Is it possible the Shidach crisis is a problem of our own making? I think that this is largely the case. Some people might dispute that there even is a Shidach crisis, but it’s pretty easy to refute them. Just ask any single living on the upper west side of New York. But the problem is not only with the modern Orthodox single that mostly populates that part of the city.
It is a major problem for the ultra Orthodox world of Yeshivos as well. The only population that seems to have escaped this phenomenon is the Chasidic one where Shiduchim are made entirely by the parents and the couple meets only one or at most two times. Although I’m sure that there are some singles in the Chasidic community that do have trouble getting married, I believe it is miniscule compared to the rest of the Orthodox world.
The focus of this article is the world of Yeshivos. This community is large and growing quite rapidly. Part of that growth is the ‘move to the right’ by many formerly modern Orthodox young people. They have adopted the Yeshiva framework for dating which has added to the problem.
A large part of problem as I see it is that opportunities for young people to meet are becoming fewer and fewer as time goes on. There is now more reliance than ever before on Shadchanim, whether professional or not. They are increasingly becoming the sole source for young people to meet. And this situation has created its own set impediments. That did not used to be the case.
There used to be a time when opportunities for young people to meet were quite common and normal. There were opportunities at weddings, a Kiddush in Shul on Shabbos, or at the home of a family friend… just to name a few.
In fact there is a famous story about a young Yeshiva University student who had adopted a Yeshivashe mentality. He attended the wedding of a friend and found out that he was seated at a table consisting of women and men together. He went over to Rav Ahron Soloveichik and complained about being seated together with single women. Rav Aharon supposedly retorted, “So what?” “How do you think I met my wife?”
There was also the fact that a young man who met a young woman would decide to call her on his own and ask her out on a date. In modern Orthodoxy this is still the case, but they have an entirely different set of issues which is not the focus of this essay.
In the world of Yeshivos this was not as common, but it definitely existed. But in the main Shadchanim were used and many if not most Shiduchim were made for Yeshiva Bachurim that way.
'EndTheMadness' founder Chananya Weissman in an interview in the Jerusalem Post points out that many students from fine modern Orthodox Jewish homes who have been taught perfectly good values well within Halacha about how to interact with the opposite sex… go away to Israel for a year. And they end up being indoctrinated into the Yeshiva dating mentality. Casual meetings between the sexes are either discouraged or forbidden. This has resulted in perfectly good Shiddach opportunities to be lost.
What has developed is something quite extreme and even brutal. Instead of young people investigating each other on a date and finding commonality of Hashkafa and purpose… and seeing if they are kindred spirits and compatible personalities, they now rely on Shadchanim to do such things now. But there is no way a Shadchan can replace the individual themselves. The Shadchan is at best a Shaliach an agent of the young person with a personality bias of their own. No matter who perceptive or intuitive they are it cannot replace the young person’s own encounter. And it is quite likely that a match will never be proposed that wouldmight be a good match. What is probably more the case is that people that are very incompatible are set up.
But that’s only part of the problem. What has become in vogue in recent years are sets of irrelevant questions asked of potential Shiduchim which are often petty and even stupid. Like whether a parent uses only white table linen on Shabbos. And there are many such stupid questions upon which Shidach dates are accepted or rejected.
What has happened in the world of Yeshivos is that parents who hire professional Shadchanim are now custom designing the Shiddach they want for their children. And of course the more requirements one has on the Shiddach one seeks for their child, the less there Shiduchim there are that can fulfill those requirements. Of course everyone wants only the best for their child. Every parent would like to have Mechutanim (in-laws) that they get along with well.
But the result of all these ‘requirements’ and the lack of opportunities is that there are a lot of singles in the Yeshiva world now. Yet when a single turns thirty all of a sudden many of the ‘unkosher’ venues are now opened up for them. And the older they get the more they are opened up. That shouldn’t be the case. There ought to be more avenues for people to meet and this move to the extreme right which is so counterproductive in so many other ways is oppressively counter productive when making Shidduchim.
There is also the problem of a Shiddach being put together and the couple getting pressure to marry even when there are obvious compatibility probems. That is certainly contributing to the higher divorce rate. And the current emphasis to lessen the number of dates between a young couple menas they will know even less about each other when they walk down the aisle. This too is a contributing factor.
One of the biggest outrages of the current situation is the fact that young Talmidei Chachamim with great potential have price in their head. These who are the kinds of Shiduchim Yeshivishe parents seek. But these young Talmidei Chachamim are urged to find young women with wealthy parents. This leaves behind the daughters of the very constituents that have been the most loyal to this… the ‘Torah Only’ Hashkafa. They are either still learning full time or have taken low paying Chinuch jobs and cannot afford the ‘price tag’ of supporting these young Talmidei Chachamim. Roshei Yeshiva are therefore steering these young Talmidei Chachamim away these Klei Kodesh towards the wealthy. What a sad irony!
I was recently told by a Mechanech who has children of marriageable age that he went to a Torah U’Mesorah convention a few years ago and duirng a session dealing with Shiduchim the Mechnchim confronted many of prominent Rabbanim in attendance… some of whom are on the Agudah Moetzes… and asked. “What have you done to us?!” “You urged us to become Klei Kodesh and now we can't get the best of your Talmidim as Shiduchim for our daughters!” They had no answer.
It would be of great value of the Yeshiva world would ease up on the reins a bit and stop fearing venues like weddings where young people can meet.
It would also be far truer to the values of Torah if a young Talmid Chacham were urged to seek daughters of Talmidei Chacham instead of urging them to seek money. If there is any group that should rely more on Bitachon and less on Gashmius it’s this one.
