Jewish ritual purity in marital relations (Niddah)

[Director Michael]

I can already see people taking offense at this.

That only happens if the person is reacting with blatant misunderstanding and misinformation about this subject of Torah Law for Jews. As always, if a person takes offense at something in Torah, they should realize that it's because of their lack of understanding, and they should try to correct this by diligently seeking out the authentic meaning and explanation.

Does this mean that women are dirty during their time of niddah?

NO. Such an idea comes from the unfortunate use of the mistranslation "unclean." As I wrote in a post above, this subject has nothing to do with physical cleanliness. Rather, because Jews are inherently holy (Leviticus 19:2), there is a spiritual "impurity" ("tumah" in Hebrew) that attaches upon Jews due to certain physical circumstances (of which female menstruation is just one of these; male ejaculation and proper marital intercourse are two other examples), and the condition of "tumah" continues indefinitely until the Jewish man or woman undergoes some specific procedure to achieve spiritual "purification," as specified in the Torah. During the condition of "tumah" a Jew is restricted from entering the precincts of the Holy Temple, or eating from the holy Temple sacrifices. This applies for Jewish men of all ages as much as it does for Jewish women of all ages. The unique aspect of the particular tumah that results in the "niddah" state is that for Jews, marital relations are forbidden indefinitely until the woman in this state undertakes the specified spiritual purification procedure.

They didn't choose for their bodies to do this, so why do their husbands have to flee from them while screaming "eeewwww"?

That is a horrible untrue stereotype. Although granted, in the unfortunate situation that has come about in recent generations, there are many Jews who haven't been correctly educated about some basic principles of their own religion, including the meaning and thoughtful and sensitive practice of niddah, which by the way serves to increase the affection and intimacy of a Jewish couple, when observed correctly.

Is this fair? I would have to agree with those who would take offense at this and admit that I thought it wasn't fair.

As I explained, your understanding was incorrect, so you should re-evaluate your reactive of offense and unfairness in light of corrected information.