'Chayei Sarah': Relationship suitability test

If matchmakers were required to give money-back guarantees for the marriages they arrange, they would quickly become impoverished. Many relationships fail, ending with the voices of war. Just as many relationships fail by fading into dreary and frustrating routine.

Yet despite this something pulls us, convinces us, that we can make it work. Something, very naive, leads people to believe that laws exist that will predict the success of a marriage.

In this week's Torah portion, "Chayei Sarah" ("The Life of Sarah"), we encounter the panic of Abraham's servant in view of his master's severe demand to find a fitting wife for his son. While still wondering if and how he will complete his matchmaking mission, the servant of Abraham prepares the "first relationship compatibility test" in history (Genesis 24:13-14): "Behold, I stand by the fountain of water; and the daughters of the men of the city come out to draw water. So let it come to pass, that the damsel to whom I shall say: 'Tilt thy pitcher, please, that I may drink'; and if she says: 'Drink, and I will give your camels to drink also'; let her be the one You have appointed for Your servant, for Isaac..."

'A woman is not a fit wife unless she does her husband's bidding'

(Tanna D'vei Eliyahu, chapter 10)

Abraham's servant was a little confused and very frightened. A strict reading of the story reveals that he prepared his "relationship compatibility test" at the very last minute, when he is already standing at the fountain of water. As a result of this, it is difficult for me to treat the test as any sort of pre-planned event. However precisely because of the impulsivity that set the compatibility test guidelines, we can gather from it intuitive definitions of a worthy wife:

• A woman who responds to a request for assistance from a man she doesn't even know
• A woman who isn't afraid to give everything of herself
• A woman who offers a man even more than what he asked for
• A woman that doesn't complain, doesn't rest, and doesn't ask for help.
  

If we will invert the story's perspective, we can determine that a worthwhile man is:

• A man who owns a great deal of property
• A man who expects a woman to serve him, and his property, in submission and with generosity.
  

'My freedom, yet I left you, a December night'

I ask myself if we have really evolved from the definitions for ideal relationships proposed by Abraham's servant. A rich man and a pretty woman that never gets tired of spoiling her husband... Thousands of years have passed. So much water has flowed through the wells of Aram-Naharaim. Yet despite everything it seems to me that the old stereotype is still alive and well, but most unfortunately, is still so tiring.

Paradoxically and sadly it seems to me that feminism, which has a long list of very impressive accomplishments, did not succeed at dislocating this stereotype that Abraham's servant spread before us with naive candor.

I return and remind myself that the "first relationship compatibility test" in human history was conducted by a slave, and it really is a test of slaves. It is the test of two people, denying their bodies and refuting their souls, in order to be win the "marriage of the year" contest, as if meeting other people's expectations was the greatest accomplishment they could achieve. In general we have in the past few years taken upon ourselves to fulfill the demands and requirements of the "second sex."

Numerous women also want to list on their "relationship business card' a "high salary." Many men want to list, next to their grandiose pay stub, "sensitive, generous, and always happy to help." Well intentioned, but instead of just canceling the competition, we actually made the list of demands on ourselves longer. Judging by the lifestyle of my friends and myself – we are terribly tired people.

Rabbis knew how to make stereotypes laugh

In direct opposition to the rigidity and superficiality that the "relationship compatibility test" of Abraham's servant (and perhaps our own as well) offers, I would like to present a short, Talmudic tale. It too deals with the "marriage of the year" test, and has at its focus, activities of serving food, drink, and their consumption. However this Talmudic tale is humorous, possibly intending to simultaneously be ridiculous, and to ridicule social conventions.

"Rabbi Elazar answered him: 'Lukewarm temperature - one sip, with cold water - two sips, and with hot water - three sips. But the Sages did not thusly determine with wine as fine as yours, with a cup as small as yours, and with a belly as wide as mine!'"

(Translated with slight editing from Talmud Yerushalmi, Maasechet Maaserot, chapter 3, Halacha 4; and other locations in the Talmud)

In this Talmudic tale, both the tester and the tested are men. The wedding has already passed, but the father of the bride is still suspiciously scrutinizing his new son-in-law who has only recently joined his family. Rabbi Elazar arrives at his father-in-laws home and does not stop drinking all the wine that his father-in-law pours him. This is a grotesque inversion of the Abraham's servant and Rebekah story.

While the designated bride-to-be has her readiness to provide drink to the servant and his camels tested, in our Talmudic tale the son-in-law is likened to a camel as he drinks copious quantities of wine. The father of the bride, appalled by his son-in-laws unmannerly behavior, asks him as a criticism if he learned from his father how a cultured person should drink: "Did your father not teach you with how many sips to swallow the drink in the cup?!"

However Rabbi Elazar has specifically learned this and is able to quote well the proper rules of etiquette: "Lukewarm temperature - one sip, with cold water - two sips, and with hot water - three sips." If so, it follows that Rabbi Elazar knows how to be polite, but simply is not interested in successfully passing any sort of "son-in-law of the year" test. He is amused by how serious the test set for him was.

He therefore concludes it with his own personal joke: "But the Sages did not thusly determine with wine as fine as yours, with a cup as small as yours, and with a belly as wide as mine!"

You have fine wine, says Rabbi Elazar to his father-in-law, but you are cheap, have given me a small cup from which to drink, but I am a big-bellied glutton! So what are the principles that need to guide us in our quest for the ideal relationship? Perhaps fine wine, big bellies, and a slight kick to accepted social conventions.

In other words, a little more of what we love and want, and a little less of what we think we "need" to do. Of course this path as well does not guarantee a successful relationship, but it may prevent a little suffering along the way...

Shabbat Shalom!

Translated by Uzi Bar-Pinchas

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