Interview with Shmuley Boteach

Marshall Weiss

The Dayton Jewish Observer

Author and Shalom In The Home host Rabbi Shmuley Boteach opens
10th Annual Dayton Jewish Book Fair

Since Shmuley first appeared on the Jewish scene in 1988, he’s garnered his share of controversy. The late Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, handpicked Shmuley as his emissary to England’s Oxford University. The Chabad movement wasn’t pleased when Shmuley began attracting a large number of non-Jewish participants and speakers at his events —among the most successful at Oxford.

The prolific author of books about sexuality, dating and parenting from a Jewish perspective — who has since returned to his modern Orthodox roots — has also raised eyebrows for his public debates with pornographer Larry Flynt and Jewish Playboy centerfold Lindsey Vuolo, and for his friendship with Michael Jackson, which he ultimately broke off.

These days, however, Shmuley has struck a chord with America’s television viewers, who flock to watch his reality show, Shalom in the Home, on TLC, which now enters its second season.

Did you gain your family counseling experience from your work as a rabbi?
Much of it yes, but it really started earlier. I tell people, without really exaggerating, that I was the marriage counselor at the age of 6. My parents had great marital difficulty and I was the youngest. Whenever they would fight, my brothers and sisters would shove me into the room in the hope that my presence, this little vulnerable kid, would stop my parents from arguing. They divorced when I was 8.

There are two ways a child of divorce can react to it, to parents’ arguing. First is just to accept it, that’s the way it is — and almost pray that they were divorced, because everyone’s better off. The other way is to ponder: what are the secrets that keep a man and a woman together under the same roof for the duration of their lives, and I chose the latter path.

What is the biggest obstacle to family happiness?
I think these days, the biggest obstacle from which everything else derives is simply that people don’t prioritize the best.

Our sense of fulfillment comes from things outside the family. We’re not putting the effort in that could really make a difference. And everything follows from there.

Were parents more effective in previous generations or is this a myth?
Well, we are aware of some of the factors that allowed people to remain married in previous generations, not all of which were positive: it was socially unacceptable to divorce, divorce was also expensive and they didn’t have the money.

But aside from those negative reasons, I do believe that marriages were much stronger in the past. I don’t think it’s something nostalgic. I think there are a number of reasons.

Firstly, we didn’t have the same kind of distractions that we have today. I mean, a husband and wife have a television in their bedroom these days — in nearly all American households.
What does that mean? It means you almost never speak, even in the most intimate area of the home. There are still all these intrusions.

Also, I think that people defined their success moralistically in earlier generations, such that failing with their kids — their kid ended up on drugs, or if you had five kids, they all ended up divorcing like Franklin Roosevelt(‘s children) — then yes, you were a great man because you were president of the United States, but you were a personal failure. You failed to give your children the skills by which to relate to others longterm.

I think today, we are hellbent on defining success by one criterion only: that is, how much money can you make? How much power did you assemble? And that’s tragic. I am a great believer in a much more holistic definition of success.

How do you suggest parents get back on the right path?
By inspiring people to find their inner hero. Heroism in the world is defined as the ability of a human being to exert control over their environment. And heroism in Judaism is defined as the ability of a human being to exert control over their own self.

So a man who is faithful to his wife is a hero. The man who prioritizes his children, who does homework with his kids and reads them bedtime stories — even though that will never get him a promotion at work, even though that will never win him the esteem of his colleagues — that man is a hero.

It’s by inspiring people to become heroic and by giving them an honest and authentic definition of what heroism entails.

I don’t want to be ordinary in my life. I want to be special. So does everybody else. But people define specialness by public recognition. And I now understand that being special was defined principally by private virtue.

What challenges do you and your wife face within your own family?
I’m raising eight children. It’s a full-time job. Some of them are better behaved, some of them are not as well- behaved. My beautiful, cute little 5-year-old, the sweetest boy in the whole world, is an incredible challenge —vivacious, very precocious — so I do give him more time.

I try to make sure I’m home — not every night, but most nights, even when I’m filming — to run home and put him to bed personally, tell him a bedtime story, because I know he needs that good interaction with me, as do the other kids, but him especially.

I am challenged like every husband in the world to keep my marriage fresh and exciting. I am blessed with a very loving wife who is a great helpmate to me in everything I do in my life.
And I want to be worthy of her. I never want to cause her pain. I only want to bring her joy. And reminding myself what a beautiful blessing she is in my life is very important, because so often, we husbands take for granted what we have on the home front.

Another challenge is I have three teenage daughters and a teenage son. Understanding their transition in the teenage years and not accepting that teenagers have to be indulged or spoiled or rebellious (is a challenge), but also not going so far as to believe that when they are teenagers it’s just like they are 8 or 9, that there are differences. That’s a challenge. And there are many more.

My principal desire in life, honestly, is not to mess up with my children. To really raise good kids. To love my children and make them feel valuable at all times. I think my wife and I share that passion.

The enlightened husband loves his wife even more than he loves his children. Because without his love for her, there would be no children. And nevertheless, he knows his children are more vulnerable than his spouse.

And so my great desire in which my wife joins: let us together passionately raise secure and confident kids who never have to question whether they were loved in life.

I want my kids to know that no matter where I went, no matter what I did, I loved them and showed it, and I didn’t use some excuse: “I was here, I was there, I was busy.” That I always came home, that I always prioritized them. If I succeed at that, I will have undone much of the scarring that is within me.

Do you believe it’s harder for men to be there for the kids?
Yes I do. There is a maternal instinct, there’s no doubt about it. I actually believe in men becoming more feminine. I believe in the feminization of the world. I await a time when the world will become more nurturing, more domesticated.

And I think women teach their husbands those qualities. And that’s why King Solomon said, “When a man finds a wife he finds goodness.” It’s almost as if he found his own personal goodness. He discovers all of his potential goodness.

We live in an age of loveless and often platonic marriages and I think for a lot of parents, their love comes intrinsically from their children, from whom they receive unconditional love. They’re nursing so much pain in their marriages, that they make the mistake of prioritizing their kids over their marriages, which is always inevitable.
In a healthy marriage, your spouse comes first. In an unhealthy marriage, the children come first.

What will you talk about in Dayton?
I would like to speak about why Shalom in the Home has made an impact nationally, thank God, how Judaism and Jewish values are one of the ways we’ll heal and strengthen the American family — meaning Jewish values, even for non-Jews.

An evening with Shalom In The Home host Rabbi Shmuley Boteach: opening event of the 10th Annual Dayton Jewish Book Fair, Sunday, Nov. 5, 7:30 p.m. at the Boonshoft CJCE, 525 Versailles Dr., Centerville. $18 per person. Tickets are available at the door. For more information, e-mail Information@jfgd.net.

© 2006 The Dayton Jewish Observer