How to Behave in Marriage: Laws of Marriage for Shalom Bayis

How to Behave in Marriage

Rav Dovid Eidensohn – Talmid HaGaon Reb Aharon Kotler, HaGaon Rav Moshe Feinstein, HaGaon Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashev, all of them zt”l

Laws of Marriage for Shalom Bayis

Rabbi Dovid E. Eidensohn

We present here teachings from the gemora about Shalom Bayis in marriage. We begin with Yevomose 62b “He who loves his wife as he loves himself, and one who honors her more than he honors himself, and he who trains his sons and daughters to go in the proper path, one who marries off his children near the time of their coming of age for marriage, regarding him the Torah says, ‘and you will know that your tent is peaceful.’”

He who loves his wife as he loves himself is praised. But is this real love or an effort to love his wife? Or perhaps the effort in of itself does the job. After all, the Torah in parshas Tsaitsei tells us that, “and he shall make his wife rejoice.” Rashi and the Zohar says that it does not say “he shall make his wife rejoice together with him” but it says that he makes her rejoice even if he is not rejoicing and even if the effort to make his wife happy takes away his own pleasure. Because making his wife happy is the Torah’s command. A prominent expert in marriage says that marrying out of love is wrong because as people get older they change, and two people who once loved each other may change and the love may decline. The right path is to marry someone good for you and to commit yourself to remaining married no matter what. This commitment brings love, but love does not bring commitment. (From Mort Fertel)

What does it mean “One who honors her more than he honors himself?” This refers to monetary matters. It is winter and it is necessary to buy a strong coat. But there is money only for one strong coat. Who should get it, the husband or the wife? The wife. The Raishis Chochmoh page 266 says that a husband must always honor his wife with monetary matters and parnoso. Thus, he honors her more than himself, because he spends money on her that he cannot afford for himself. This is similar to what we say above that a husband must make his wife rejoice even though he does not rejoice. In fact, the act of making his wife rejoice may cost him some aggravation, but he is commanded to sacrifice his own happiness for his wife. Of course, a wife who sees her husband always trying to make her happy reciprocates. A marriage that is a partnership is a problem, because each partner feels they work harder than the other partner. But when one partner says I will assume the burden by myself and not wait for the other person, that is a higher level, and one that can bring peace into the home.

Raising children properly is not an easy task. Children are not mature people and need a lot of attention and ability to deal with minors. But one who deals with them in the proper path and does his best can merit heavenly help in developing fine children.

One must be very careful when raising children not to make the mistake of Yaacov who loved Joseph more than his other children and let everybody know it. This led to the brothers of Joseph selling him to Egypt. We have to know not to show one child more attention than the other children. We have to know to always encourage a weak child. We have to realize that a parent lives for the children, and that is a lifetime job, but it is at its height when they are very young. If then the parents sacrifice all and raise children properly, they may merit very special children.

When children come of age and the parents look for shidduchim, this can take up day and night. But the benefits are lifetime achievements.