Q:
My friend told me that his wife left him. He wants to know what he should do in order to win her back. Can the Rav offer any advice?
A:
That’s a tall order. The first thing is שימו לבבכם על דרכיכם – Put your thoughts on your ways. Think, what happened? Why did she leave you? A woman doesn’t leave her husband for nothing. Find out what you did. So he says, “Oh, I made a mistake.” A mistake?! So the question is, how can she know that you won’t continue making mistakes like that?
That’s number one. How can she know you won’t make a “mistake” again?
And the truth is, how do you know that you won’t continue making such mistakes? So my suggestion is that you go to a chochom, a wise man, and plan a strategy, because it’s not going to be the same for everybody. Now, a chochom doesn’t mean me. Don’t come to me! But you’ll have to look for a chochom and plan a strategy, because not everybody is the same. You need help coming up with a strategy.
In some cases, you can appeal to her parents. But sometimes you can antagonize her parents too much, to the point that they’re happy to get rid of you. I once gave a man advice that he should give his wife the title to the house. The house should be in her name only. That brought her back. Because now she’s safe. She can kick you out of the house if she wants.
So it depends on the strategy that’s needed for your specific situation, and it’s not easy to say one eitzah, one piece of advice for everybody.
But this one thing, what I said in the beginning, is certainly true: You must do שימו לבבכם על דרכיכם. You’re going to have to figure out what you’re doing wrong. Because you are doing something wrong. There’s something wrong with you, and you have to see what you can do in order that from now on it should never be repeated. Because what have you accomplished if you bring her back and then she goes out of the house again?!
TAPE # 812 (January 1991)
