The Gemara says (Yoma 2A) that the word “baiso” (his house) refers to his wife.
Sefer M’Zekeinim Esbonen (Chelek 1, page 95) relates the following incredible story in the name of Rav Mordechai Chaim of Slonim zy”a:
There was a man who was a chasid of “the Gutter Yid”, Rav Yosef Boruch of Neistadt zy”a (the son of the Me’or Vashemesh zy”a). This man lived in the Gutter Yid’s city for many years before eventually moving to another city, here he built a big house for his family.
One day, the man’s wife got sick but he couldn’t go to the Rebbe for a bracha because he needed to remain by her bedside. Instead, he asked his son-in-law to go to the Rebbe. However, the son-in-law was not a chasid of the Gutter Yid and he didn’t want to go. He asked his friends what he should do and they told him that he is obligated to listen to his father-in-law and, in any case, it just might help.
He traveled to the Rebbe and arrived on a Friday. He went into the Rebbe’s house and saw a man without a jacket on telling the servant to do certain tasks for Shabbos. He thought that this must the Rebbe’s gabbai and he asked him if he could go in to see the Rebbe. The man replied, “Here no one needs to ask. You can always go in to see the Rebbe.”
He realized that this man was the Rebbe himself, and he was surprised by how he looked.
During the tish, the Rebbe ate together with his chassidim and then went into his room. He didn’t display any signs of greatness or tzidkus and the son-in-law thought: How could this man be a tzadik? This caused him a lot of anguish but he went to the Rebbe with his kvittel, with his mother-in-law’s name on it, on Motzoei Shabbos.
The Rebbe told him, “The Mishnah says that a man’s house is his wife. Why can’t the opposite be true? Why can’t a man’s wife be his house?”
The young man didn’t understand what the Rebbe was talking about.
When he got back to his father-in-law’s house, he saw a large crowd gathered around and he thought that his mother-in-law must have died. However, when he entered the house, he saw her sitting up and speaking to people. It looked like she was completely cured. When he asked what was going on, he was told that an amazing thing had occurred. One of the walls of the house had collapsed, despite the fact that it was a very strong wall. As soon as the wall fell down, his mother-in-law started feeling better. All of the people who were gathered there had come to see the amazing occurrence.
He now understood the Rebbe’s words. A man’s wife is his house, and in exchange for having his house fall down, the man’s wife was saved.
