What’s a matchmaker?
If you watched Fiddler on the Roof, Yenta the matchmaker was the meddling woman who knows all the town gossip and introduces people to prospective mates.
Nowadays, the role has had an extreme makeover.
Aleeza Ben Shalom helps people find their matches and in the process shares great relationship advice and Jewish wisdom.
If this piques your interest, make sure to mark your calendar for December 3, 2023, when JWCATLANTA will host Aleeza in a fabulous evening.
Details about the evening to follow.
Finding the perfect match was on my mind this week.
Maybe it was due to the fact that I participated in a planning meeting for the aforementioned event with a dynamic committee who is organizing an amazing event.
Or perhaps it was because I attended a wedding this week of two young people who grew up on my block, on the same street.
They did not know one another, until they were introduced by a matchmaker who extolled the virtues of one to the other and it ended with a perfect match.
Sometimes the match made in heaven is right under your very nose.
So I had matches on my mind.
Matches can bring people together in joyful matrimony, but matches can also cause s conflagration which can bring about destruction.
What is our role in our match?
How does one define the “match made in heaven”?
What does one look for in a prospective mate?
A soulmate is someone who completes the other, and helps bring out the best in their partner in life.
This week’s Torah portion gives us a peek into the power of having the right mate, and the repercussions that result from the positive, or conversely the negative attitudes of a spouse.
This week’s Torah portion is entitled Korach.
Korach was a man, a close relative of Moses. He was a person of elevated spiritual stature.
He was also extremely wealthy.
While it seems that Korach had everything life could provide, he was dissatisfied. He felt that Aaron being the High Priest was a result of nepotism, as Aaron and Moses were brothers. Korach was their relative and he felt he should be the person in power, not Aaron. He embarked on a power play against Moses, and the jealousy he felt sparked a rebellion.
This coup d’etat ended very badly.
Gd was incensed by this brazen disrespect of the emissaries Gd had chosen and causes a miracle to happen. The ground beneath the feet of Korach and his rebellious group opens up and they are all swallowed up.
The first sinkhole in history.
No survivors.
Except one!
When the Torah lists the names of the perpetrators, there is one man listed in the group named On Ben Peles. But later on in the narrative, when there is a list of the casualties , On Ben Peles is not mentioned.
What happened to On Ben Peles?
I am sure when On’s mother was trying to find him the perfect wife, she had a long list of prerequisites.
I would imagine that wisdom, empathy and good values were probably high on that list.
On’s mother was a great matchmaker.
She found him the best wife possible.
The perfect mate.
Because Mrs. On Ben Peles (we don’t know her first name), saved her husband’s life.
When she heard about the rebellion that Korach was instigating she realized right away that her husband had nothing to gain. Either way, he was not going to become the High Priest. He had just been swept up in the passion of the moment.
She knew her husband was in over his head (no pun intended) and she needed to find away to keep him away from the rabble rousers and still save face.
So she devised a plan to stop her husband from participating with Korach. She gave him a great deal of wine to drink until he fell into a stupor.
When Korach’s people came to fetch On, she sat in front of her tent in such a way that the “holy” men would not come close. These rebels were willing to go against Gd’s chosen leaders, but they wouldn’t come close if a woman was not modestly dressed.
In this way, the wife of On was able to save her husband from being included in the assembly which met their fates by being swallowed whole.
Their is a verse in Proverbs which states
“The wisdom of a woman builds her home” and our Sages teach us these words refer to the wife of On Ben Peles.
The verse concludes with the words
“And a foolish one tears it down”
Our Sages teach that these words refer to Korach’s wife who instigated the rebellion from behind the scenes.
Despite the fact that she was a woman of tremendous means, she was jealous. She saw that Moses wife had a beautiful piece of jewelry that had been gifted to her by Moses. This jewelry was made from the leftover shards of the tablets of the Ten Commandments which Moses had chisseled. When the tablets were completed, Gd allowed Moses to keep the remnants. The Midrash teaches that the Tablets upon which the Ten Commandments were written were made out of a precious stone, perhaps sapphire, so the remaining pieces would make a stunning piece of jewelry.
The wife of Korach, who had it all, jealously beheld the one unique bauble she couldn’t attain, so she fomented Korach’s feelings of inadequacy which resulted in the worst possible outcome.
This use of “wisdom” did not save her husband, it sadly led to his downfall.
Perhaps the actual names of the wives are not mentioned, because there is a little Mrs. Korach and a little Mrs. On in each of us.
When we build our homes, making the matches we are part of, we have a choice.
Will we use our wisdom to build and bring out the strengths of our mate or will we let negative emotions rule?
It’s a choice we make dozens of times each day.
And while the results may not be so immediately dramatic as a heavenly sinkhole, repeated efforts to build up the other will ultimately result in the veritable match made in heaven.
This is a feat we can actually accomplish without Aleeza or even Yenta - a perfect match!
Shabbat Shalom and so much love!