PETER S. KNOBEL

She points out that Philip Birnbaum translates the phrase v’hitkin mimenu binyan adai ad as“who hast created man in Thy image and didst forever form woman out of his frame to be beside him.”* Her elaborate discussion makes clear that the theological argument has halakhic implications. Women as equal partners are not secondary creations. They are part of the original male-female Adam and not the rib or the tail of Adam.

It is the Sheva Berachot that express the essence of marriage, and it to this text that we must look if we are to understand marriage. As Adler says, it is these blessings that make it“respec­table” and reframe kiddushin as acquisition as an archetype of re­demptive union.”*® God is creator , and humankind shares the divine image with God , and, like Him, they are capable of creation. The couple’s love participates in the perfection of the Garden of Eden and the first marriage of Adam and Eve, whose mesadder kiddushin was God ; and its joy anticipates the messianic fulfillment promised by the prophets. Its symbols are a cup of blessing and the chuppah, the marital chamber that symbolizes the intimacy they will share and the sanctuary they will build. For the home is the replacement for the sanctuary. It is mikdash meat, the Temple writ small.

In Reform Judaism the symbolic act of kinyan(acquisition) has become a mutual exchange rather than a unilateral exchange. Such an exchange in the traditional halakhah invalidates the trans­action. Birkat Erusin(the betrothal blessing) has either been eliminated or severely truncated because there is no longer the as­sumption of virginity before marriage. Specific reference to the arayot(forbidden sexual relationships) is eliminated in every pro­gressive version of the current wedding ceremony.”

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