[This is not as much a Purim dvar Torah, as much as it is a thought related to the title, using examples from Megillat Esther.]
Emotional vs Intellectual decision making
I don’t care very much
to compare women and men simply because I think the comparison isn't fair.
Human we all are, but other than the obvious physical differences, I believe
that the natural differences that come from being different genders make
comparisons ill-conceived. It's almost like comparing a tennis player to a
soccer player, wondering which is a better athlete.
I first heard the
following generalization from one Rabbi W/Vunder who was one of the rabbis on
the Heritage Tours trip to Poland
that I participated in as a teenager, when I noticed Israeli girls weeping in Auschwitz
while I was scribbling in my notebook and keeping my emotions to myself. He
said, "That's the way it is. Girls are more emotional." The
generalization is more supported in a simple Google search than the other way
around, and it follows that males – in general, though by no means exclusively
– make more decisions based on a rational or intellectual thought process,
while females are (generally, though not exclusively) more prone to making
decisions based on emotions.
With that in mind, I
confess that this past week, in advance of one of my public speaking
engagements, I happened to run some of the ideas past my wife, who told me that
one of the thoughts I planned to share – though heavily sourced in a comment of
Tosafos (Yoma 72a) as well as by many Rabbinic sources from the last several
centuries – was anachronistic and inappropriate for the intended audience.
Was her response emotional or highly thought out? It
may have been both. But I can say with certainty that my defense was purely
emotional. What's wrong with it, I argued! Every person who studied in yeshiva
knows this! Yes, she responded, but your audience is not a bunch of yeshiva
guys. I realized I was letting my emotions dictate what my intellect was
telling me should be OK to share. The emotion versus intellect roles, it seems,
had been reversed.
As luck would have it a rabbi I admire happened to approach
me before I spoke. I quickly asked his advice to which he responded quoting
Bereshit 21:12: "All that your wife Sarah has told you, listen to her
voice!" And I did. They were both right.
With all this background, I think there are two very
worthy points we can take from Megillat Esther which can play a significant
role in the male-female relationship: the first for spouses and the second for
those looking to find spouses.
The Megillah is
full of characters who are impulsive, who make every decision based on their
emotions. Arguably the only exceptions to this are Mordechai explaining to
Esther how she can not shirk her opportunity to save her people (which causes
Esther to change her emotional response to an intellectual response), and Haman's
wife Zeresh who lays out for her husband a logistical plan for how to rid
himself of the nuisance called Mordechai who literally ruins Haman's day every
time he refuses to bow. She tells him, "Make a wood [gallows] 50 cubits
high, and in the morning you will tell the king, Mordechai will be hanged, and
you will come to [Esther's second] party happy." (Esther 5:14)
The king's insomnia may have uncovered his obligation
to Mordechai for saving his life, but he may have chosen to honor Mordechai in
a different way had Haman not shown up in the middle of the night and gotten
tricked into playing into the king's "trap." Even if Mordechai had
been otherwise rewarded that night, without a personal parade and Haman's
disgrace, were Haman to come along in the morning to say, "Since saving
your life, Mordechai has become a traitor!" there is a reasonable chance
to say the king might have allowed the execution after he had paid his debt to
the man.
But everything changed for Haman because of his problem;
he did not listen to his wife! His wife said, "Sleep on it. Wait until the
morning." But he had no patience. He let his emotions overtake him, and
they told him, "You have to do this now." Intellectually it made
sense, but the intellect was really driven by the emotion.
The moral of the story: If your wife gives you good,
sound advice, take it and follow it.
The second lesson about relationships is based on a
comment made by Rabbi Elijah Kramer, the Gaon of Vilna (Gra), when
Achashveirosh crowns Esther queen. "Esther was brought to the king in the
tenth month, Tevet, in the seventh year of his reign. And of all the women, the
king loved Esther, for she found favor and kindness before him… and he placed
the crown on her head, making her queen in place of Vashti." (Esther
2:16-17)
The Gra wrote, "He crowned her immediately,
without waiting to see if there might be one more pleasing than she. He told
himself there is none better than she."
One can argue that a man who has spent every day with a
different woman for four years either knows everything about women, doesn't
know what he's looking to find, or knows exactly what he is looking for in a
woman.
In light of the Gra's interpretation, my vote is for
the final possibility because I believe that the "Maybe there is someone
better" attitude is one of the most destructive approaches to
"shidduchim" out there. Too many people play games with others' time
and lives because they don't really know what they are looking to find.
We can learn from Achashveirosh, however, to know what
you're looking to find so that when it comes your way there need not be
hesitation. Go for it. Work at it. Make it work. Lightning doesn't strike.
Bells and whistles don't sound. You just know. You make a decision, a
commitment, and then a "go" at a life together. And with God's help,
it lasts a lifetime.
And when men listen to the sage voice of "all that
Sarah says to you," (not that men don't have good advice, ideas,
suggestions and encouragement to provide as well – it does take two to tango,
after all) we can come out looking great for doing the right thing.
And our relationship is
only strengthened as a result.
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