Question:
I understand the reason I will be breaking a glass under my foot at the end of the wedding ceremony is to commemorate the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem some 2,000 years ago. This indeed was a significant event in Jewish history, but it doesn't seem to have any personal relevance to me. What does a destroyed building have to do with my wedding?


Answer:
The destruction of the Temple has extreme personal relevance. It happened to you. The shattering of the glass commemorates not only the fall of Jerusalem, but also a cataclysmic shattering that happened to your very own temple, your soul.

The destruction of the Temple has extreme personal relevance.



Before you were born, you and your soulmate were one - a single soul. Then, as your time to enter this world approached, G-d shattered that single soul into two parts, one male and one female. These two half-souls were then born into the world to try and find each other and reunite.


At the time, the split seemed tragic. What was once a peaceful unit had become fragmented and incomplete. Why break something just so it should be fixed? If you were meant to be together, why didn't G-d leave you together?


Only when standing under the chuppah do you find the answer to this question. At the wedding, these two halves are becoming whole, reuniting, never to part again. And you can look back at the painful experience of being separated and actually celebrate it. For now you realise that the separation brought you closer. Only by being torn apart, living lives away from each other, were you able to develop as individuals, mature and grow, and then come together in a true relationship, a deeper oneness than you had before, because it is created by your choice.



Had you never been separated, you would never appreciate what it means to be together, because it wasn't earned. At the wedding, you realise that your soul was only split in order to reunite and become one on a higher and deeper level than before.


And so, we break a glass under the chuppah, and we immediately say "Mazel Tov," because now, in retrospect, even the splitting of the souls is reason to be joyous, for it is what gave your connection depth and real meaning. Just as one day soon, when the Temple in Jerusalem is rebuilt, we will no longer mourn the destruction, but our souls will reunite with G-d, our Soulmate, in a true relationship that we built ourselves - and we will celebrate.