The Belzer Rebbe Shlita has instructed heads of the chassidus to make a $300 payment to anyone making a shidduch for older bachurim in the community. The sum is in addition to standard shidduch fees, not in place of, Ladaat.info reports.
Generally speaking those involved in shidduchim have their eye on the younger bachurim, while the older ones are forgotten. Seeking to change today’s reality, the rebbe has offered the additional sum as an incentive to look at the older bachurim as well in the hope of not having them left out of the shidduch scene.
At the motzei Tu B’Shevat tisch the rebbe distributed apples to the older bochrim as a segulah for a shidduch.
These older bachurim learn in a separate yeshiva gedola in the old Chevron Yeshiva Building in Geula after completing three years of limud in the regular yeshiva gedola.
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5 Responses
All this attention and hoopla on finding shidduchim for “older” bochurim and girls who c’v are in the mid-20s or even early 30s and not married is only increasing the stigma for those who either choose not to marry early and pursue a career or simply have not yet found their beschert. The notion that you have to “pay” extra for such shidduchim makes the slightly older bochurim and girls seem like “rejects” or “damaged goods” on whose behalf one has to bribe to seek a shidduch. If we would stop this obcession about everyone having to marry in their teens and instead allow nature to take its normal course like happens in the rest of western society, the “shidduch crisis” would resolve itself over time.
In the US we seem worried about “older” girls, so maybe we can make a shidduch???????
P.S. Adam ha-Rishon did in fact have a very serious shidduch crisis that did in fact require divine intervention. Everyone else thinks they have an equally dreaded shidduch crisis – until they get married.
To Akuperma
The fact is that according to our Mesorah, the unmarried men do have to stand out as being different, even in public.
They must come to Shul wearing a plain jacket without a Talis just like the 16 year olds. When they need an Aliyah, they must go over to a married yungerman and borrow his talis.
Unmarried women walk around on the street with their own hair just like young girls.
So the $300 is a good idea.
Gadolhadorah – I understand your view point, but you need to take into consideration that it is much harder to find a shidduch for someone older than younger. You also have to understand that while not in all cases, but in many, part of the reason while he/she hasn’t gotten married is because of unrealistic expatiations which oddly often get worse as they get older.
As far as your statement, “If we would stop this obsession about everyone having to marry in their teens and instead allow nature to take its normal course like happens in the rest of western society, the “shidduch crisis” would resolve itself over time.”, I’m not sure if I agree with you (even though I can hear the potential logic there).
I happen to be a person who has his feet in both circles and know quiet a number of secular people that either finally settled down in their 40’s or are still not married! The problem with that is that 1) for women the chances of having kids at that age is slim, 2) the older you are the more settled you are in your ways making it harder to mold the marriage (not impossible, but harder), and 3)the age gap between them and their children is great thus by the time their kids are becoming active the parents are slowing down and having a harder time spending quality time with their kids. Imagine he gets married at 45 and has a kid at 47. By the time the kids is 13, the father is 60! How easy is it going to be for the father to play ball with his son. If his son gets married at 30, then the father will be 77 (assuming he’s still alive).
This may sound extreme, but it is really common now in the secular world! I don’t think we should turn towards the goyim for guidance.
If we look towards Chazal (I believe it is in Mesechta Kiddushin) we see that Daas Torah is to start encourage a child to get married somewhere between 18 to 24 (depending on which opinion in the Gemorah one follows). There has always been those that have had a harder time to get married and always will be. Our job as a community is to realize 1) there is a proper age range to start encouraging to get married and 2) we have to be sensitive to the older singles, not give up on them, and try as much as we can to help them find their Bashert.
The fact that the Belze Rebbe is paying extra for those making shidduchim for older boys just proves that the age gap is the reason for the shidduch crisis. The Chasidim (except for Chabad) have extra older boys while the Yeshivish world in America has extra older girls. The reason for this is that the Chasidishe boys and girls marry at the same age and there are even many girls who marry boys who are a year or two younger than they are. The ideal age gap is that the boys should be 9 months to 1 year older than the girls (this is because there are in fact more boys born every year than there are girls (105 boys to every 100 girls). If the boys are a year older than the girls we will have very little older singles; boys or girls.