Celebrating Romantic Love
Tu B'Av carries an important lesson for modern relationships.
Rabbi Simeon's linking of Tu B'Av and Yom Kippur is at first disturbing. Why does the Jewish year end with a celebration of love? The answer says a lot about Judaism's unique perspective on relationships, a perspective that could enhance courtship today.
Tu B'Av, like Yom Kippur, is about introspection and new beginnings concerning our relationships and personal values. How courting was done is indicative of this view. The young girls borrowed white dresses so that the young men could not choose among them according to materialistic concerns. The Talmud teaches that women set the rules; the women admonish their suitors to pick not according to beauty, but by the good name of the women's families and by their fear of God. Today we live in a world that is status and fashion conscious, a world of beauty pageants and beauty ideals set by television and movies, and some synagogues are even described as "meat markets" where one goes to look over the unmarried merchandise.
Tu B'Av tells us to look beneath the surface when looking for (or at) a life partner, just as Yom Kippur forces us to look deep into ourselves before God grants us life anew. Like Yom Kippur, Tu B'Av is a time for reflection and introspection. But instead of being an individual process, it is a mutual, shared experience between two people.
Tu B'Av is a great day for weddings, commitment ceremonies, renewal of vows, or proposing. It is a day for enhancing current relationships or defining anew what you are looking for in a partner. It is a day for romance, explored through singing, dancing, giving flowers, and studying. The rabbis teach that on Tu B'Av one begins to set more time for studying Torah as the High Holidays approach.
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