In today's Western society, the family and its moral underpinnings are in a state of crisis. In the United States about one-half of all marriages end in divorce and in Sweden half of all live births are outside marriage. The family being the incubator of the maturing individual, the crisis is bound to shake the very foundation of society, and alarming tremors are already evident in the form of rampant juvenile deliquency, drug abuse, random violence, etc. The traditional Jewish family has a divorce rate about one tenth that of the population as a whole. Long distinguished by its stability, its success seems to be due to the nurturing of altruism and to a wise assignment of a well-defined role to sex, molding it into the strong bond it is in these families. These elelements, together with a judicious division safeguarding the rights of each while dividing the responsibilities more or less equitably, represent an ideal synthesis of the contending needs of masculinity and femininity, of body and spirit. Here the reader will find a surprisingly explicit description of guidelines given by Torah sages through the ages, including intimate details.
by Leo Levi