Rabbi Shmuley Boteach has been named "the most famous rabbi in America" by Newsweek. I first ran into his name through reviews of his bestseller Kosher Sex which, at the time, screamed "sensationalist" to me. I've since come to see he's got some good ideas up his sleeve, even if - like so many other self-anointed saviors - he often states what should be the obvious. His expansion of what "attraction" means, beyond the surface-level denotation it has today, is remarkably important, especially to the many guilt-ridden religious people out there. I take issue, though, with his last syndicated article, "Every Man a Matchmaker", which ran in this weekend's Jerusalem Post.
The article certainly makes for a good read, and though he's mainly writing to religious Jewish singles here, much of his descriptions will sound familiar to singles of all stripes. Boteach gives a reasonably accurate, if somewhat simplistic, overview of the reasons singles today aren't getting married (or at least not to the right person).
The first part of the problem, as Boteach sees it, lies with today's "shallow values" (his words). He claims these have penetrated "even" the "very Orthodox dating scene, where stick-thin women are paired up to young men from wealthy families, and where character is subordinated to pedigree." As he goes on to say, "In the secular world, of course, it's much worse." So, in short - it's a crisis of values. I'll get back to this later.
He then goes on to paint an amusing picture of the dire options facing the average single - covering singles parties, bars, speed dating, internet dating and matchmaking - and ruling them out. In one particularly sharp observation, he writes:
"Speed-dating is one of the most puzzling relationship ideas to come along in years. Take a generation of commitment-phobic young people, who are already dating-addicts and love anorexics, and cater to their obsession for variety by having them date 10 people at once! What wonderful preparation for monogamy!"
The second part of the problem, then, lies with flawed options for how to meet people.
Having set out such a frank overview, I had high hopes for whatever solution he was going to come up with. Must say I found it more than a little disappointing. The solution, he claims, is having everyone play matchmaker:
"Every man and every woman must take it upon themselves to introduce the single people they know to each other. We all believe in giving charity and we all believe in acts of loving-kindness. Now, is there any higher act of kindness than curing someone else's loneliness?"
That's it? After having systematically ruled out the other possibilities as inherently flawed to the point of pointlessness, he's going with the friend-brings-friend system? A quick look around my hometown shows that this system is at least as flawed as any of the others he finds fault with. (You'll either have to trust me on this or read the article, if you haven't yet. Go! Read! it's not long.) Jerusalem's infamous "swamp", that area of neighborhoods teeming with semi-cool, semi-desperate religious 20-somethings, has everyone busy matchmaking all the time, with plenty of still-frustrated singles complaining about feeling smothered, seeing the same old faces, feeling it's all a bit too forced. My point isn't that this system is bad, only that it has its own problems, and isn't fundamentally better than the rest.
So what's my solution, you ask? Well, as far as what options to go for, I just say - whatever you're comfortable with. Diversify. I wouldn't fundamentally endorse any technique over another - odds are fairly low no matter what you do - but you can try to enjoy yourself while you're looking.
As for the main problem, I agree with Rabbi Boteach that at heart, it's those "shallow values". I do take issue, however, with his off-hand assumption that the problems are "much worse" in the secular culture. I would say they're different, but not "much worse". The secular problems are quite widely known, so let me just point out one problem I see quite often in the religious world: many of them seem paralyzed by the sheer gravity of it all. They have more guilt for lusting, since they ought to be "caring about the inside". They can't touch, yet are dying too. But mainly, every encounter becomes incredibly decisive - since marriage is such an immediate, pressing concern. This brings a tendency to focus on every flaw in the other person - "do I want to live my whole life with this person? I should decide now" - and to measure every word, instead of just enjoying oneself and giving the relationship some breathing-space.
Obviously, for many if not most religious singles this isn't the case, and people handle it differently. The imperative to marry can bring more "results", but it can also paralyze. I am not generalizing, only saying it does happen, and more often than Boteach seems to think. "Shallow values" may be slightly more acute among the secular, but religious singles certainly have problems of their own in this "get-married-now" ethos.
So how do we deal with shallow values? Well, they're all around us, so the battle becomes quite individual. A proper answer would be quite long, but as time goes on, I feel more and more that the gist of it is: by growing up.
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