Getting to Know Your Family - 06 Partnership of Marriage

“Bone of My Bones, Flesh of My Flesh”

Chazal state, “There are three partners in man: His father, his mother, and Hashem.”[1] Chazal learn this from the fact that Adam said about his wife, Chavah, “She is the bone of my bones, and the flesh of my flesh.” Through the unity of a husband and wife, a partnership is formed in the birth of the child – they are partners with Hashem, Who is creating the child. From this statement of Chazal, we learn that husband and wife are a partnership.

There are two kinds of partnership that they can have – either they are “bone of my bone” to each other, or they are “flesh of my flesh” to each other. The “bone of my bone” implies that they are truly connected, while “flesh of my flesh” implies that they have a superficial kind of partnership, in that they merely share a physical relationship.

The ideal partnership which husband and wife need to reach with other is the level of “bone of my bone” – to become truly connected with each other, and not just to have a superficial kind of connection with each other and simply be physical “partners” in creating the child. Their partnership must extend beyond the physical, beyond the “flesh of my flesh” level.

Becoming Partners

We know what husband and wife must “not” do – they must not abandon each other. But what must they “do” for each other? They must become partners. Every husband and wife must realize how they are partners - to be working together towards a worthy goal.

What is this ‘partnership’ in marriage? Does it mean for a husband to include his wife in what he’s learning about in Kolel? It does not mean to include her in everything. She should live her life as it is, and he should live his life as it is. They cannot be partners in every area of life. Instead, they must have one point in their life in which they are partners in together.

Clarifying Your Partnership

If we ask a husband married for a few years, “How are you partners with your wife?” what is the answer? Is it the fact that they raise children and live together in the same home? That is a very superficial answer. You lived with your roommates too in yeshivah and did stuff together. So what exactly is the partnership between husband and wife?

If it is not defined, the partnership can fluctuate, and sometimes there will be less partnership, and sometimes they will have more partnership; either of these situations will be detrimental. Let’s explain what we mean.

The Key To A Successful Marriage: Finding The Partnership

Many times couples come for counseling, full of complaints on each other. (Before he gives her the get, which is called “sefer kerisos”, he has Baruch Hashem written a full sefer of complaints against her). But if they would just know of their partnership and be clear in how they are partners, most of those complaints would fall away; they wouldn’t be considered ‘problems’.

If they are clear in how they are partners, and they still have complaints, they have valid complaints. But if they are not clear in their partnership to begin with, then every little issue that comes up in the home will be a reason for discord between them.

One of the Sages, Rav Chiya, had a wife who would constantly pain him. His children felt so sorry for their father that they asked him why he does not divorce her. Rav Chiya responded, “It is enough that she raises our children, and that she saves us from sin.” It is of course not l’chatchilah (preferable) for a couple to rely on this alone for their marital peace. But this Gemara does reveal to us that when a husband views his wife as a partner, he can handle a difficult marriage. He saw that she raises the children, thus he viewed her as his partner, and that was how his marriage survived.

If husband and wife don’t see each other as partners, then the fact that they merely live together in the same home does not create a partnership.

This is the foundation upon which a marriage is built; if it is shaky, the whole marriage will be shaky, and there will be a lot of discord. But if they are clear in how they are partners, even if he gets something different than what he planned, and it’s unpleasant, it still won’t damage the root of their connection. It will be a lasting partnership.

Making A List Of What You Want and Don’t Want In Your Partnership

If a husband takes a pen and paper and writes down the things he would like his wife to be partners with him in, he’ll also find that there are areas which he doesn’t want her to be partners with him in.  For example, some husbands do not the wife to be involved with the finances of the home, and would not like to be involved the wife in every monetary decision. But the point is that we all have things which we want partnership with in, and we all have things which we don’t want partnership in.

So practically speaking, write the list as if you are now beginning your marriage, not from what you already know about your wife. Write down what you would like from your wife, as if it’s the beginning of your marriage.

The list might include:

1)    “I want her to be partners in helping me get up for davening.” (Maybe until the end of Sheva Berachos that’s what he will want from her…)

2)    “I want her to get up in the morning to make breakfast so we can eat breakfast together.” Maybe that’s what he really wants, and maybe not.

3)    “I want my wife to walk me to the Kolel every morning.” This is probably not something you need her to be “partners” in with you.

Write down the things in which you clearly want her to be your partner. You will discover that a lot of these things have nothing to do with partnership. Don’t write down the situation as it is now in the home. Write down what you would like to expect, and what you don’t expect, from your spouse.

Some do this and they don’t know what to write down; they’re not sure if they want partnership with their wife or not. Perhaps a person is not even interested in a partnership with his spouse. For example, some fathers think that they know how to raise their children independently of their wives. We won’t get into if this is good or not. But the point is that a person needs to know what he would like to be partners in with his wife, being that Chazal tell us that there is a partnership. One must see what partnership he has with his wife, even if there are areas in which he feels he doesn’t need her in.

After a person knows what he would like in his partnership, he should now ask himself which areas they have partnership in, and which areas they don’t, as well as the areas in-between that are unclear.

What does this accomplish? It helps you become in touch with the reality in your home. In the areas which you would like to see partnership, you might discover that you don’t have partnership in. In areas which you don’t want partnership in, you might discover that you’re making demands even in those areas.

Next, one should down which is the most important area of partnership which he would like to have with his wife. This is necessary so that one can be very clear about what exactly he wants from his home.[2]

So one should write down his strongest need in partnership, and then he should write down a practical application of this. What is the clearest thing he recognizes in his marriage in which he sees that he is a partner with his spouse? He might discover that it is not connected with either what he wants in the partnership or with what she wants in the partnership.

Subconsciously, each of them wants something in the partnership, but in our conscious state throughout the day, we might be acting differently and demanding different things. When husband and wife are not clear about what they are partners in, any little issue between them can cause discord. When they are clear, they are able to learn how to pick their fights, because they have identified their priorities in the marriage.[3]

What we want to know is: What exactly the partnership is between a husband and wife.

Deep down, in our subconscious, a husband really wants to feel that his wife is his “partner” which Chazal speak of. But in order to feel that reality, we need to clarify to ourselves the areas in which we want to be partners with our spouse in.

Know Before You Get Married What You Want In Your Home

What does it mean that for a husband and wife to be ‘partners’?

Everyone before he gets married has aspirations and has a full list of what he would like from his home: Torah learning, fear of Hashem, kindness, emunah, love, etc. Yet, this is still being superficial. These areas will not be enough to create a partnership between husband and wife.

Before a person gets married, he needs to sit with himself and reflect: “What exactly will my wife and I be building together? What kind of partnership are we entering into with each other?”

Again, there is what he wants, what she wants, and the in-between areas. They must discuss with each other what their most important aspect of their partnership is.

For example, there are couples who run a gemach (chessed organization) together. If they clearly discussed before the wedding that they each love to do chessed, then running a gemach together will work wonderfully for them, and they will find each other to be partners in helping each other fulfill their goals. They will then feel more unified with each other by the fact that they do chessed together. They will run it together smoothly and pleasantly.

But if it is only the husband who has an affinity for chessed, and his wife has little or no such interest in this, then running a gemach together with his wife will not really work. It won’t be a partnership between them, rather a husband who’s doing his own thing.

Here is a common example of partnership. If a husband considers raising children to be the main partnership he has with his wife, then as long as he is aware that she’s doing that, he will have the key in keeping a successful home. He is aware that raising the children is his most important aspect of his home, so he is aware that as long as she does that, he respects her so much that other issues simply cannot come between them.

Of course, this is not everything there is to the home. But it is the basis in keeping a strong marriage and enables a person to build his marriage from there: to recognize the partnership he has with her.

So one should write down on a paper what is the main thing he needs a partnership in with his wife, something he thinks that will be the key to his marriage.

When Rav Chiya said that it’s enough that a wife raises children and saves a husband from sin, the depth of his statement was that their partnership is solely of these two factors – and nothing else is required for the partnership! She is raising the children, and she saves her husband from sin; there is nothing else she has to do in a marriage, so a husband should not expect anything else of her.

In addition, it is unrealistic in the first place to expect anything of a wife other than your partnership with her. Any expectation from your wife is a recipe for unhappiness. It is simply unrealistic for a husband to expect anything from a wife.[4]

Acceptance

Do this with all other areas of life as well: Write down what you would like in your life, what you wish you would have, including your spiritual frustrations. Realize that you are not perfect. Deal with yourself and accept yourself the way you are, even though you have imperfections.

Now see that your wife is not perfect either. You want certain things from yourself which you don’t have, such as being smarter or having better memory, yet you don’t have those things. So too, your wife is also not perfect, even though you wish she would be different. Just like you learn how to deal with yourself by accepting yourself as you are, so can you learn to accept her the way she is.

You are not perfect, yet you accept yourself as you are, even though you wish you had it better. So too, you can accept your wife the way she is even though she is not perfect and even though you wish she would change.

(And, by the way, you can’t change her. Does anyone here think they can change their wife?)

Realizing The Partnership

Therefore, after becoming aware of the reality in their marriage, a husband should clarify to himself how he needs his wife; the specific areas in which he knows that he needs her help with.

It’s not about how they are partners, rather it is about becoming aware in the first place that she is your partner. The fact that a husband knows that he needs his wife when it comes to certain areas is already the key in how he can see her as his partner.

Know the areas in which your wife helps you with, the areas in which you are connected together with. The areas of partnership you have with her are really the points in your marriage which bring you together to connect with each other, and that is essentially the purpose of marriage – to become connected as one.

Marriage: The Path Towards Becoming A Partner With Hashem

We can be “partners” with Hashem, and so can a couple be partners with each other. It is the purpose of their marriage. All of creation must become partners with Hashem, and in order to get there, one must first develop the basic kind of partnership – in his own home. How exactly they are partners differs in every home.

The point is not what they are partners in; the point is that they be a partnership. The actual partnership is the goal of marriage.