A man must not withhold sexual pleasure from his wife. This is God’s message in this week’s parasha (Exodus 21:10). The context is: “if [a slave woman] proves to be displeasing to her master who designated her for himself… [and] if he marries another, he must not withhold from this [slave woman] her nearness of flesh, the cover of her bed, or her time of love.” (This is Ramban’s translation.) Our Sages interpreted this lifnim meshurat ha-din–beyond the letter of the law. They understood this verse to apply broadly, so that it required all married men to give sexual pleasure to their wives, not just to owners and their slaves (Mishnah Ketubot, Chapter 5, Mishnah 6).
The mitzvah of a man giving the gift of intimate pleasure to his wife is likened to God’s gift of pure love to a soul in the heavenly realms called the “Palace of Love”, where the blessed Holy One kisses Shekhina, just as Yaakov kissed Rachel (Zohar, Sava de-Mishpatim 2:97a). The Sages of the Mishnah understood Exodus 21:10 to require intimacy for all married women; and the Rabbis of the Zohar imagined that this verse teaches that the delight of the intimacy of two human beings actualizes and is mirrored in the heavenly union of the creative and receptive aspects of the Divine. As above, so below.
And so it is with prayer as well. The intimate act of prayer, just like the intimate act of making love, is a unification of the soul with God. An individual’s prayer and intimate relationship with his or her Creator should be of equal intensity, excitement, and intimacy as that of making love. Perhaps it is in this light, and for this reason, that our Sages mandated that the mitzvah of prayer is obligatory for women as well as men (Mishnah Brachot, Chapter 3, Mishnah 3).
Standing in prayer at the Kotel is the nearest that we can get today to the place where the Holy of Holies stood. Is that intensity, excitement, and intimacy only for half of us to experience? Should that intense intimacy be prohibited at the Kotel? Deep in our hearts, don’t we want that experience for all Jews? In light of these mishnayot, if our Sages were alive today, would they really restrict women’s prayers to a very small section of the Kotel? Would they really prohibit women from chanting Torah’s holy words and praying at our people’s holiest site? I don’t believe they would. The same rabbis who understood that the Torah means more than what it says literally would also say that the Kotel is a place for Jewish women and men to have equal access to an intimate relationship with the Holy One.
As we pray in the daily Amidah: Veh-tein khelkeinu beh-torahtakh lah-ahsot khukei retzonach u-leh-avdakh behlehvav shaleim. Grant our portion in Your Torah so that we may fulfill the statutes of Your will and serve You wholeheartedly.
Rabbi Elihu Gevirtz and a friend are starting a congregation in Santa Barbara, California called Zimrat Yah, and need a Torah. If you have a Torah that you can share, please email rabbielihu@gmail.com.