Jewish Sages on Married Life
Married life is good and joyful when spouses feel such unity with one another that they become, as it were, one body, as our sages put it: “A wife and husband are one body.”
This teaching should be followed literally. An example can be found in the married life of Rav Aryeh Levin[1], of righteous and blessed memory. Accompanying his ailing wife to the doctor, the rabbi explained the reason for their visit: “My wife’s leg is hurting us.”
Once, one of the rabbi’s students asked him for advice before his wedding: how should he treat his wife? Rav Aryeh was surprised by the very question: “What are you talking about? You and she are a single whole. So treat her as you treat yourself”[2].
[1] He was born in Poland in 1885. For many years, he served as the spiritual director of the Etz Chaim Yeshiva in Jerusalem. He died in 1969.
[2] Simcha Raz. “A Tzaddik in Our Time,” ch. 11.