Re: Breaking dishes (was: dance of death)

[Joe Kurland <ganeydn...>]

I believe it was Roz Bresnick Perry who told a story of an arranged 
marriage--maybe it was her mother's or grandmother's.  After the 
t'noyim, the bride complained that she did not like the match and her 
father told her that she must go through with the wedding because to 
break the t'noyim would dishonor her father as he had made the 
contract.  After the wedding, if she didn't like her husband, she 
could divorce him then with no dishonor, as the father's contract 
would have been fulfilled.  So she went through with the wedding, 
grew to love her khosn and remained happily married for the rest of 
her life.

By the way, Peggy's mother and my mother broke a plate at our t'noyim 
celebration which was held a month before the wedding.  We 
autographed the shards and guests took them for keepsakes.

Zayt gezunt (be healthy),

Yosl (Joe) Kurland
The Wholesale Klezmer Band
Colrain, MA 01340
voice/fax: 413-624-3204
http://www.WholesaleKlezmer.com


At 3:10 PM -0400 7/3/02, Robert A. Rothstein wrote:
>SamWeiss (at) bellatlantic(dot)net wrote:
>
>  >  This is the traditional gesture that clinches
>  > the ceremony of writing the Conditions of Engagement Contract
>  > ("Tenaim").  It mirrors the breaking of an item made of glass at the close
>  > of the wedding ceremony.  The explanations given for this act are various
>  > and sundry, and are probably ultimately related to universal gestures of
>  > superstition and good luck.
>
>     One explanation, supposedly going back to the Vilna Gaon, is that an
>earthenware plate, broken at the _tnoim_, cannot be put back together, while
>the glass broken at the wedding, can [?].  Thus it is better to get divorced
>after the wedding than to break the obligation of the engagement contract
>(Abraham Hirshovitz, _Seyfer minhagey yeshurun -- Yidishe minhogim_, 3rd. ed.,
>Vilna, 1914, p. 161).
>
>Bob Rothstein
>

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