This week’s parsha is known as the parsha of shidduchim. The Gemara in Pesochim (49a) tells us: “One must sell all his belongings in order that he is able to marry the daughter of a talmid chocham, because if he dies or goes into exile, he will still be certain that his children will be talmiday chachomim. He shouldn’t marry the daughter of an am ha’aretz because if he dies or goes into exile his children will end up as amay ha’aretz.” The above Gemara is very difficult: Why should one be worried about dying or being exiled when his children are so young, and that the chinuch of the children will be left to the mother? People dying young and going into exile is not so common, and normally people don’t worry so much about these things, certainly not someone who is a ba’al bitochan?
Moreover, where do we find that for such an unlikely thing, one must sell all his belongings? Moreover, even if one has money, normally one only has to spend up to a fifth of his money for a mitzvah, so how come here one has to spend everything for such a small unlikely event?
R’ Avraham Erlanger (Birchas Avraham, Chumash) answers:והדברים זועקים שלמען בניית משפחה של תלמידי חכמים אין שום שיעור כי ראוי לאדם לוותר על כל ממונו למען המעלה של בנים ת״ח ומניעת בנים עמי הארץ עד כדי חששות רחוקים כי הם חיינו ואורך ימינו ובזה אין לבטוח אלא להשתדל ולחוש בגדר אשרי אדם מפחד תמיד – “These words call out to us, that when building a family of talmiday chachomim, there is no limit as to how much one should spend on his children. In order to avoid a child becoming amay ha’aretz one has to be worried for the most unlikely things, as this is what life and the length of our days is all about. When it comes to such thing, we can’t have bitochan, we have to put in the upmost effort and be worried about everything.”
