CHAPTER FOUR - The Question of Marriage

A: BACKGROUND

2. The Jewish attitude to marriage: the view from Bereishit

The starting point for any examination of Judaism’s approach to marriage is, by definition, the attitude towards humankind’s existential state found in the familiar Creation stories at the beginning of Bereishit.

In Bereishit 2, after the creation of man (Adam) and, indeed, after G-d had celebrated the totality of Creation by resting on the seventh day, G-d begins to realise that something is amiss in Eden. Previously G-d,

“saw everything that He had made and, behold it was very good” (1:31). Yet it now appears that there are second thoughts. A closer observation reveals that “it is not good for man to be alone” and the decision is taken to find man a helpmate or a soulmate (2:18). This is, of course, the prelude to the creation of Eve.

The fascinating element in this traditional account of the creation of human beings is that woman is seen as being taken out of man’s side: woman and man are considered part of the same entity. They might evolve into separate beings with their own wills and their own autonomy, but they are essentially part of one essence; there is togetherness and a connection that are in their very substance. This, it should be noted, follows the strange description of the creation of the first being (– HeAdam) in chapter one. Here we are told (1:27) that,

“G-d created Man[kind] in His own image. In the image of G-d He created them. Male and female He created them. And G-d blessed them and G-d said to them, be fruitful and multiply…”

This statement in Chapter 1 is compelling: it is an even stronger expression of the traditional Jewish concept that man and woman are essentially one. The implication is clear: they belong together by their very nature; there is clearly an underlying natural connection between man and woman. It is therefore inevitable that the two parts of mankind - man and woman - autonomous beings though they might appear to be, will seek each other out in that search for wholeness that characterised them at the time of their creation.

Jewish mysticism will express this idea very clearly. In the central book of Jewish mysticism, the Zohar, is the following idea:

Each soul and spirit, prior to its entering into this world, consists of a male and female, united into one being. When it descends on this earth the two parts separate and animate two different bodies.

At the time of marriage, the Holy One, blessed be He, who knows all souls and spirits, unites them again, as they were before ,and they again constitute one body and one soul, forming as it were the right and left of one individual…

This union is influenced by the deeds of man and by the ways in which he walks. If the man is pure and his conduct is pleasing in the sight of G-d, he is united with that female part of his soul, which was his component part prior to his birth.
Zohar 1:91b

This idea is also echoed in the Talmud:

Forty days before the formation of a child, a voice proclaims in Heaven. The daughter of X is to marry the son of Y.
Bab. Talmud, Sotah 2a

These ideas, which were subsequently elaborated in many Chassidic stories, afford a fundamental insight into a basic Jewish concept that men and women belong together and are chosen for each other in a Divinely sanctified union. In other words, the coming together of men and women - sexually, institutionally and spiritually - in the ceremony known as marriage is an act that is part of the Divine plan and blessed by G-d.