she gave birth.

I always say that men were put on this earth as a little joke on G-d's part and we simply have to put up with them the way we put up with toddlers and teenagers (whom men resemble most of the time.) And here the Torah says clearly that men are much more trouble than women. They surely gave the priests way more headaches, what with the endless checking, rechecking, purifying, more checking and all the decisions (is it a white dot or a yellow one? was this here last week? does this look puffy to you? Sure sounds like a man when he is sick, doesn't it?)

Women (as I always claimed) rock.

And so, for a nice young woman who is plagued by not being able to eat tomato sauce on her pasta (see the post "Not quite the same thing" from 2/15/13 for the full story). http://osnat-kitchentokitchen.blogspot.com/2013/02/not-quite-same-thing.html
I am offering yet another way to eat pasta without tomatoes or dairy. For you Tzivya. A woman of valor. Just like all other women.


Walnut and Parsley Pesto

In a food processor process until relatively smooth (it won't ever be super smooth):

1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil (don't use regular. With no cheese, you need all the flavor you can get)
1 cup packed parsley leaves (just leaves. Take the 5 minutes to pluck them of the stalks)
1/4 cup lemon juice
6 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp salt (kosher salt is best)
Black pepper to taste (you can mix it in after the rest if you want to "taste")


This will give you about a cup or so of pesto. Cook your pasta and mix with the pesto while the pasta is still hot. You might want to reserve some pasta cooking water to mix in as well if you need to dilute it a bit.




We are women. Hear us roar.