A 60-year-old man went for a check-up and was told, "You’re in terrific shape. You have the body of a 35-year-old. By the way, how old was your father when he died?"
The 60-year-old responded, "Who said he was dead?"
The doctor was surprised and asked, "How old is he? Is he very active?"
The 60-year-old responded, "Well, he is 82 years old and he still goes skiing three times a season and surfing three times a week during the summer."
The doctor couldn`t believe it. "Well, how old was your grandfather when he died?"
The 60-year-old responded again, "Who said he was dead?"
The doctor was astonished. He said, "You mean to tell me you are 60 years old and both your father and your grandfather are alive? Is your grandfather very active?"
The 60-year-old said, "He goes skiing at least once a season and surfing once a week during the summer. Not only that," said the patient, "my grandfather is 106 years old, and next week he is getting married again."
The doctor said, "At 106 years old, why on earth would your grandfather want to get married?"
His patient looked up at the doctor and said, "Who said he wanted to? His mother put on tremendous pressure.”
Have you ever seen brothers and sisters criticizing a sibling's spouse? Here is how it works:
“Our sister in law, I am telling you, she is impossible… He is a narcissistic spoiled brat… How does our brother survive her? I am never talking to her again… He was so obnoxious at the Bar Mitzvah." Is this familiar? It happens in some families. We feel that our brothers or sisters in law are real winners… and we love talking to our siblings about it! Where did we learn this?
Well, in a somewhat more subtle and lofty fashion, this week's Torah portion, Behaalotcha, tells a similar story.
The Torah enigmatically says: “Miriam and Aaron spoke about Moses regarding the Cushite woman he had married.” The story ambiguously keeps us in suspense. What did they say about her? Whatever it was, we see that G-d grew angry. But why? Who was this woman?
The Moshav Zekenim gives an astounding commentary.
Moshe's brother and sister felt it was unfitting now for Moses to be married to this woman who was a convert and came from a crude and undistinguished family. Miriam argued that it was beneath Moses' dignity that he should be married, at this point in his life, to his wife, a Midianite woman.
Let us recall the circumstances of Moses’ marriage to his wife. He was a fugitive, running away from Pharaoh's ire and sword to Midian. He was alone and vulnerable when he married his wife Tzipporah, daughter of a Pagan Priest. From a gentile family, she had no connection to Jews or Jewish culture. We can understand how under those circumstances he married such a woman.
But now he was the greatest man of his generation. He was king and prophet, the one chosen by G-d to lead His people. He took them out of Egypt, molded them into a nation, and gave them G-d’s Torah, His blueprint for life. Now he needed a better, more worthy, woman. He needed a lady of Jewish royal blood, at least a woman who grew up among the Hebrews, saturated with their culture and heritage. It was simply inappropriate for the spiritual giant, leader of the generation, to have a foreign woman of unimpressive lineage as his soul-mate. Tzipporah, they argued, maybe a fine woman, a humble and moral human being. But still, she was from nowhere; her family was not Jewish; she was virtually unknown. Did Moses not deserve the crème de la crème?!
But Moses refused to listen to this advice. He told Miriam that he would never even entertain divorcing his wife for precisely the factors Miriam was calling to his attention. "When I was a poor fugitive, a penniless shepherd, a man on the run, with no home or family, without standing or support, this woman married me. She stuck by me when I was a nobody; she chose me not because of my bank account, family origin, or prominence, but because of my character. Now that I am the teacher of all Israel, and the master of all prophets, I should abandon her? This is how I will show her my gratitude? Never!
This interpretation is buttressed by G-d's testimonial to Miriam and Aaron. “Not so is My servant Moses; he is faithful throughout My house.” Why is this relevant?
G-d was saying that what made Moses so great was his loyalty and faithfulness. A relationship's most vital traits are loyalty, devotion, faithfulness, and dedication.
What is more, G-d told Miriam and Aaron, is that he cultivates this perspective because of his unique relationship with G-d. It is because of his intimacy with G-d that he loved his wife this way. People who don’t have G-d in their lives often create new gods. Their barometer of right and wrong is about “how will it look for my community, my neighbors, my relatives, or my friends.” They are busy with impressions and ensuring everything “looks good.” Appearance matters more than truth.
But Moses was on the opposite extreme. All that mattered to him was the truth, and yet more truth. If you think this is a small lesson, ask yourself what caused World War I.
Archduke Franz Ferdinand (1863-1914) was heir to the Austria-Hungarian Throne, as the nephew of the Austria-Hungarian Emperor, Franz Joseph. (Third in line to the throne at one point, Ferdinand became heir through two untimely deaths.) His marriage to his wife Sophia in 1900 was called one of the world's great love affairs. Unfortunately, his uncle, the Emperor, considered the Duchess Sophia a commoner and tried to convince Franz Ferdinand he was marrying beneath him. They went through with the marriage against the Emperor's wishes but had to renounce rights of rank and succession for their children. Sophia was also not allowed to ride in the same car with her husband during state affairs.
Ferdinand and Sophia were gunned down on June 28, 1914, in Sarajevo. A month later, World War I broke out, pitting Germany and Austria against Russia and Britain. It continued for four long years, claiming the lives of 16.5 million people, and wounding another 20 million, more than any war in history, and redrawing the maps of Europe and serving as the catalyst for World War II.
World War I was one of the greatest calamities in history, and the lead up to the Holocaust. The worst part is, it did not have to happen! In a few weeks, as the result of the murder of a couple, the entire world was up in flames. The recklessness and lack of judgment of individuals is still mysterious. Walter Rathenau, a German Jew who was Germany’s foreign minister after the World War I until his murder in 1922, opposed the war and said it would be a disaster. “200 elderly men who knew one another controlled the fate of Europe and the world.”
Henry Kissinger used to quip that it was all due to a bad shidduch (marriage). You see, Keiser Wilhelm of Germany and Czar Nicholas II of Russia were cousins. Had Ferdinand married a noblewoman, who would have attended the funeral in 1914? Franz Joseph, Keiser Wilhelm, the Russian Czar and the British King. Since he married a peasant, no one showed up! Had the Russian Czar spent time with his German cousin, together with the Austrian and British leaders, the war would have been avoided—and history would be very different!
You see what happens when everything becomes about “how good your marriage will look for other people”? The world can be changed as a result, literally.
It was a lack of Moses’ attitude that led to the great wars of the last century.
A prominent rabbi's daughter, a fine, lovely young woman, met a wonderful, wise and dedicated young man who was a convert. Both his parents and siblings are, of course, not Jewish. The two decided to get married. The parents of the girl were crushed.
“I thought to myself,” the girl's father, the rabbi, related, “I will be photographed at the wedding with my non-Jewish 'mechutanim.' What will my siblings say?!”
"Then I told myself, 'If I oppose this marriage not because I think the relationship won’t work, but simply because of my own phobias—I must quit my job in the rabbinate, for that means I am a hypocrite.' I preach how we are all G-d’s children, and every soul has infinite value, and converts are to be loved and treated with the utmost respect—and here I am living the exact opposite way.”
He spoke to his own father about it who told him that years earlier, one of his sisters was dating a boy who also came from a background not satisfactory to the father. He consulted the Lubavitcher Rebbe, who rebuked him for falling prey to externalities instead of substance.
The rabbi told me: “I decided to embrace the situation from an authentic, Divine perspective; not from a social PR vantage point. I marched down the aisle with joy, pride, and admiration for my child and her soul mate. I knew what a wonderful, wonderful, human being he is—what a mentch, a real and G-d fearing person, how refined and dignified. The wedding was one of my most intimate moments with the G-d of truth,” the father said.
G-d's unprecedented praise for Moses was that "in all My house, he is the most faithful." Moses would not abandon his closest relationships in life just because he had graduated to become the leader of Israel. He did not even think in such terms. What mattered to him—and what must matter to us—is loyalty, faithfulness, devotion, trust, genuineness, and caring.
What I want for my children and grandchildren are spouses who will love and nurture them, and be there for them. I want to see them find soul mates who will respect them, cherish them, and be present for them in their lives. I want to see couples who will be loyal to each other, and to the needs of one another; who will appreciate the values and traits of each other, and ensure that nothing can come in between them. I want to see a wife and husband about whom the spouse can say: He is trusted in my entire home, and in my entire heart.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Yoseph Geisinsky
Tom Peacock wrote...