Timeless Torah

Is it natural to be married; to want to take on the burden of responsibility? If the answer is no, why do we celebrate weddings (and Bar Mitzvahs)?

Judaism postulates that man’s fundamental challenge is to rise above his natural inclinations. Only then will our lives be meaningful, and not the product of mere impulse. In that context, marriage is not natural. To illustrate: you receive a great offer to buy a beautiful beachfront home built with every luxury. There is one catch: You cannot sell it or rent it, and if you move out there will be severe financial penalties and emotional pain. Are you still interested?

If you aren’t, why are you prepared to be married? In no other facet of life are individuals prepared to commit to a lifelong contract. How can we?
The answer is that marriage is not a human, but a divine institution; meaning, if G-d had not commanded us to marry, man would never have invented it. To be sure, humans would have devised some structure for living together, but it would contain contingency plans for an uncertain future.

Proof that marriage is a religious invention is this: now that we are living in what is largely a godless age, marriage and marital fidelity are outdated, and the average couple is opting, instead, to live together.

When we speak of marriage as a G-dly institution, as in “Holy Matrimony,” we must attune our ears to the implication: marriage is a supra-natural convention. And the quicker we realize this, the more secure our marriages will be. In fact, the belief that marriage is natural has led to terrible misconceptions. Many couples complain that the person whom they married is different than the person they dated. How can this be? Does marriage have the sinister capacity to change Snow White into the Wicked Witch or Doctor Jekyll into Mr. Hyde?

When couples date they exert every attempt to impress because they understand this is necessary, but when they marry they exert little effort, thinking that, since married couples naturally love each other, it will happen automatically. Bad assumption. Marriage is a hungry animal that needs to be fed constantly. We must pour an inexhaustible supply of love, affection, attention, caring, and understanding into this magical brew. Just as one does not merely eat once and is forever satiated, no-one emerges from under a canopy and is in love until the end of time. Marriage is life ongoing, and we must monitor its pulse constantly, if it is not to die. In this respect, success in marriage comes only if we focus on what we put into marriage; indeed, into every relationship. We must never focus solely on ourselves, but on what we can contribute to one another.

This parallels the first command of this week’s reading: “When you take a census of the Israelites…each one is to give…an atonement offering for his life…so that they will not be stricken by plague.” (Exodus 30: 12) This actually happened with King David. Although he was conscience-stricken after conducting a census, a plague occurred. Evidently, it is dangerous to count Jews. Rashi suggests “the evil eye” is then at work. Rabbenu Bachya explains that when people are numbered one by one the danger is that an individual’s merit may not be sufficiently great to save him from judgment. Sforno warns that a census draws attention both to those who have died and those still alive, which raises the question: by what right am I here, and others are not? To avert this we must give, by way of ransom, a gift to the Temple.

Perhaps there is another reason. Why do nations normally take a census? To establish their strength: military (how many can be conscripted), economic (the number from whom taxes can be raised), or simply demographic (the growth of the nation). The assumption is that there is strength in numbers. That is why it is dangerous to count Jews. If we, “the fewest of all peoples,” ever believed that there is strength in numbers, we would long ago have given in to despair.

How then do we estimate our strength? To this the Torah answers: Ask Jews to give of themselves, and count, not them, but their contributions. There is one episode in the Book of Judges (chapters 6-7) that epitomizes this amazing truth. The Israelites had suffered a devastating series of attacks from the Midianites. G-d called on Gideon, who duly assembled an army of 32,000 men. G-d responded with what must surely be one of the strangest lines in military history, “You have too many.” So G-d told Gideon to allow soldiers to return home. 22,000 men did, leaving 10,000. G-d said, “There are still too many.” Gideon was then ordered to observe how they drank: 9,700 kneeled down to the river to drink from it directly, a mere 300 cupped the water in their hands and stayed standing. G-d told Gideon to retain the 300 troops, an absurdly small number. Satisfied at last, G-d said, “With the three hundred…I will save you.” / Gideon mounted a surprise attack and won.