Sheva Brachot (Part 9)
A husband and wife are one soul, separated only through their descent to this world. When they are married, they are reunited again.
Zohar HaKadosh
The seventh and final blessing of the Sheva Brachot is: Blessed are You Hashem, our God, King of the universe Who created joy and gladness, Chattan and Kallah, mirth, glad song, pleasure, delight, love, brotherhood, peace, and companionship. Hashem, our God, let there soon be heard in the cities of Yehudah and the streets of Yerushalayim the sound of joy and the sound of gladness, the voice of the Chattan and the voice of the Kallah, the sound of the Chattanim’s [plural] jubilance from their chuppot [plural] and that of the youths from their song-filled feasts. Blessed are You, Who gladdens the Chattan with the Kallah.
Our blessing is comprised of ten different expressions of happiness: sasson (joy), simchah (gladness), gilah (mirth), rinah (glad song), ditzah (pleasure), chedvah (delight), ahavah (love), achvah (brotherhood), shalom (peace), and re’ut (companionship).
Rabbi Chama bar Chanina teaches (Bava Batra 75a) that Hashem made ten chuppot (plural of chuppah) for Adam in Gan Eden. Our blessing alludes to those original ten chuppot and to the sense of perfection that existed at the time of Adam and Chavah’s marriage.
The Talmud in several places (Brachot 61a, Shabbat 95a, Eruvin 18a-b) and the Midrashic texts (Bereshit Rabbah 18, Otiot d’Rebbi Akiva) describe the lengths that Hashem went to to ensure that their wedding be a spiritually elevated experience, tending to Chavah before He, Himself, brought her to the chuppah; and how Hashem arranged all the details of the chuppah for them; and how He blessed their union.
As with the previous Sheva Brachot, our blessing portrays the similarities between the world’s first wedding and the wedding that is now taking place.
Fascinatingly, Nachmanides is of the opinion that there are actually twelve expressions of happiness not ten, because he includes the Chattan and the Kallah in the list. The Ramban is introducing us to a deep and thought-provoking concept: happiness is not only an emotion.
Happiness is a state of being. As Ingrid Bergman, a Swedish actress, once said, “Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get!”
So central is the concept of happiness that our blessing opens with the words, “Who created joy and gladness.” The final blessing is teaching the Chattan and the Kallah one of the most fundamental lessons of married life: joy and gladness are not simply positive emotions that enhance our lives, rather, joy and happiness are the most effective means of serving Hashem! As Rabbi Akiva teaches (Sotah 17a), “A husband and wife, if they merit it, the Shechinah is [present] between them.”
Rashi explains that the Hebrew spelling of the words Ish [literally “man”, but in context, “husband”] and Ishah [literally “woman”, but in context “wife”] spell out the holy Name of Hashem. The Midrash (Pirkei d’Rebbi Eliezer 12) explains that when a couple marry, the Shechinah joins together with them and protects them.
Thus, the underlying reason for being joyful is that happiness gives honor to Hashem because happiness enables the Shechinah to dwell together with us. As the Kol Bo (a foundational Halachic compendium of unknown authorship) writes (siman 75): “For it is Hashem’s honor when people are happy because then they can receive His glory. This is because distress closes the soul and creates a barrier that separates the person from Hashem. A person should not be angry, but accept Hashem's decree(s) with love… [Our Sages teach us that] the Shechinah cannot reside in a place where there is laziness or sadness, only where there is joy, and this is Hashem’s honor.”
What a revolutionary concept to impart to the Chattan and Kallah! The final words that they hear under the chuppah, the words that everyone hopes that they will carry with them throughout their life together are “be happy together so that you can serve Hashem with wholehearted purity!” As Rabbi Avigdor Miller so perfectly and eloquently describes, “Happiness is not something that can be pursued directly; it is the by-product of a life lived with meaning and purpose.”
To be continued…
