3 Plans After Wedding Plans Were Downgraded

By Rabbi Yakov Saacks, Director of the Chai Center in Dix Hills, NY

When my son Mendy got engaged a few months back, my wife and I began our wedding preparations immediately. We met with our new family and chose a date which was Lag BaOmer, corresponding to May 12, 2020.

We chose the 33rd of the Omer because it is an auspicious, happy and holy date of the Jewish calendar and is one of the only days that one can get married between Pesach and Shavous. On this day, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who lived in the second century of the Common Era, was the first to publicly teach the mystical dimension of the Torah known as the Kabbalah, and is the author of the classic text of Kabbalah, the Zohar. On the day of his passing, Rabbi Shimon instructed his disciples to mark the date as “the day of my joy.”

Lag BaOmer also commemorates another joyous event. The Talmud relates that in the weeks between the Jewish holidays of Pesach and Shavuos, a plague raged among the disciples of the great sage Rabbi Akiva (teacher of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai), and on the 33rd day of the Omer, also known as Lag BaOmer, the deaths ceased.

We immediately serenaded the couple with a grand welcome at the Chai Center. We then held an engagement soiree at the Jewish Children’s Museum in Crown Heights and everything seemed to be going great. We were full of joy as our son had met Mushkie, his bashert/intended.

We were in wedding overdrive — making invitation lists, meeting with caterers, halls, florists, bands — and then a mysterious microscopic virus named Covid-19 hit the world and everything changed. Businesses were shuttered, synagogues were closed, schools were padlocked and we were placed in quarantine.

What on earth do we do now?

PLAN A:

Our thought process was to choose an alternate date post quarantine when the risk of cross-contamination would be over. We were told by leading rabbis that we don’t push off the date of a wedding. The rationale is that choosing a date is not happenstance or random, but rather a spiritual choice, given the holiness of a wedding. In other words, this is the best day for these young souls to become reattached after their “unisoul” was split into two. So, Lag BaOmer it is – no ifs or buts.

PLAN B:

I spoke to politicians and judges to try and get a special dispensation to have a limited wedding in my massive backyard, which would allow us to socially distance and still have a wedding. We were not talking hundreds of people. A few friends and family. The answer was a resounding no. it is too dangerous as Covid is spread too easily and even with precautions, we are putting people at risk. Agreed.

PLAN C:

We decided that clearly we will need to have a small wedding with strictly immediate family, namely moms and dads, bride and groom and whichever siblings are close enough to drive in. There will be no aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces or nephews. We are unable to invite lifelong friends and colleagues. Instead of yarmulkas, we will have custom made masks. Instead of a fully catered meal, we will order in from a kosher restaurant.

Are we upset, you may ask as our weddings are usually packed with everyone important in our lives, as we usually invite the community and a plethora of friends and relatives? My response is G-d forbid, absolutely not. We feel fortunate that we are all healthy and Covid-free, and that our son met such a great person, together with her kind parents and family. If there is one thing that this microscopic virus taught me, it is that we can take nothing for granted and that every day is a day to celebrate. My joy knows no bounds, and I have learned that a band and hall are secondary and possibly much lower than that.

May we only know of Simchas – no matter the size.

Closing thought. Maybe all weddings should be smaller post-Covid. Less pressure and less debt.