Why does a woman become unclean after many days of her discharge in Leviticus 15:25?

Question

A woman with a discharge of blood besides her monthly period is said to become unclean after a number of days of her flow

Leviticus 15:25 NIV

“‘When a woman has a discharge of blood for many days at a time other than her monthly period or has a discharge that continues beyond her period, she will be unclean as long as she has the discharge, just as in the days of her period.

Whilst a man with a discharge is said to become unclean after noticing the issue even when the discharge stops(even if its only for one day)

Leviticus 15:1-3 NIV

The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, 2 “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When any man has an unusual bodily discharge, such a discharge is unclean. 3 Whether it continues flowing from his body or is blocked, it will make him unclean. This is how his discharge will bring about uncleanness:

Why did the woman become unclean after several days of her flow?

Answer 1

They are Different Discharges in Symptom

Firstly, what we observe from the text immediately is that the woman's issue is an issue of blood, while the man's issue is one of 'unusuality'. Straight away, we can see from the text that these are different things. Why would they not then be treated differently?

They are Different Discharges in Source

Secondly, we know that men and women are different - we could quote Genesis, but this is common grace - and at a biological level they differ very much on the genital front - I am not a doctor, but Mike Borden may be right in his comments - and thus the actions that demonstrate a danger, or that demonstrate imperfection may be different from one sex than the other.

The Text doesn't Say, but nor does It make the Comparison

These two passages are in one section - and chapter fifteen can be considered quite separate from the neighboring chapters beginning with narrative of God speaking and stopping before a narrative of God speaking on another subject - but they are not adjacent in that passage. Between them are teachings of copulation, periods, and copulating with one on her period. These all share similarities and they all share differences.

The text doesn't explain why the differences, but if you trust that God's laws are wise then you can try to deduce the reasons differences in terms of this being a demonstration of God's mercy. That is if you have a theory about why the law of man's discharge exists then you can then see if it also predicts why the law of woman's bleeding is as it is. But that is going beyond the precise meaning of the text itself, which are instructions for the Israelites to follow.