By Rabbi Yair Hoffman for the Five Towns Jewish Times
It was a shidduch crisis. The young women were not getting married and a solution needed to happen. The greatest Rabbis of the generation got together and worked out a solution. They made enactments, and people took it seriously. The solution worked. Girls were able to get shidduchim once again, and a major social obstacle was overcome.
Fiction? No – Jewish Halachic history.
THE BACKGROUND
It was one of the enactments in a gathering called the Takanas Shum. The confluence of illness, danger and the crusades had contributed to the fact that there was a higher than normal mortality rate in the Jewish community. If a young woman’s new groom were to pass away, Chas v’shalom, the entire dowry that the bride came with – went to the husband’s family. The bride’s family did not get any of it back.
As a repercussion of this reality, many parents no longer provided their daughters with a large dowry. They did not wish to risk the significant sums of money that it entailed. As a consequence, the young girls sat single, with no prospects of shidduchim.
Something had to be done.
THE GEDOLIM GET TOGETHER
The great Gedolim of Medieval Europe, of the communities of Speyer Vermes and Mainz (forming the acronym Shum), gathered and made a number of takanos. Who were these great leaders? They were Rabbeinu Tam and the Rashbam, Rashi’s grandsons. The Raavan, one of the early Baalei haTosfos. Over 250 Rabbis, Rishonim were in attendance.
THE SOLUTION TO THE SHIDDUCH CRISIS
The takanah that they made at the gathering was to decree that if a husband chas v’shalom passed away in the first year of marriage, the dowry would not be inherited by the husband’s family, but it would revert back to the bride’s parents. If he passed away within two years of marriage, then half of the dowry would go back to the bride’s family (although this is a yesh omrim). The decree was passed and observed. The halacha is incorporated in the Shulchan Aruch and is mentioned in Even haEzer 53:3.
The gathering was held in the city of Troyes. It happened 857 years ago – in the year 1160.
But the result was that the Takanah worked. The parents of the brides began to once again give dowries and the young girls began to wed once again.
It solved the Shidduch crisis then.
WHAT WE NEED NOW
We need another Takanas Shum of sorts. We have girls that have not received shidduch calls in months – if not ever. This may be because of the disparity in numbers between available boys and girls, but whatever the reason may be – it needs to be resolved.
There are individual people and organizations that are attempting to address it. Reb Shlomo Yehudah Rechnitz tried to address it and even authored a number of articles and backed some initiatives too. But we need to make a macro-effort here.
This is something that should be on our spiritual agenda. If that Shidduch crisis of nearly 900 years ago so captured the attention of the Gedolei haRishonim, it is certainly be something that we should consider. The solution given then made it into the pages of our Shulchan Aruch. We need to address this issue on a grander scale.
The author can be reached at [email protected]
Join the official YWN WhatsApp status
9 Responses
Good idea. How about that parents of girls give a dowry again?
there is a difference in that the situation the author mentions there was a singular reason that served as the impediment – has there been a singular impediment identified in the current situation? In answer to THE single most crucial impediment to matches today one would get twice as many reasons as there are people responding.
maybe at the next singles event a questionnaire can be handed out that asks “have you completely given up on finding that perfect someone?” anyone that answers yes will be automatically paired
I don’t post much if ever, but I had an idea that I think could work for this. Much of the focus on resolving the shidduch crisis has been on people arguing the boys should get married younger and some others saying the girls should get married older. Both positions are impractical as boys don’t want to get married younger as for whatever reason they don’t feel ready and frankly are not willing to base their decision as to when to get married on whether it solves a communal issue or not. For girls, asking them to wait also is unworkable as girls think if they wait they will not get married. Instead what I suggest is that the Rabbi’s get together and issue a Kol Koreh stating that for boys the first 3 (maybe it should even be the first 4 or 5) girls they go out with should not be more then 1 year younger, with at least one of the girls older then the boy. This will ensure that older girls (23+) have numerous shidduchim being redt to them, whereas now they don’t get many. It will also mean that younger girls get less shidduchim redt, but unless boys are ready to get married younger that is what has to happen to fix the age gap.
I heard the shidduch crises is just an American phenomenon.
By continuing to characterize it as a “crisis” and creating the perception that a girl in her mid-20s or early 30s is somehow “damaged goods” because she isn’t married with several children we are perpetuating the “crisis” and imposing cruel and painful anxiety on these girls and their families. In some cases, it simply will take several years or longer to meet your beschert. In the interim, use the time wisely to enhance your knowledge and advance your professional career, , become more immersed in limudei torah and use whatever time you have left over to assist others less fortunate.
I continue to doubt the existence of a shidduch crisis at the present time, and the shidduch crisis of 857 years ago does not tell us (a) whether there is in fact a current shidduch crisis, or (b) if there is a current shidduch crisis, how to solve it.
If indeed there is now a shidduch crisis, I would guess it is due to the high number of bochurim who continue learning after high school age, and then, at age 21 or so, decide that they need a college education to earn a parnassah. Young women waiting for a shidduch can use the years after high school to get the education they need for their own parnassah, and when their male age-mates are ready, the shidduchim will happen.
Why don’t they make a Takanah that a man has to marry more than 5 wives?
The original solution was to get guys to marry at younger ages. Fact is, most guys aren’t ready at 20, 21 (some are, most aren’t). Would it be so bad to ask the girls to wait 2 or so years. Obviously they are probably “ready” in regard to maturity and emotions, but how about getting some college out of the way or starting a job to have some money saved.
Solves the gap issue!!
Also, I know I’m not the only one to mention this, but divorce rates, and (although more unnoticed) broken engagement rates have skyrocketed to epidemic levels within our communities in recent years. My theory is that the young 20/21 year old guys who are being pressured into getting married (pressure is worst ingredient) don’t have the foggiest clue of what marriage is or what they are getting into. If we are going to push people to get married younger, there must be tremendous levels of education to those people.