What makes a relationship “sacred?” In what ways can you enhance the holiness of your relationship?

Understanding the Jewish conception of marriage, Kiddushin, was an important aspect of my Jewish journey and required me to answer some significant questions. How is my relationship made sacred? How do I make it holy? Even beginning to address such questions was difficult: for some reason, I felt as if I was required to be in a “sacred” place with my spouse it order to begin the process of considering such things, which brought me around in a circle, of course, trying to determine what “sacred” actually looks like.

In searching for the definition of sacred, the following definitions resonated with me: entitled to reverence, respect; devoted to one service or use; highly-valued. As Kiddushin is also referred to as a ritual of sanctification, I sought the definition of that term, and found the following: to set-apart, to make holy; to give sanction to, as with an oath or vow; to entitle to reverence.

To better understand Jewish marriage and family life, I conducted some research into the halachic laws of family purity, taharat mishpachah, which required the discovery and understanding of a whole new vocabulary and set of rules (indeed, I finally had to refer to a glossary of halachic terms to understand them all). The most relevant, of course, was the concept of niddah, the laws of separation.

I came across a wonderful article by Merissa Nathan Gerson in Tablet magazine that explained these concepts more fully and certainly better than I ever could. I have reproduced it, in part, below:

On a visit to an apiary I didn’t expect to find a deeper understanding of Judaism there, but in the bees I discovered a clarification and reinvigoration of the dry and complex Jewish sexual laws I had been studying for years. I saw the laws of niddah, the laws around sexual abstinence, and a call, no longer heard collectively, to infuse God and the divine into sexual engagement.

It is not a coincidence that we talk about “the birds and the bees” in reference to sex and mating. Religious groups for centuries have looked to the bees, in particular, to learn about channeling and bridling desire. The beekeeper took me inside the hive and told me about the bees’ specific and organized sexual system that makes honey possible. Drones mate with the queen before splitting in half and dying, but all other honeybees are non-reproductive and work their whole lives tending to the larvae, collecting pollen, protecting the queen, or performing any number of other highly specific jobs. Sexual energy that might otherwise be used for mating is proactively engaged in the production of honey and the maintenance of a well-ordered and tight-knit bee universe.

I watched the bees as they emitted a loud and almost palpable hum together. Honey oozed from the cells of their man-made hives. I realized it was the abstinence that created the flow of things in this hive. In this organized and tempered sexual order, the non-mating bee’s redirected sexual energy reorganizes itself around highly efficient production within the hive itself. Bees thrive because they have an ordered sexual world.

My mind went straight to the laws of niddah and mikveh, still very much alive in Orthodox Jewish practice, although essentially abandoned by other modern permutations of Judaism. Niddah are the laws that dictate sexual engagement around the monthly menstrual cycle; when a woman has her period and for one week after, the couple is to abstain from sex and touching. Mikveh is the ritual cleansing that coincides with the timing of the laws of niddah.

For Jewish couples that observe the laws of niddah, half the month is then reorganized, redirecting sexual energy into the community, into the work of protecting the “queen”—the sanctity of the Sabbath. During the periods of abstinence, this energy is used to perform acts of tikkun olam, study Torah, or generally apply oneself toward the greater good of the Jewish collective. While bees produce honey, I like to think of Jewish laws around sex as yielding something, too: a sweet substance that comes in the form of tzekadah, of building community, and making the world brighter through devotional practice.

The concept of kavanah is the cornerstone of Jewish sexual law: Sex is to be something infused with the divine, something that works toward a higher order and in a collective way. When sexual activity desists, for those delineated two weeks a month, the energy is redirected toward the tafkid, the specific work that each individual is called to do. In this way, in the combination of abstinence and specific direction of sexual energy, so-called spiritual sparks are raised. This Jewish notion is what I saw in the honeybees, acted out through a collective order of abstinence and sexual engagement, cautiously arranged jobs, and work toward a common good.

Bees, like adherents to traditional Jewish law, are organized by a given tafkid, a purpose unique to their one body and life. There are the larvae, the feeders, the pollen-collectors, the maters, the gatherers, the guards, the attackers. Where Judaism and its many laws are organized to protect the Sabbath and raise the sparks of the divine, the highly specific organization of the honeybee colony centers around protecting the queen and maintaining continuous production.

This honey, these bees, this sexual metaphor for Jewish life and law is the very thing we take into our bodies in celebration of the Jewish New Year. Honey becomes the aphrodisiac and also the emblem of a species designed around the control of sex and the redirection of otherwise sexual energy toward a collective goal. In eating honey at the cusp of winter, we are actually putting flowers and bees inside our bodies, quite literally ingesting summer into ourselves to begin the darkest time of the year. But more important, ingesting honey becomes an emblem of using sex and intimacy in a cautious and directed way. It is about tempered sweetness, about intention behind sexual action, in or out of marriage—queer, straight, or in-between—and about the positive use of that same energy when not engaged in sexual activity.

Other key concepts I came upon during my study focused on the role of sex in the Jewish marriage. As I came to learn, sex is a central feature of relationships in Judaism:

– In Judaism, the primary purpose of sex is to reinforce the loving marital bond between husband and wife. The first and foremost purpose of marriage is companionship, and sexual relations play an important role. Procreation is also a reason for sex, but it is not the only reason. Sex between husband and wife is permitted (even recommended) at times when conception is impossible, such as when the woman is pregnant, after menopause, or when the woman is using a permissible form of contraception.

– Sex should only be experienced in a time of joy. Sex for selfish personal satisfaction, without regard for the partner’s pleasure, is wrong and evil. A man may never force his wife to have sex. A couple may not have sexual relations while drunk or quarreling. Sex may never be used as a weapon against a spouse, either by depriving the spouse of sex or by compelling it. It is a serious offense to use sex (or lack thereof) to punish or manipulate a spouse.

– Sex is a celebration of couple hood, not an effort to procreate. Judaism is a religion that not only allows sex for pleasure, but sees sex as the holiest of all acts because it sews people together as one flesh and one soul. Sexual desire is not evil, just as hunger and thirst, it must be satisfied in the proper manner at the proper time.

– In the Torah, the word used for sex between husband and wife comes from the root Yod-Dalet-Ayin, meaning “to know,” which vividly illustrates that proper Jewish sexuality involves both the heart and mind, not merely the body.

How wonderful to find that sex in honoured in such a significant way in a Jewish marriage. The question still remained, though, in what ways could I make my own relationship more sacred, sexually and otherwise?

Prioritising a marriage is one key way to make it sacred: to set it apart from other relationships and commitments. To reserve time to spend with my spouse when we can listen to each other, share our thoughts and feelings, and express our love for each other. To seek moments that will bring us closer and seize opportunities to show love for each other, even if it means leaving other priorities aside.

Establishing routines in a marriage, while not thought of as particularly sexy, is one way to set it apart from other aspects of life. Just as Shabbat is a day apart, so too should time be dedicated to each other on a predictable, regular basis to maintain closeness between a couple. This includes sex.

Communication obviously supports a relationship, but communication that supports sacredness and sanctity must be respectful, honest, and vulnerable. While talking with and seeking the support of friends and family matters a great deal in anyone’s life, the deepest, most hidden parts of ourselves should be revealed to our spouse.

Forgiveness makes a relationship holy – not just forgiveness of the other, but forgiveness of ourselves and our own imperfections. Remembering that our often unrealistic expectations of ourselves, the judgment we bring to our own lives, ultimately trickles down to the way we treat our partners and our expectations of them. Releasing ourselves from judgment and forgiving ourselves makes us better partners.

I have work to do to make my relationship sacred and holy. Thankfully, I think this is a process as opposed to an end-goal. I was initially put-off with the legalistic minutiae of the rules associated with niddah. I came to realise, however, that the Jewish conception of marriage and the attention paid to its most intimate details demonstrated the centrality of this relationship to our lives. It is not second to God and Torah, but essential to them.

For more information on taharat mishpachah, visit the following website:  http://www.yoatzot.org

Nathan Gerson, Melissa. "What Honeybees Can Teach Us About the Value of Regulating Sex." Tablet Magazine. (Viewed on September 13, 2013). http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-life-and-religion/141597/honeybees-and-sexuality.