Knowing and Letting Go: How a Marriage Is Built

“He will send His angel ahead of you.” A Strange Fact Here is something that is hard to explain. Today people go on more and more dates. They check more and research more. And yet the number of divorces keeps growing. The generations before us met once or twice. Then they built homes that stood for seventy years. In our generation we meet twenty times, thirty times. We look into every detail from every side. And still the home does not hold together. What happened? Did our cleverness grow while our love shrank? It is a simple question, but it cuts to the bone. The answer is also simple. It just goes against every modern instinct we have. The Basic Mistake: Love as Information The great mistake is to think that marriage is a matter of knowledge. The idea goes like this: the more you know about your partner, the more you will love them, and the longer you will last. In this view, dates are “field research.” Questions are “fact-checking.” Gather enough data, and you will reach the “right decision.” But this is exactly where the danger hides. When you build a relationship on knowing and checking, you train yourself to look for flaws. Every extra date brings one more point that does not match the “list” in your head. One more small thing raises a doubt. One more reason to say no. That is not a search for love. It is a rerun of disappointment. Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, author of the Tanya, the classic book of Hasidic thought, writes about this. Love that depends on something ends when that something is gone. And a person can always find a reason to say that the “something” is already gone. The Answer: Letting Go, Not Checking Let us begin with a well-known verse. It comes from a Torah passage that is all about the mystery of finding one’s match. Abraham told his servant: “Hashem, Master of heaven, will send His angel ahead of you.” Abraham sent his servant Eliezer to find a wife for his son. But he did not send him to investigate. He sent him to receive, to accept whatever Hashem would arrange. He did not say, “Go check out the family, measure her character, collect testimony.” He said, “Go, and Hashem will send His angel ahead of you.” This is the turning point. Finding your match is not a mental exercise. It is an act of setting the self aside, and an act of faith. Our Sages said long ago that bringing two people together is as hard as splitting the Red Sea. Why compare the two? The sea did not split because someone did the math. It split when people walked into the water, trusting in Hashem. In the same way, a match does not come about through research. It comes about when we give ourselves over to a divine order that is higher than our reasoning. Our Sages also teach that a heavenly voice goes out and announces, “The daughter of this man is for that man.” It is not “information” that goes out and announces. It is a voice from Hashem. In Hasidic teaching, setting the self aside does not mean ignorance. It does not mean being careless. Of course you should go and meet her. Our Sages teach that a man may not marry a woman until he has seen her. This is so that the heart will truly agree, and there will be no rejection. But the building itself is not made from what you discovered on your dates. It is made from how much of your ego you are ready to give up. What to Do So yes, go on the dates. Ask questions. Look into what needs to be looked into. But know where all of that ends. At the moment of decision, there is no math problem that will give you the answer. There is an act of commitment, of taking something upon yourself. At Mount Sinai, when we received the Torah, we said “We will do” before “We will understand.” In the same way, under the wedding canopy, setting the self aside comes before knowing. A Jewish home is not built on what you found out in thirty dates. It is built on the giving up of self that you and your wife both bring into it. It is the readiness to say: “I am not asking for perfection. I am bringing myself.” This, and nothing else, is a home that lasts forever.