Israel Today

Israel Today Mazal Tov, You’re Invited to a Wedding

By Rafi Sackville

My wife Keren and I met on a wintry February evening in 1985. Eight weeks later, we were married in Jerusalem. Over the course of those eight weeks, we arranged a shul for the chuppah, a caterer, and a place to live; we helped co-ordinate our families arrival from New York and Melbourne, rented a wedding dress and all the accoutrements that come with planning a wedding, and we purchased a tie for me. My late father initially wanted us to invite acquaintances of his, people we didn’t know. We were insistent; we wanted nothing fancy. We wanted a small crowd. We’d make the wedding meal in a friend’s home.

Which is precisely what we did. In total, there were approximately 40 people at our wedding. Since then, we’ve made bar mitzvahs and a wedding all with the same approach in mind.

Recently, we attended a friend’s son’s wedding in Haifa. It was beautiful. The encroaching winter remained at bay while we partied outdoors under a mid-November sky. There was a smorgasbord serving the typical range of pre-supper delights: sushi, chicken and turkey, a carving station. The tables in the elegantly decorated hall that seated over 300 guests were adorned with delicate flower arrangements that looked as if they’d teeter over with the slightest movement of cutlery.

I looked around and wondered about the excess. For one, I’ve never understood smorgasbords. People gorge themselves on so much food there’s never much room left for the main courses. I was thinking this because, knowing our friends as I do, I understood how the expense of such an occasion would have severely stretched their limited financial resources.

Considering that an average wedding in Israel can cost hundreds of thousands of shekels, it is surprising just how many families go out on a limb to marry off their children. That’s a lot of money when you consider the average earner brings home less than that annually. So, how do people do it?

For one, there is an accepted Israeli practice whereby guests write checks covering the cost of their plate. This might run from 400-600 shekels and rising for each plate. This is what Keren and I did. We deposited a large check at the entrance to the hall.

The thought nagged at me, though. Our friends are simple people who live in the footsteps of the Golan Heights. The cost of the wedding was, for all intents and purposes, out of their league. Yes, there was the bride’s family, who would foot half of the bill, but even so, the cost of the five-hour event might have been mitigated had our friends decided to limit their list of invitees to family. I, for one, would have understood if my friend had not invited us.

Our neighbors from across the way will soon be marrying off their son. She has eleven siblings. She told me that before they could even start making a list of friends she wanted at the wedding, there were at least 450 family members she was obliged to invite. Take that in for a moment – her siblings, their children, their children’s children. That’s a lot of people.

Now consider the cost to a family that receives an average five wedding invitations in the course of a given year. The financial newspaper “Globes” estimated that more than a third of Israelis will spend between 1,000-3,000 shekels annually for the pleasure of their invitations. For many, that is an economic burden they’d prefer not to carry. That is why some people prefer attending celebrations without their spouses.

Some people refuse invitations but will turn up for the chuppah. Yet it is difficult to turn down a wedding invitation. It’s just not what people do. As one article on the subject succinctly put it, “Stop at the bank on the way to the wedding.”

Gifts, the like of which we used to give when I was a boy, are things of the past. Oftentimes, the degree of familial closeness will determine the size of gifts. Family members tend to give more. So, how much should one fork out before they’ve hit the smorgasbord?

I turned to KamaKesef (how much money), a website calculator that offers suggestions as to how much money one should give at any given celebration. I was shocked. Had I attended the wedding alone, I should have given 400 shekels. Having attended with Keren, I should have given 700. Were I a pensioner, that amount drops by only 50 shekels. Not having been at many weddings over the last few years has cast me as a guest who isn’t exactly in the loop. Multiply that 700 by five, and one would need to spend upwards of $1,000 a year at celebrations.

Are there ways to limit costs? Some prefer to forego the smorgasbord and flower arrangements; others to have recorded, rather than live music. Some will hire fewer staff or borrow a wedding dress. Some will have a large list of invitees but only invite family to the meal.

I mention all this because as we settle in to 2023 the economic reality we were once used to has become an anachronism. The cost of living has sharply increased in Israel. Our family’s weekly shopping list has changed little by way of content over the last two years. What has dramatically shifted skywards is the cost of our purchases. What used to cost us a hundred American dollars is now edging closer to over 50% more. The cost of everything, let alone smachot (celebrations), has risen and shows little sign of becoming more manageable for the simple man-on-thestreet.

Back in April 1985, I felt pride in having limited the total cost of our wedding to approximately $1,000. I told my father so. He gave me a bemused look and placed his hand on my shoulder.

“Yes, you’ve done well, but you didn’t take into account the expense of flying the family out from Australia,” he gently reminded me.

It’s mindboggling. The actual cost of our wedding would cover four and a half weddings we’d attend as guests in an average year.

Mazal tov.

Rafi Sackville, formerly of Cedarhurst, teaches in Ort Maalot in Western Galil.