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030 - Tenaim (Where Moms Break a Plate)
51 Plays2 months ago
You know about breaking the glass, but what about breaking a PLATE?
Welcome to the first LISTENER QUESTION episode of the Your Jewish Wedding Podcast, where I answer Olivia’s question: “I was wondering if you could explain the breaking of the plates by the mothers?”
Yes! There is a Jewish custom where the mothers of the people getting married break a plate to “Seal the deal.”
(Watch a short video of a plate-breaking I facilitated here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1p9wGz9E92s2LajZY8LAPj07MTcblOiJN/view?usp=drive_link)
As with anything to do with Jewish Weddings, there are many explanations for this custom and different ways to do it. It is connected to what was traditionally an engagement agreement called a tenaim. So, obviously, we need to learn about that first.
Show Notes are below.
Don't forget - you can reach me (Rabbi LeighAnn) any time at www.yourohiorabbi.com or everyonesfavoriterabbi.com or rabbileighann.com !
Fill out the contact form there if you'd like to work with me on your wedding. There are SO many options, from Ketubah consulting to ceremony planning. If there's something you have in mind, don't hesitate to ask - I'm here to help!
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Hope to see you next time! Remember - there is ALWAYS more learning to do!
<3 Rabbi LeighAnn
Text of a egalitarian tenaim example:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1a-o-c__kVCmRz2wD-NkOy12NLB324dAAs9YLGxXBOfg/edit?usp=sharing
Traditional explanations of tenaim/breaking a plate:
https://ohr.edu/ask_db/ask_main.php/2632/Q1/
https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/49234/why-do-the-mothers-break-the-plate
Pieces of the broken plate as auspicious:
https://ketubah.com/jewish-wedding-superstitions-segulahs/
Contemporary Tenaim/Plate Breaking Resources:
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/tenaim-the-conditions-of-marriage/
Recommended
Transcript
Jewish Wedding Rituals: Significance and Planning
00:00:00
Speaker
consider this ritual, consider this thing, because it's not religious. It is a way to bring your family together. um It's super Jewish and it's sort of like a fun cultural moment.
00:00:13
Speaker
And it gives your mom something else to do. I think a lot of times like moms can be moms and dads can be kind of like floating through your wedding day. There's they're not like hanging out with your bridesmaids, but they're not exactly like I don't know, they're they're not doing nothing, but they're not exactly doing something. So it gives them something to do. It's very nice, okay?
00:00:36
Speaker
Are you planning a Jewish or interfaith wedding? Are you lost on where to even begin planning the ceremony, let alone finding a rabbi to help you?
00:00:48
Speaker
Well, it doesn't matter whether one of you is Jewish or you're both Jewish. You deserve a guide. So take a deep breath. I promise it will all be okay.
Introduction to 'Your Jewish Wedding' Podcast
00:01:00
Speaker
Welcome to Your Jewish Wedding with Rabbi Leanne. Here, i can be everyone's rabbi. Yours too. My guests and I will share everything we know to help make your Jewish or interfaith wedding full of tradition and perfectly
00:01:33
Speaker
Well, hello, everyone. It is so good to be here with you on the Your Jewish Wedding podcast. I've had a couple of really crazy months and been really not recording very much at all, which, as you may guess, makes me really sad because, as I say in every episode, i love sitting here and chatting with you all.
00:01:52
Speaker
about something that I know about Jewish weddings or maybe something that I've just learned, which is kind of the case for today's episode. But before we begin, i know you want the weather report. So we are here at the end. It's like the third week of May.
00:02:08
Speaker
Editing Rabbi from the future here. i am just getting around to editing this episode and it is, um I think over 10 months later.
Personal Updates and Broadway Passion
00:02:18
Speaker
So when I say that it's the month of May, actually the recording happened last May, May, 2024, but I am editing this at the end of 2025.
00:02:29
Speaker
Okay. And it is cool and rainy outside and the plants are happy. And so, you know, i am happy as long as the plants are not like the plant in Little Shop of Horrors, which I'm hoping to see in a few weeks here in New York. That's exciting news. If I do see it, I'm hoping I will get in time to catch the show I will tell you all about it.
00:02:53
Speaker
Little Shop of Horrors is like one of my favorite things of all time um for several reasons. If you love musicals or it Broadway or theater, send me an email or send me an Instagram message and tell me what is your favorite and why. I could literally...
00:03:10
Speaker
I could probably start a whole other podcast about like a casual Broadway fan. I'm, you know, I was in my first musical when I was 14 years old and I've, I've been obsessed ever since.
00:03:21
Speaker
So anyway, the plants are happy. They are not carnivorous plants. So I am also happy. And that's that I am hopping on today to do a short episode Now, I know that you all, I say this every time, it's not it's not going to be a short episode, Robyn Leigh. Okay.
00:03:40
Speaker
It really is, though, because this is an episode that is answering a question.
Listener's Question: Plate-Breaking Custom
00:03:46
Speaker
i got my first listener question. i'm yeah I'm just beside myself, so excited, because...
00:03:54
Speaker
it's It's really hard to put into words. If you've ever podcasted or like written a book or written a song, put any kind of media out into the world without any guarantee that anyone else will willingly consume it, you understand this feeling.
00:04:09
Speaker
Just knowing that somebody out there is listening, like really listening. I can see my downloads, you know, the number of downloads and each episode gets a couple dozen right now.
00:04:21
Speaker
And that does bring me great joy because I feel like, you know, if there were a couple dozen people in a room listening to me talk about something, I would feel like I was bringing Some value.
00:04:32
Speaker
so even if all twenty four or thirty people who downloaded the podcast maybe they did it accidentally right even if they're not really listening i know for sure now that there's at least one person out in the world who is listening to the your jewish wedding podcast and genuinely finding it helpful and useful Olive, thank you so much for your question. I assume that's your name.
00:04:56
Speaker
Her Instagram handle includes the name Olive. So I'm pretty sure that ah that's her name. But if it's not, you know, I'm sorry, but you know who you are regardless. Okay. Olive writes, hi, Rabbi Leanne.
00:05:11
Speaker
I am preparing for my Jewish wedding. Congratulations. L'chaim and b'sha'a tovah may it happen in the exact right time. I love listening to your podcast.
00:05:22
Speaker
Thank you very much. Thank you so kindly for sharing your wisdom. I was also wondering if you could explain the breaking of the plates by the mothers in one of your next episodes, or maybe even have a questions from the audience episode.
00:05:35
Speaker
Okay. Yes, I will answer the breaking of the plates question in this very episode. A questions from the audience episode, guys, i would be thrilled to make 20 different episodes that were all answering questions from you.
00:05:52
Speaker
Answers the exact questions that you want. It would make things a little easier on me because I would be able to write like a targeted outline for what I'm going to talk about. Let's do it. If you have any Jewish wedding questions,
00:06:05
Speaker
You know, free answers. I have a little bit of experience. I could you know answer your questions on this podcast. I'm not going I'm also not going to do that thing. I do have um a question in my inbox from one of my friends who's a florist asking about a topic that I already have an episode on.
00:06:23
Speaker
I'm not going to do the thing where I say, please refer to this episode on whatever that you shouldn't answer. your question Now, I can just answer your question again. Okay, guys, what is life for if not to help one another and have conversations with one another? But back to Olive.
00:06:38
Speaker
She wants me to explain the custom of moms breaking
Tanayim Document: History and Modern Use
00:06:42
Speaker
a plate. Now. As far as I know, this custom is mostly centered in Eastern European diaspora Jewish cultures.
00:06:55
Speaker
Okay, so the Jews who moved from Israel over the generations into Eastern Europe, I believe that this breaking of the plate comes from mostly those Jewish subcultures. Okay, but if I'm wrong, please tell me.
00:07:13
Speaker
All I know is this. There is a ceremony slash document called the Tanayim. So you might say, okay, Rabbi Leanne, we already had the Ketubah episode. You talked about Ketubahs for not one, not two, but three episodes. We know all about Ketubahs.
00:07:29
Speaker
What do we need another document for? I am so glad you asked. Okay, so let's go back in the day. We're going to rewind just, you know, not back to Bible times, but back, you know, a few hundred years.
00:07:43
Speaker
Well, actually, scratch that. It is back to Bible times.
00:07:49
Speaker
So we all know that for centuries and going back millennia, weddings and marriage have been a way to combine families and to combine assets, maybe to combine power or influence of some kind.
00:08:03
Speaker
it It was more about an arrangement that made sense in some way than love match usually. However, this document also applies to the love match. A tanayim just means conditions. okay So when a couple ah decided to get married, what however they came to that decision, their parents suggested it. They met. They liked each other. They said, fine.
00:08:28
Speaker
Maybe they fell in love. Maybe they were dancing in circles around the gazebo on their father's Austrian estate. Did you guys get that reference? If you did, send me a message on Instagram, and your Jewish wedding podcast, or send me an email, please.
00:08:43
Speaker
um You know, they there's a couple, they want to get married, and they've decided to get engaged. Everybody is on board. Their families are all on board. Okay. But they are not going to have a wedding like today or tomorrow, right? Arrangements need to be made.
00:09:00
Speaker
So we talked about in the chuppah episode, yes, a chuppah is pop-up wedding. Okay. And Jewish weddings are by and large, simple affairs. You write a kechuba, you have rings, you have a chuppah, people make a celebratory meal, smash the glass, mazel tov, mazel tov, you're married, right?
00:09:22
Speaker
It does still take some time. And we do have in Jewish culture and Jewish communities, as in, i think, almost every culture and community, the idea that if we're having a wedding, we should have a party. you know and in In Jewish parlance, it's like a Yiddishism, maybe. I don't know. You hear people talk about we're going to make a simcha.
00:09:46
Speaker
What does it mean to make a simcha? So simcha is a happy, joyous event. joyous occasions, so life cycle celebration basically. And when you make the simcha, it just means you have to plan the party, okay?
00:09:57
Speaker
So it take it does take time to make a simcha. And it also takes time to prepare a place for the new couple to live. So for that reason, when a couple got engaged, the families would write up a document saying, these two people, our children, intend to get married.
00:10:19
Speaker
And in that time of their engagement, this family is going to put this much toward the wedding. That family is going to put that much toward the wedding. These preparations will be made and the wedding will take place.
00:10:36
Speaker
Maybe it's at a specific time. I think more often it was within a specific time with the understanding that if that time had passed and the wedding, the chuppah, had not taken place, that engagement could theoretically be considered void, broken.
00:10:54
Speaker
Okay, it's really I think it's really interesting because this Tanayim thing is a bit of a full circle moment, I kind of think, because we are seeing now, there's an article that I read on My Jewish Learning, and and there are also several pages on ritualwell.org, and I will link both those things in the show notes. Obviously, they talk about contemporary to Naim ceremonies.
00:11:21
Speaker
Why is that? Because In this cultural moment, I think that, so what is the number one indicator that you've gotten engaged?
00:11:34
Speaker
Somebody proposes, perhaps there's an exchange of rings, And you tell the people that are your nearest and dearest that you're planning on getting married. Okay.
00:11:49
Speaker
However, I do feel like in in this cultural moment, there is a lot of leeway around getting engaged. Like some people might consider moving in with somebody you love as like the first step on a path to engagement I hear people say we're considering getting engaged or we're talking about getting engaged.
00:12:14
Speaker
And so it's, I think in our cultural moment, or I'm expecting an engagement, it's not this leap from dating to all of a sudden we're engaged. There's there's not a solid demarcation between those two things in a lot of instances, right? Instead, we make a gradual shift in in American culture from dating to seriously dating to maybe moving in together. Maybe there are little steps along, but maybe we spend holidays with one another's families.
00:12:48
Speaker
And the the path to engagement is kind of more like a a slow creep you know Until you reach the point where if you've been dating somebody for like right two, three years and you're going on vacation together, you're kind of like on edge, right? Like you're getting your um your nails done if that's something you do, which I've never been able to do that. That's a whole other story.
00:13:16
Speaker
If any of you knows anything about fingernail health, please message me because I need your help. Mine are like, they just don't, they can't handle anything. Anyway, um they're getting their nails, they're having a manicure, they're moisturizing their hands, they're, you know, they're practicing the ring shot, okay, to show off that they got engaged because there comes a point where people are sort of just like expecting that to happen, right?
00:13:40
Speaker
And so I don't say a full circle moment because that's the way that things used to be. However, i do think that some couples or maybe even a lot of couples might feel a need for something official to mark off that moment of saying like, all right, we're not married yet, but it is as close to a sure thing as anybody can get, right? Right.
00:14:07
Speaker
So a lot of couples are doing a contemporary Tanaim ceremony or write-up or certificate or something like that. So the Tanaim is a contract. It's a short contract. It's it's like ah a bit of a shorter version Tanaim.
00:14:25
Speaker
um of the ketubah, obviously talks about different things. But I found for one of my couples back in February, they did have their mothers do the plate breaking ritual, which is connected to the tonight. Okay, that's why I started with this, you know, that there's no such thing as a short or simple question.
00:14:42
Speaker
But we are, we are getting there, I promise. the tonight, they thought about doing a reading of the Tanayim document before their mothers breaking the plate. But because their mothers were breaking the plate right before their wedding ceremony, they decided that the the document really wasn't applicable.
00:15:05
Speaker
But before they decided that, we did go through some discussions about what an egalitarian Tanayim document would look like. So let me just read it to you quickly, okay? Because it's we've taken some language from Tanayim in the 17 and eighteen hundred and incorporated it into this document. There are Bible verses and some older language, and you will hear that. so And I will also, you know what, I'll put a link to this text, just like a Google Drive link in the show notes, so you guys can see it and read along if you want. Okay.
00:15:40
Speaker
So... The Tenayim document, the egalitarian one that we were sort of playing around with, it reads like this. May this match flourish and grow like a verdant garden.
00:15:51
Speaker
He who finds a wife finds good and draws favor from Adonai who is good. With the help of the one who dwells in the heavens, this is the outline of the agreements which were discussed and agreed upon between these two parties.
00:16:06
Speaker
Firstly, the aforementioned groom will marry the aforementioned bride in good fortune with a chuppah and Kiddushin, according to the law of Moses and Israel.
00:16:17
Speaker
They will not flee nor hide from the other. They will exert equal control over their property and will dwell together with love and affection. maintaining a Jewish home together.
00:16:28
Speaker
The wedding will take place, God willing, in a good and auspicious time, in the time and place upon which the two parties will agree, which we anticipate will be in the holy city of Jerusalem, may it soon be rebuilt and established.
00:16:42
Speaker
The costs of the wedding celebration will be divided fairly, as will any cost that may come with the bride and groom establishing their household, as is customary. All the above was performed with the party's solemn word,
00:16:55
Speaker
and an absolute transaction done via the breaking of this plate according to the customs of Israel. And then there is a space for the witnesses to sign. So there are a couple interesting things about this Tanayim document, as I said. You heard at the beginning of Bible verse, he who finds a wife finds good.
00:17:15
Speaker
Obviously, um if you are in a couple where there is no he, then you would revise that to something else or take it out altogether. Okay.
00:17:25
Speaker
ah Similarly with the language of groom and bride, ah you could substitute it with names or just change it to groom, groom, bride, bride. It says in good fortune with a chuppah and kedushin, according to the law of Moses in Israel, which is cool because...
00:17:42
Speaker
According to the law of Moses in Israel is the exact same language that will be used in the Jewish wedding vows once you are standing under the chuppah. Okay. So this contract, tonight, contract goes on to say, literally, you cannot ghost each other.
00:17:56
Speaker
at this point, you are in planning mode. Maybe it's like, don't know. you have like vision boards for your wedding ceremony? do you Maybe you could have a little tonight party where you sign this and say, like, it's officially the start of our wedding planning or something.
00:18:11
Speaker
um The interesting thing about this one is that the wedding will take place in a good and auspicious time. The time and place was not determined in this particular tonight that we found online. However, for a couple who has their venue and their date all set, obviously we we could put that in there.
00:18:31
Speaker
if they felt good about that. Some people might feel superstitious about that, in which case we would leave it out. The other interesting thing is that it includes the phrase, which we anticipate will be in the holy city of Jerusalem.
00:18:42
Speaker
This is such a wonderful custom, i think. It comes from Yitzhak of Berdichev, who was what consider is widely considered to be one of the tzaddikim of Judaism. He was basically a super...
00:18:58
Speaker
revered and holy rabbi in Berdachev. And he included this phrasing in Tanayim that he wrote. So he would write something like, it will take place in Jerusalem unless, God forbid, Messiah has not come by that time. Mashiach has not come.
00:19:20
Speaker
So there's an idea in in Jewish tradition of that we never lose faith that one day Mashiach could come and we would basically achieve world peace. um And we don't want to make plans that show we don't have faith in that. So we would put, um of course, the wedding, we imagine it will take place in Jerusalem.
00:19:42
Speaker
But if Mashiach has not come by then, it's going to be in New York City the The Ritz or whatever. Okay. So you can read that the actual date and time that is planned on is in this place, but we we want to maintain our faith that um things could change at any moment and we could all enjoy world peace and be celebrating a wedding, God willing, in Jerusalem. So it's a cool custom, I think, and it's a few hundred years old.
00:20:10
Speaker
A lot of people like to include it in their wedding invitations. as well as their Tanayim. So I think that's a cool touch. If you have any questions about that, um we I can answer that in a different episode. Anyway, this Tanayim, you can see it's very simple.
00:20:23
Speaker
If you're on the Google Drive link, you can see it's very simple. It's ah sort of fill in the blank. You guys could write whatever you want. There is an article I referenced, myjewishlearning.com.
00:20:33
Speaker
ah This contemporary couple did a really cool tanaim ceremony. So it seems like, you know, I'm just doing a skim of it, but it seems like there's like a long distance situation and maybe that's their jobs or something that is preventing them from, you know living together, having a life together. And they didn't want to get married until they could be in the same place.
00:20:56
Speaker
But they wanted everyone to know how serious they were about planning this wedding, about eventually getting married, even if you know it sort of looks different on the surface. So they wrote tanayim and they had a party for it, which is pretty cool.
00:21:12
Speaker
And it let's see, it included an agreement to marry within 12 months of the ceremony.
00:21:24
Speaker
and Let's see.
00:21:30
Speaker
oh look, they mentioned the possibility that you could actually surprise your family with your engagement announcement in this way.
00:21:46
Speaker
Okay. So this one groom in this article um talked about the story about Jacob and Rachel from Bible times, Yaakov and Rachel.
00:21:57
Speaker
They fell in love and made a pact that someday they would marry no matter what. And if you know the story of Yaakov and Rachel, you, or if you want to go back in the book of Genesis and read it, they are sort of like ah the Torah's definition of star-crossed lovers. They, um,
00:22:15
Speaker
They wanted to get married and fell in love at first sight. And it, for various reasons, didn't end up happening for many, many years. um And the Bible actually, in one of the Bible verses about this story says, Jacob and Rachel waited seven years to get married.
00:22:31
Speaker
And those years seemed to them but a few days because of their love for one another. So if you are in a situation where, you know, I don't know, one of you is doing ah fellowship and somewhere far away or you can't be together for whatever reason, this is a beautiful story and a beautiful way to mark that you're engaged and it's serious. You know, even if it's going to be years or whatever that you are putting a date out there, you're telling everyone, heck, you are signing a piece of paper.
00:23:00
Speaker
Now. So this is a contemporary usage of the Tanayim ritual.
Engagement Concerns and Solutions
00:23:05
Speaker
But back in the day, you know, this, you could see how it could make families nervous to have an engagement, um but no definite wedding arrangements yet, right? You want to make sure that your child is protected in that engagement, which just means that she's not going to get ghosted or he's not going to be surprised with, okay, now we're engaged, we're Now, all of a sudden, there are these demands about who we're going to live with or how much we're going to spend on the wedding.
00:23:35
Speaker
So it sort of gave families an opportunity to sort of lock in this engagement and the terms under which the couple had become engaged. Right. So we don't have any baits and switches. We don't have any surprises. Right.
00:23:52
Speaker
We just we know that with the signing of this document, we are going full steam ahead. There's no more questioning. We are on a straight path to the wedding. So it became a custom here. Olivia, are you still here?
00:24:08
Speaker
We're at minute like 25. Olivia, I hope you're still here because we are getting to the breaking of the plate. Okay. So traditionally, the mothers of a couple would have a big plate and would just um smash it.
00:24:24
Speaker
And there are there are relatively few explanations of this custom compared to, for example, smashing a glass. However, you can see how it's you know thematically connected to breaking a glass. And one of the more popular explanation explanations of breaking the glass at the end of a Jewish wedding is that you can't put the shards of the glass back together. It's like impossible. So what has been done cannot be undone.
00:24:51
Speaker
And the most common explanation of breaking the plate with the mothers is basically just that, like, okay, we're so happy. We're so excited because now we know. We know this is going to happen. And I don't know, maybe you live in a small town and you've been shipping your kid with somebody else's kid for a long time. And oh my gosh, and they were...
00:25:10
Speaker
maybe sweethearts in school and oh, now they're finally engaged. You know, you want to make sure that is a done deal. Okay. Of course, there's also the custom of breaking stuff when you think the evil eye might be on you.
00:25:25
Speaker
Okay. So moments of heightened happiness or um hopeful planning for the future. we want to break something, make a big noise to scare away the evil eye. If you like that explanation, I do.
00:25:39
Speaker
then use it, okay? If you're doing breaking the plate. Now, we are moving, in my mind, which I haven't explained, we're moving from this model of having a tanayim and plate-breaking ceremony ah months and months beforehand as sort of an engagement party to what you might see um in the last several decades, which is mom and mom or parents or you know close family breaking a plate right before the Kachuba signing.
00:26:07
Speaker
Right. Same function, but without the understanding that there's a long time, we still get um the celebratory vibes. We still get scaring away the evil eye, if you like that.
00:26:20
Speaker
The significance of having moms do it, I think is, i think it's very sweet. First of all, there's one plate and moms have to figure it out together. It's kind of like when I talked about circling,
00:26:34
Speaker
in the episode on circling, how it's just kind of an awkward thing that people aren't used to doing, and they don't really know exactly what they're doing. So they kind of look to each other. We do when we have moms breaking a plate, we see a lot of very sweet interactions between moms, you can tell they're bonding a little bit.
00:26:50
Speaker
There's maybe this moment of lightness that, oh, we've been planning for so long. And we've sort of been waiting for this moment. And now it's finally here. And we're goingnna do this together and um for people who are maybe nervous about how their in-laws are going to get along or, you know, if they haven't hardly met. I've done some weddings where the in-laws have met once, maybe twice.
00:27:13
Speaker
Or if they've known each other for a long time, you know, I think that in any situation, basically, with your meana with your in-laws, especially your mother's in-law, this breaking of a plate thing is just a fun thing to do.
00:27:27
Speaker
For all different kinds of reasons, okay? So there are, however, Olivia, you asked for explanations. So if you don't like any of the explanations that I gave before, there are, you guessed it, definitely more explanations. who This would not be and Jewish subject if we didn't have like at least...
00:27:46
Speaker
three explanations for every custom, right? So I had a couple in February who wanted their moms to break a plate. You know, there were children involved. They were looking for more fun things to do. They were looking for a way for their moms to bond.
00:28:02
Speaker
um We did find out that it is considered auspicious, like lucky, if you take the the pieces of the plate that you've broken and pass them out to people who are hoping to find a match, that it can be like a lucky charm for them.
00:28:18
Speaker
So they liked that. I think they had a few people in their orbit who were going to be at the wedding who were hoping for a match of their own. So they liked that idea of being able to distribute their blessing, I guess, of a done deal um to their friends who they loved so dearly. It was a very like...
00:28:36
Speaker
very close, like very intimate wedding. It was one of those where everybody was like already sitting at their dinner table and watching the Chava. It was very cool. um very Just a very loving couple, lots of love in the room. So they really liked that idea.
00:28:49
Speaker
and um So I did find some other explanations, as I said. We have an explanation from Rav Belsky, Zichr no Livracha. He was a great rabbinic mind of the contemporary age, passed away recently. He mentioned in a class that he was giving, um and when' obviously this was a tangent of the actual topic he was speaking about, but...
00:29:14
Speaker
He said that, you know, in a wedding, the mothers break a plate to show the couple that broken plates just are a thing that happens in a happy home.
Plate-Breaking Ceremony: Tradition and Practice
00:29:25
Speaker
Right. So maybe if you have ah in particular ah a bride or a groom or a couple who are maybe like eastern East Denise. So an East Denise is um a Talmudic word for somebody who is very particular.
00:29:41
Speaker
They like their things to be neat and clean and orderly and be in a certain way and everything to always be just so. So if you especially are dealing with a bride or a groom who is that way, to that the he, Rav Belsky said that this is for the mothers to sort of flex a little bit on their experience and show the couple like, hey, when you've lived a life and raised a family and built a household together, things are going to get broken.
00:30:08
Speaker
And that's okay. You know, either it's ah it's a plate that's getting broken and we we get a new one, we sweep up the pieces, it's just fine. even if we Even if it was a plate that we really loved, you know, we have the memory of what was going on when we dropped the plate, which was probably like a teenager doing the dishes or Carrying it to the table for a celebration. And so that's fine.
00:30:31
Speaker
We don't want a house, especially where kids are afraid of breaking things and nobody feels comfortable, right? Your goal, the mothers are telling the couple by breaking this plate. This was Rav Belsky's explanation that your goal is not to build a perfect home.
00:30:48
Speaker
It's to build a home that's a home. where people can be themselves and feel comfortable. And if they break a plate, nobody will yell at them and it will be okay. And because the mothers are experienced, they are maybe maybe breaking the first plate for this household or maybe just showing them that, you know, they break it with, um I've seen them either smash it on the ground or break it with like special little hammers.
00:31:09
Speaker
And it's it's not a big deal. And it's it's actually really fun. So I do have um the link to where this explanation from Rav Belsky is mentioned. I will put that in the show notes. So yeah, I guess that's about it. When I spoke with my couple...
00:31:24
Speaker
who were having their moms do this ritual. We talked about what explanation they liked. And I wrote just a little script piece for it. You know, when I officiate a wedding, by the way, and this is something that you should ask your wedding officiant, ask him or her, do you have a script for the wedding?
00:31:44
Speaker
And he or she should say, yes, I do have a script, unless they're very good at riffing. But man, like, you know me, I go off on tangents. Your wedding ceremony would be twice as long. I use this a script for every wedding.
00:31:57
Speaker
I do not read the script word for word. And that's the important part. The script is there. For two reasons. It's to keep me on track and to give me words where I may not have otherwise had them right at the tip of my tongue. So you don't want your officiant to be saying lots of ums and ahs and well and let's sees. You want her to be able to stay on track and to sound eloquent and confident for your whole wedding. So anyway, the script that I wrote for this particular moment is...
00:32:29
Speaker
Let's call the moms Sarah and Fraindle. Okay. So the script says this. So Sarah and Fraindle, do you both agree that these two young people should be married and to make it official according to the conditions they have determined?
00:32:46
Speaker
And they would say yes and yes. And it's a little interactive. And it's kind of funny because these people were not, they were in their 30s. So they were, The young people thing was kind of a little bit of a joke. Obviously, 30s is still young, but they weren't, um you know, 18 and 22. Right.
00:33:01
Speaker
um And to make it official according to the conditions they have determined. Right. And that the time of their chapa should be approximately 30 minutes from now, which is when it was. So that got a laugh. It loosened everybody up.
00:33:13
Speaker
And I said, OK, well, When you break this plate, it will symbolize the seriousness of this commitment. Just as the plate can never be unbroken, so too is this connection between your family's final.
00:33:24
Speaker
And it also has a sweeter meaning. It's to remind the couple that in the happiest of homes, there will be many broken plates as dogs and kids run in and out and you bring more and more friends as guests to your table.
00:33:37
Speaker
It's a blessing that you will live generously and that you will have a full house much more often than you have an empty one. And so i think they at that point and that was it. And then at that point, they maybe be gave a little I think I maybe invited them to give a blessing or maybe not. They were pretty quiet, but they were very sweet.
00:33:56
Speaker
And then they just went at it. They i gave them I got little um golden hammers. I got them on Amazon. They were like five dollars. And I got a plate from the thrift store because um especially for this couple, they um they were like very heavily sustainability minded.
00:34:15
Speaker
So that was important to them. And it was also important to me because listen, I love to go to the thrift store, but I live in a small house, as I may have mentioned. I simply do not have room for any more stuff, which means I can't go to the thrift store because if I go to the thrift store, I will buy more stuff that I don't have room for. And it's just a whole problem.
00:34:32
Speaker
When am I allowed to go to the thrift store? when I have to buy a plate for moms to break. Okay, so if I'm officiating your wedding, listen, help me out, okay? Let me live, guys. Let me go to the thrift store.
00:34:44
Speaker
Tell me you want your moms to break a plate. to Have somebody break a plate and i'll I'll be able to go and buy the plate and I'll be so happy. And sometimes there I find like a kiddish cup or something that needs a home.
00:34:56
Speaker
ah So you can even maybe get like some vintage Judaica as a wedding gift, okay? So anyway, And then the plate was broken. This couple decided to do it just in front of the people who were going to be there for their ketubah.
00:35:11
Speaker
um People have done it in like larger settings. I think if you didn't want to do like an engagement party kind of setup, but you also didn't want to add anything on to your big day.
00:35:22
Speaker
So this is something that I hear a lot of concerns about, like Rabbi Leanne, there's already a lot of stuff going on. It's already going to be chaotic. And you're wondering about your maybe you're also having a rehearsal dinner or like a welcome dinner and you're feeling like, i don't know what we're going to do. How are we going to make it special? It's it's not even like it doesn't feel like really Jewy or official or anything.
00:35:42
Speaker
Listen, do your plate breaking at your rehearsal dinner. This is something you don't need a rabbi for this. Anybody can do it. You can write up your own little script, you know, click on the links that I've put here. You can figure it out. If you want help writing something for somebody to read before your mom's break a plate or some ideas, brainstorming it, send me an email. we will figure it out and do this at your rehearsal dinner or do it.
00:36:06
Speaker
I don't know if you're having like. like a getting ready thing and you're looking for ways to kill the time while your makeup artist is working on one bridesmaid at a time and you want your photographer to have something to take pictures of besides that.
00:36:18
Speaker
I don't know. um But think about doing this because it is fun. It adds something decidedly super dewy to your ceremony, right? And, um you know, what's not to love?
00:36:31
Speaker
So practicality issues, anytime you are going to break anything. So I've put videos of this on my Instagram of how I wrap up the glass for smashing.
00:36:42
Speaker
Guys, it is the freezer Ziploc bag and it's like wrapped and tucked and whatever. And then it's inside of a handkerchief and it's zipped, like seriously zipped.
00:36:53
Speaker
In fact, I maybe should start even taping the bags shut, like with ah some duct tape or some packing tape. And then it's wrapped up in an extra handkerchief. So same thing applied for the plate I got. i wrapped it in a in a couple large plastic bags.
00:37:10
Speaker
i do I think it was too big for gallon bags, but I did wrap it in a couple of larger plastic bags. um And then I think I did I tape it? Leah, if you remember what I did to that plate, i I don't think I taped it because I wanted them to be able to get to the pieces um to pass out to their guests that they really wanted to give that little good luck charm to. But I definitely put it in two pillowcases.
00:37:36
Speaker
So it was definitely not going to cut anyone. You could smash it with the hammer or they could have you know slammed it on the ground, which are the two ways that I've seen moms break plates.
00:37:47
Speaker
um And none of those pieces were escaping. They were able to open it easily and reach in and grab the bigger pieces. And I think that the couple maybe wanted to save the rest of the pieces for, don't know, some tchotchke or craft or whatever. They're those kind of people. There's two little girls in the family. I don't know. They want to modge podge something. Enjoy.
00:38:05
Speaker
So just for safety sake, you don't want any shards of anything getting into your venue's carpet, flying and hitting somebody. i don't care if you have wedding insurance. Nobody wants to have somebody at their wedding need stitches. Okay, so just be very careful about that and mindful, but I'm sure that you would be.
00:38:22
Speaker
So if you are planning a Jewish wedding, L'chaim to you, to life. And B'Sha'a Tovah, which is something that we usually say when we hear someone is, God willing, expecting a new baby.
00:38:37
Speaker
We don't say congratulations. We say B'Sha'a Tovah, which means may it happen in a perfect and good and auspicious time for your family. So whenever it happens will be the exact right time.
00:38:49
Speaker
And we don't want to jinx anything by saying congratulations. Congratulations, because that's kind of like it's already happened. So that's my little Jeperestition lesson for today. So if you are planning a Jewish wedding, L'chaim, may it only result in more life, more joy, and may it happen at the exact perfect time for you.
00:39:09
Speaker
And consider this ritual. Consider this thing because it's not religious. It is a way to bring your family together. um It's super Jewish and it's sort of like a fun cultural moment.
00:39:23
Speaker
And it gives your mom something else to do. I think a lot of times like moms can be moms and dads can be kind of like floating through your wedding day. There's they're not like hanging out with your bridesmaids, but they're not exactly like I don't know.
00:39:41
Speaker
they're They're not doing nothing, but they're not exactly doing something. So it gives them something to do. It's very nice. Okay. Well, Olivia, thank you so much for that question. And please, please, please let this be proof that I am thrilled to answer questions on this podcast.
00:39:55
Speaker
It will be a shorter than usual episode, but not super short. And I love responding to your questions if you don't want it on the air. I'll send you a quick email and answer.
00:40:06
Speaker
If you would like to read your question on the air, we can figure out a way for you to make, ah figure out a way. I know how to make a recording ah so that I can air your question on this podcast. If you want to come onto this podcast, like we just do a Zoom call, okay? It makes a recording of your voice. It makes a recording of my voice.
00:40:25
Speaker
We don't do video, as you know. If you have a question, but you think you're going to have a lot of follow-up questions or you have a very specific circumstance, Come on the show. There's no limit of episodes we can have. OK, we can do this forever. God willing. You know, we we all have long lives ahead of us and we can make hundreds of episodes about your Jewish wedding because God willing, you know, Am Yisrael Chai, the Jewish people will continue to live, flourish, fall in love.
00:40:54
Speaker
get married and make Jewish homes together. um there's There's no limit. So come on to the show and ask your question. If you want to keep some of your situation anonymous, we can agree on those terms before you come on. Okay. There are ways to to figure all that out ah before you get onto the show. Okay. So please consider me while you are listening to this podcast or while you are in my inbox, please consider me your rabbi. It is my honor to help you and to give you advice and to help you plan. the perfect Jewish wedding for you.
00:41:24
Speaker
So until next time, remember that there is always more learning to do. Just because you don't know something today doesn't mean you won't know it tomorrow. And may we all go from strength to strength and keep learning new things and keep growing.
00:41:38
Speaker
Until next time. Well, everyone, i have had the best time being your rabbi for this episode. I'm so glad you joined me for another little bit of insight into planning your perfect Jewish or interfaith wedding.
00:41:51
Speaker
Until you can smash that glass on your big day, you'd might as well smash that subscribe button for this podcast. I don't want you to miss a single thing.
00:42:02
Speaker
Remember, you can always find me, Rabbi all one word, for even more tips, tricks, recommendations, and wisdom on Jewish weddings.
00:42:19
Speaker
If you want to work with me on your wedding, you'll find all the info you need at yourohiorabbi.com. Until next time, remember, you deserve the perfect wedding for you.
00:42:30
Speaker
Don't settle for anything