CLOSE-UP
Making Marriages
RICHARD PEARL
Staff Writer
S
ometimes, Risha
Kaufman says, the
naches she gets
from matchmaking
is bittersweet.
"A few years ago," she
recalled, "a boy came to
town from New York to see a
girl. He was meeting her
with the intent they would
become man and wife.
"He was a university
graduate and from a nice
. ,i.4,- ir ,
,',. 4; '6
- 14, 9, 44 k, „
6 * 6 i '..
.„,,,,,,, a4 *sic , Z
‘..i . ..t , • eal 40 4; ,
, a ,,.
,
':. .....,
.•,, , io v 0 47
0
0 ,. 0 Alio <oit A
• «,
0 0 , ° tt,
..e, 1"
, I. 4 %1: VI N ,
;,. • ''' 4* "lb Vo „4 0 RC
ik1 41><SN, `,. A
• 0
'.7
A . w. ' 49 '% s 7 1 4 7,,
11. 4,
t%. ‘'.
''''
0
As
Vo.Q .14 4
n, {.::,• ft 7 1, 4
,* 4 t. .„ .. 4
9 0 4 4'4 e, •
4
'**'
gib
ti • 4a 4
1 - 1 q ZS
t \.. $ 0
-
4 ,*=• Z.1
g u
''.
.r. ''.,‘, „
,
All, .,: 0 -24
,
0 '''
4
* `*4 9,.. €4? ,4% 4: 15 5 1‘ 1 040
r'' 4
2 g
. • 0 ...- c' 01 0 0 %
, \ ' , -,
"1
„"It5,0 g 0 0
•
4,i, ..1 R.
'•: , 1
_
,,.'.
0 9 - * ,_
..„' 4
. ..", 4 :
.A- v 0 ' . e 9
..... . - 9 '. 0 -: 9 clo‘0 ,-.,,,e
te.i. .is 4 1
* .4;
4 + 0 r.
0
"
4 4.
is '' 41
,
<is ,,, ,
%141 , t ' °2
,..-1,,,
Co
,
r ,.•
fl
*%, ,
•
a,
t
.
4.0 - '''
*
'
. 4, ... a ft
". it
'ft
lie
■ a".
,
.., D. 00 0 " Z. a
.vote 0 9e***".'
15 6 a.' Cli
GD
Ada Moseson now uses
a computer to match
couples.
28
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1990
family, but the shidduch
didn't work. I told him when
he gets back to New York to
call my sister. Meanwhile, I
told my sister he was a good
prospect; she should have
somebody for him. And like
that — one, two, three — she
made a shidduch.
"Then his mother calls me
up to tell me, 'He had to
come all the way by you to
find a girl in New York!' "
The backhanded com-
pliments — mixed in with
the naches and the long-
distance telephone bills —
are all a part of the life for
Mrs. Kaufman and the some
20 others who occupy a
significant niche in Detroit's
Orthodox Jewish commun-
ity: that of the shadchanim,
matchmakers.
These women often run up
long-distance bills of $200-
300 each month as they
make calls to, and take calls
from, marriage prospects,
their parents and grand-
parents day and night,
within the United States
and without, in an attempt
to carry on the centuries-old
task of making a shidduch
— a match between eligible
Jews.
Besides taking care of
their own families and in
some cases running a busi-
ness outside the home, they
spend hours hearing what
dozens of young and
sometimes not-so-young
unmarried Jews, including
widows/widowers and
divorced people, want in a
mate. Then they spend more
hours making calls and
visits in the hope of finding
that person.
They will even, on occa-
sion, host a prospective
bridegroom who comes from
out of town seeking a
shidduch.
In the Middle Ages, the
work of shadchanim was the
chief source of income for
many rabbis. Today, there
are nationwide Jewish mat-
chmaking services as well as
individual professional mat-
chmakers with fee schedules
— sometimes as much as
$10,000 in the case of the
latter, says shadchen Feige
Singerman of Southfield.
To be sure, "There is a par-
ticular obligation to show
shid-
appreciation for
duchim," says Rabbi
Elimelech Goldberg of
Young Israel of Southfield.
However, just what form the
appreciation takes is deter-
mined by custom and prac-
tice, he adds. "To some, it is
a profound 'Thank you.' "
Many Detroit women
make shidduchim volunta-
rily — they do not ask fees.
Some do accept gifts — in
one case, it was a microwave
oven — or gratuities when a
match is made. In other
cases, families offer to pay
for the shadchen's long-
distance calls. Still other
matchmakers refuse any
gifts or payments.
Making shidduchim is a
serious business which the
Detroiters, like centuries of
shadchanim before them,
consider a pious task desired
by God. Besides perhaps
helping to fulfill the ancient
prophecy that the Jewish
people will "be fruitful and
multiply," these shad-
chanim see it as a means of
bringing happiness and con-
tentment to others and, at
the same time, combating
the growing rate of inter-
marriage.
"It's one of the greatest
mitzvahs around," says
Rabbi Chaim Bergstein of
Bais Chabad of Farmington
Hills. "There is an obliga-
tion," he says, to guide those
of marriageable age who are
"capable of dealing with
family physically, emo-
tionally and financially"
toward marriage.
"It's not a hobby," says
Ada Moseson of Oak Park,
who also runs her own jewel-
ry business, Regency Ear-
port of Southfield. "It's too
important. To bring two
Jewish people together is a
benefit for klal Yisrael — all
the Jewish people — because
it strengthens and promotes
Jewish life by creating more
Jewish families and thus
spreads Jewish learning to
more generations."
Because of the massive
amount of information that
is the basis of matchmaking,
many shadchanim see the
need for computerization.
Mrs. Moseson, who gets
matchmaking calls at work
as well as at home, is using a
computer at home to store,
on behalf of herself and
several other area shad-
chanim, such data as the in-
dividual preferences,
physical characteristics like
height and weight, edu-
cation, family background,
extent of religious obser-
vance, lifetime goals and ob-
jectives and personal refer-