Rav Idi tells a story: There was a woman who was married for ten years without having children. [The couple] decided to get divorced but when they turned to Rabi Shimon Bar Yochai for advice he said just as you got married with festivities so should your divorce be festive. They made a beautiful party and out of his love for her the husband said “Though we have to get divorced and you must return to your father’s house before you leave choose the best thing from my house and take it back with you to your father’s house.”
She got him drunk and he succumbed to the wine and fell asleep. While he was sleeping she had her servants pick him up and carry him to her father’s house. When he awoke he asked her “What am I doing here?” She answered “You told me to take the best thing from your house. There is nothing that I love more than you.” When he saw this great love they went to ask Rabi Shimon Bar Yochai what to do and Rabi Shimon Bar Yochai prayed for the couple and they had a child. (Shir HaShirim Rabba 1:31)
The husband in this story was goal oriented. If this marriage is not producing results even if we love each other there is no point to the marriage. The woman though sees the world differently. The connection is enough. We are in this marriage not to produce but to be in the relationship.
In a beautiful and metaphorically powerful finale this couple merits a child only when the husband is shaken out of his goal-oriented approach by Rabi Shimon Bar Yochai’s validation of the wife’s perspective. Paradoxically it is when the couple begins to understand the purity of love that has no ulterior motive that their relationship bears fruit.
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