RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL: JEWISH SPIRITUAL RENEWAL : JEWELS, WOMEN, TALMUD, SHAVUOT

RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL: JEWISH SPIRITUAL RENEWAL :JEWELS, WOMAN, TALMUD, SHAVUOT

 

THIS TALMUDIC ESSAY IS DEDICATED TO MY LOVING WIFE, HADASSAH LEAH BAT AHARON, AKA ELLEN LOUISE SEGAL ***

 

Rabbi Arthur Segal
Via Shamash Org on-line class service
Jewish Renewal

www.jewishrenewal.info
Jewish Spiritual Renewal

www.jewishspiritualrenewal.org
Jewish Spirituality
Eco Judaism
Hilton Head Island, SC, Bluffton, SC, Savannah, GA

 

 

During the Kol Ha Moed days of Pesach this year, after conducting seders, and teaching a bit of Jewish Spiritual Renewal, to a group of over 200 Jews from what seemed to be as many countries and minhags, Ellen and I strolled along the streets of St Johns, Antigua, in the Leeward Islands, in the Caribbean. We have been blessed to have been to Antigua many times before, so we were not touring or hitting the beaches. We walked. And I heard some Hebrew. And went into a jewelry store where the manager was from Israel. After finding out there were about ten other Israelis and Jews on this Island, who had Passover together, Ellen was already eyeing jewelry. Note please that the last time we were in a real jewelry store was when we picked out her engagement ring, after we had become engaged on the Nevi River in what is now Petersburg, Russia, then Leningrad, USSR. And that was in 1989. I am not counting the times we went to the Walmart Jewelry counter to get  new batteries for our watches.

 

Ellen is a simple Yid, a menschette. She doesn't ask for much. As long as she can do good for others, and not be around those doing harmful things to others, and has my devoted love, and the attention of our pet parrot, Avivit Keter, she is happy. Very happy.

 

But a gorgeous Fire Opal caught her eye, and her heart. For the first time in our marriage, she asked me for this jewel. Said Pliny about the Fire Opal: ''There is in them a softer fire than the ruby, there is the brilliant purple of the amethyst, and the sea green of the emerald -all  shining together in incredible union.  Some by their splendor rival the colors of the painters, others the flame of burning sulphur or of fire quickened by oil.  ''

 

And being in a loving mood, as I usually am, I said yes, and then asked for the price. After I was revived with a bottle of water and a cold towel and a seat under the air conditioning unit, I began to use my souk techniques with the Israeli fellow and got the priced reduced, knowing darn well I was still overpaying. But Ellen was beaming and the necklace of this fire opal, made her whole face light up like a 100000 p'nai or.

 

I remembered a Midrash: We find that God...adorns the bride, as it is written, "And the Lord God built...". Rabbi Yochanan said, "He built Eve [interpreting the word binyan as b'naeh , with beauty] and adorned her with jewels and showed her to Adam."  Said Rabbi Abahu, "Perhaps you will say that He showed her to him from some carob tree or bush? But no, after He adorned her with 24 kinds of jewelry, only then did He show her to him. For it says, 'And He brought her to the Adam.'" (Midrash Rabbah Ecclesiastes 7:7. )

 

And I remembered one of my adolescent  pin-up's teachings: "Diamonds are a girl's best friend.'' I was going to have to call my credit card company in the states because I had pre-flagged any purchases other than meals, taxis, and hotels. I also remembered Rita Rudner's quip: ''I think men who have a pierced ear are better prepared for marriage.  They've experienced pain and bought jewelry.''  

 

On Tuesday nights, I was teaching Halakah. And I remembered when I taught this passage from Code of Jewish Law, Orach Chaim 529, that I said to myself, "I am getting off cheaply with Ellen.''  "Men are instructed to buy our wives new clothes and jewelry before every Jewish holiday, each husband according to his financial means.'' Men are happy when we ''drink wine and eat meat.'' Women, however, would rather ''wear diamonds.''

 

Even our Talmud tells us that a man's livelihood depends on his getting his wife jewels. Talmud Bavli Tractate Bava Metzia 59a teaches us:  Rebbi said in the name of Rabbi Chelbo : "A person should always be careful about the honor of his wife, for blessing is found in a person's home only due to his wife, as the verse states, 'And he did good to Abram for her sake.'"

 

So it is obvious that we honor our wives by treating them with dignity, love, respect, no lashon ha ra about her, and to be sensitive. But jewels? Really? Yes, for when God provided for all of us in B'Midbar, by giving us manna to eat each day, Talmud Bavli Tracate Yoma 75a, says God provided women with jewelry! Trying to emulate God is hard enough trying yo be just, kind, merciful, and forgiving, but buying gems,...and at retail?!

On the same daf, Rava, speaking to his town's people says, "Honor your wives, in order that you will become rich." I am retired from practice and do my rabbinic work mostly for gratis. A necklace is going to make me rich? Being rich will toss me into another tax bracket. I am happy with what I have so the sages tell me I am rich.  But Ravi explains in Talmud Bavli Tractate Shabbat 62a. ''There are three things that bring a man to poverty…and one is when his wife curses him." Rava explained, "When she curses him about jewelry, because he can afford it and does not provide her." Oy, since 1989, I have been cursed.

So, there is an unwritten clause in my Ketubah. "Buy your wife bobbles, and I will reward you, I am the Lord your God, Who has taken you out of Egypt, to bring you into the bondage of matrimony.''  Nah. I love being married to Ellen.

Now the Kabbalah gets into this: '' When a man buys his wife fine clothes and jewelry, he should have in mind that he is beautifying the Divine Presence, represented in this world by none other than his wife." "Every man must see himself as standing between two women—the Shechinah (Divine Presence) above, providing him with all his needs, and the Shechinah below, i.e. his wife, to whom he provides in turn.'' We guys are simply a channel. According to how we provide for our wives, so will God provide for us.  Talmud Bavli Tractate Chullin 84b reads: '' a man should eat and drink less than his means, clothe himself according to his means, and honor his wife and children beyond his means. For they depend upon him, and he depends on the One that spoke and the world came into being.''

The Rabbis discuss what we are obligated to provide a  individual who is poor. The rabbis cite the verse that instructs us to provide the pauper, "…sufficient for his needs which he is lacking."  (Deut .15:8). Talmud Bavli Tractate  Ketubot 67b talks about how we give charity.

"You are obligated to provide the poor person "sufficient for his needs," but you are not obligated to make him rich. When the verse in the Torah adds, "which he is lacking," this implies even a horse to ride upon and a servant to run before him."
While the Gemorah explains that  a person is used to luxuries , and has come into hard times, and we provide him with  a servant , we are not making him rich.  Going above having our  needs fulfilled is being rich and having no concerns. And how do the rabbis say we get this rich? We get this rich by giving our wives jewelry.    

But in a Jewish Spiritual Renewal sense, a marriage is not a business deal ! If one's marriage is based on:  "you give this and I give that," this is no spiritual union.  "Love turns one person into two and two into one." (Rabbi Don Yitzchak Abarbanel). Our souls need to fuse as one. 

So I always learn. I need to do more than buy Ellen necessities. She could do this for herself. To show love, one buys something that has no purpose at all. And the sages tell us its jewelry. And this goes back to emulating God. As God provides for all of our earthly needs, we need God for our spiritual needs. We need a relationship with God that goes beyond the physical into the metaphysical. The prophets and Midrash describe the Jews' relationship with God as a marriage.

 

The Jewelry that God gives us are the spiritual lessons contained in the Torah starting with the revelation on Sinai, which we honor this Shavuot, the eve of Tuesday May 18, 2010.  Just as a wife looks pretty with jewelry, a Jew looks ''mahvelous dahling''  when he/she  wraps one's life with Torah.

 

Happy Shavuot:

 

Rabbi Arthur Segal
Via Shamash Org on-line class service
Jewish Renewal

www.jewishrenewal.info
Jewish Spiritual Renewal

www.jewishspiritualrenewal.org
Jewish Spirituality
Eco Judaism
Hilton Head Island, SC, Bluffton, SC, Savannah, GA

*** with thanks to R'Tzvi Freeman whose essay prompting my writing this.