“A Woman Is Acquired in Three Ways”
The opening mishnah of tractate Kiddushin states:1 “A woman is acquired in one of three ways: through money, through a document, through marital relations.”2
The words of our Sages are wondrously precise in all details. Here as well, the fact that one can marry a woman in one of these ways is not merely because these are the three manners of acquiring a wife, but because there is an inner connection between these three manners of acquisition and the very essence of marriage.
In other words, the act of kiddushin and marriage — establishing a bond between husband and wife — is composed of three distinct elements, and these correspond to the three components of the bond that is established between husband and wife. The three above-mentioned forms of acquisition are a faithful and accurate expression of these three types of attachments.
Money — Body
1) Money is a physical entity through which one acquires physical matters in order to satisfy his physical needs. Kiddushin by means of money thus expresses the idea of the physical and bodily connection that is formed between husband and wife through marriage.
In addition, the word for money in Hebrew is kessef, which also translates as longing, yearning and desire, alluding to the love between husband and wife. Since money is physical, it alludes to the physical connection of their bodies.3
Document — Soul
2) Document. According to Jewish law, a document need not have monetary value as is stated: “If he marries her via a document, even though the document is worth less than a perutah, the kiddushin is entirely valid.”4
Thus the pleasure derived by the wife from the kiddushin that is accomplished through a document is not from the actual document (for its value is less than a perutah). Rather, since she becomes married through this document, she derives pleasure from the very fact that she is now married. This is in keeping with the saying of our Sages:5 “Better to dwell as a couple [in marriage] than to dwell alone.” In other words, the woman derives pleasure from the fact that from now on, she will not live a lonely life as a solitary individual but is now together with her husband.
This form of pleasure is neither physical nor material; it cannot be sensed by the sense of touch (as can be the physical money of kiddushin). Rather, it is a spiritual form of pleasure — pleasure of the soul.
Thus kiddushin through a document expresses the spiritual and soulful connection that is established between husband and wife.
[Additionally, the connection between kiddushin through a document and the spiritual and soulful connection between husband and wife is even more pronounced according to Jewish mysticism, where it is explained that a document (i.e., the shtar kiddushin) written on parchment serves as an allusion to our holy Torah which is also written on parchment.]
Marital Relations — Body and Soul
3) “Marital Relations.” “He shall cleave to his wife and they shall become one flesh,”6 refers to both the physical as well as the spiritual connection between husband and wife. Indeed, concealed within the physical bond is an inner soul connection, for as explained later in the chapter “Be Fruitful and Multiply,” pregnancy and childbirth (which are the natural consequence of marital relations) are a result of the soul’s creative power as well, as the infinite power revealed through regeneration relates to the infinite power of the holy soul.
The meaning of kiddushin through marital relations is thus the combined body and soul connection of husband and wife.
Moreover, the connection that is accomplished through marital relations also points to the intimate connection of body and soul: Just as the physical act of intimacy is so connected to its spiritual dimension that in essence they cannot be separated, so too are the body and soul so unified that there is no separation between them.
As explained at length in the section entitled “Eirusin — Betrothal” below, there are advantages to the soul connection of husband and wife and there are advantages to the physical connection of husband and wife.
The advantage of the soul connection is that through that connection, husband and wife truly become one entity and their connection is total. This is not so with regard to their physical connection; they will always remain two distinct entities.
The advantage of the physical connection is that it is much more tangible and perceptible to a human being, while the connection on the spiritual level may be concealed and not felt at all.
The optimal state is a combination of the two: to be truly as one (the spiritual connection), while experiencing an actual physical realization of that unity (the physical connection). This wondrous unity is expressed in “marital relations,” in which the same act achieves both a spiritual and physical connection and unity.
We thus see that the three manners of kiddushin express the three manners of connection between husband and wife:
“Money” — the physical connection; “document” — the spiritual connection; “marital relations” — the connection — and moreover the simultaneous connection — of both body and soul.