Here’s the thing about Bais Yaakov.
Bais Yaakov offers an excellent formal education for girls. The girls are well-trained when it comes to Chumash [Bible], Navi [Prophets] and Ketuvim [Writings]. They are adept and intelligent and they attend the creme-de-la-creme of seminaries. (One of the smartest girls in my class went to BJJ; she lives in Lakewood now. I don’t know what she’s up to but if she’s teaching, those students are lucky.)
Now, most Bais Yaakov girls are taught that the highest calling to which they could aspire would be to become a kollel wife. (There are terms for the men they might marry- learners and earners, with learners being sought after and earners being looked down upon. Moreover, even when it comes to learners, the ideal is to support your husband in kollel for as long as you can as opposed to having him learn for a year and then go to work.) The reason for this is because they are taught their sechar [reward in heaven] is based on their husband’s learning. Women are taught they should have mesiras nefesh [sacrificing for the sake of Heaven] for their husband’s learning. They are taught that their husbands learning Torah (and let’s be honest, that really means Gemara) is the most important thing, and they should do anything they can to support it. By anything I do mean anything- living without luxuries is the least of it.
But don’t believe me. Go scroll through the ImaMother message boards and you will see these sentiments expressed everywhere. Here’s one example from this thread.
These are beliefs engrained in Bais Yaakov girls.
I find a lot of girls, myself included, do not respect a man who is also working.
And
For someone who isn’t on that level you can’t force yourself to be a “kollel wife” if you’re really not.
Look at how that’s been phrased. The real Jewish women, the ones who are valuable, are the ones on that high spiritual level who live their whole lives sacrificing for the sake of their husbands. Those other Jewish women who expect their husbands to actually make a living, nebach, they just aren’t on that level.
Now, the actual kollel husbands often help their wives as much as they can. They pick children up from daycare/ playgroup, drop them off at daycare/ playgroup, help around the house, and if they see their wife is not doing well, they leave learning to go to work.
Women work very hard, exceptionally hard, to support their husbands learning Gemara…but they themselves don’t learn Gemara. There’s a reason for this; you can go through Rabbi Kenneth Auman’s class on the history of women learning Torah She’Baal Peh [Oral Law]. I have posted up many of his sources at this link.
What does that mean practically? It means that after a husband spends all day learning, he cannot actually discuss it with his wife. She won’t understand what he is talking about. In the yeshiva world, this is understood - “you don’t marry a chavrusa” is how it’s phrased.
So what do you discuss with your wife?
Maybe, if she’s academically minded, parsha and Torah and parshanut. If she’s a reader, maybe articles she’s read in the local magazines, or books she’s found interesting.
Otherwise, you’ll talk about your respective days- her job, encounters you had with people, family matters, upcoming weddings and events.
You’ll bond over child-raising, milestones and life events.
It’s certainly possible to have a loving relationship with your wife even if you cannot discuss the main thing you do each day- the Gemara you learn.
And many of us who are not members of the yeshivish community are in a similar position. We might be married to lawyers or computer programmers or insurance salesmen and not really understand what they do or the minutiae involved in their daily lives. We find other topics to discuss and over which to bond.
But.
What happens if Gemara is your passion?
What if it’s not just something you do because it’s what you were taught, but something you do because it is who you are?
What if is your life, not in a figurative way, but in a real way?
Well, then you live a very lonely life. Or at least, you live a very lonely marriage. Because how close can you really be to a wife, even a wife you love, if she cannot understand something essential about who you are, how you work, how you think, what you crave and what you live to do? There will always be an obstacle between the two of you, an impediment to your closeness.
And that’s unfortunate. Because more broadly, I believe that leads to a divide between the sexes.
It leads to Shabbos meals in Boro Park where Heshy and the men are speaking together in Yiddish and someone is telling over a Dvar Torah to the group, but the women are huddled together discussing how cute the new baby is.
It leads to men not needing to take women seriously. Because women are assumed not to have the kind of mind that men have, a mind that can be logical, analytical and deductive. Women can be dismissed, because even though we need to respect them and their binah yeseirah [additional understanding], we also need to remember that teaching them Torah is teaching them tiflus [foolishness] and they are emotional creatures at their core. Women are considered the backbone of the home. They provide comfort- meals, beauty, intimacy, children. But intelligence, especially the kind used when it comes to the Talmud? Beyond a woman’s capacity.
So the magazines for women will focus on Yom Tov recipes, parenting articles, tablescapes, pieces on the lives of Gedolim [great, revered figures in the Jewish community] with the odd Dvar Torah thrown in. And much of a woman’s life will revolve around materialism- how the table is laid, how the simcha is set up, which flowers they received, the outfits they dress their children in and the like.
If you’re a man who loves Gemara and your wife is passionately talking to you about tablescapes, what does that marriage look like, really? Can there really be mutual respect there?
I’m sure it’s possible. I’m also sure it’s not the kind of marriage I would ever want.
I want a marriage of mutual understanding, where my loves and joys are recognized, and I can recognize (or at least, have access to and learn about) my husband’s loves and passions as well. I don’t want to be locked out from having access to him, to what goes on in his deepest self, to what matters to him. I especially don’t want religion, and a belief as to what I can or cannot learn, to be the thing that locks me out.
I think of this scene from Outlander sometimes.
Jaime: Is it usual, what it is between us when I touch you, and you lie with me? Is it always so between a man and a woman?
Claire: It’s often something like this. [pauses] No. This isn’t usual. It’s different.
It’s different because of who they are to each other- people who each come from a different time but who connect with one another wholeheartedly. Who learn each other. Who know each other in intimate and profound ways.
Marriage is something that involves being known.
And so, at least for some kollel husbands, it must be profoundly lonely. Because their wives can never know them. They aren’t allowed to know them.
I find this very sad.
Your article touches on the overemphasis on materialism and the fomenting of shallowness in our culture— which is a big problem not only in marriages but in undermining our true values. There can be something wonderful about spouses supporting each other in their respective, supportive yet distinct roles. But there can be a real disconnect when a husband is immersed in learning whilst his wife is obsessed with sporting the luxury stroller, dressing herself and her children to the nines, and consistently putting out Shabbos meals that look like they’ve been professionally catered. If the couple truly values spirituality, they can bond over their shared pursuit of the husband’s kollel learning and the positive spiritual influence it has on the entire family. But if the wife is a materialistic, shallow girl aspiring to the kollel lifestyle for the social prestige she expects it will get her, then both the husband and the wife will indeed be very lonely and unfulfilled.