Intermarriage and assimilation

Question:

Unfortunately, I have a brother who has been married to a non-Jewish wife for about 30 years, and they have a daughter. Yet according to statistics, most intermarriages end in divorce.
There are many common misunderstandings among secular Jews, so my question is how to respond to these points correctly.
For example, they think that the Bible is full of examples of legal intermarriage, such as:

1. Abraham marries Keturah, who couldn’t have been a daughter of Israel, as Israel, Abraham’s grandson, was yet to be born.
2. Judah marries Shu’a, the Canaanite.
3. Joseph marries Asenath, daughter of the Egyptian priest Potiphera.
4. Moses marries Zipporah, daughter of the Midianite priest Jethro.
5. Boaz marries Ruth, a Moabite woman.
6. The kings of Judea married all sorts of foreign princesses.
7. King Solomon had 1000 non-Jewish wives.
8. Samson marries Delilah.
9. Ezra compelled the returning Jews to divorce their non-Jewish wives, implying it was permitted until then.
10. Also, only the 7 nations are actually listed in the Torah as prohibited from marrying them.
11. Apparently, one of the Rishonim, the SMaG, also admonished intermarried Jews to divorce their non-Jewish wives in Spain in the year 4996, as he mentions at the end of lav 112.
12. After the advent of the Haskalah and Reform, all kinds of lenient policies were instituted.

The general attitude of secular Jews is that any prohibition against intermarriage is just a restriction created by various Rabbis throughout history.

Unfortunately, my brother, who actually doesn't know any of this, won't listen to me. Perhaps I can find someone else who will, or perhaps I could help others by giving the right answers.s.

Answer:

Hello,

Unfortunately, the reason many secular Jews intermarry is not that they know enough of Tanach to think it is actually permitted. Rather, it is simply that they don’t see enough reason to specifically marry and have Jewish children. To them, their Jewishness doesn’t mean enough to want to continue it. Nevertheless, we have to know the answers to these questions, not in order to answer back to those looking for excuses, but for ourselves, so we can understand things properly.

The prohibition against intermarriage is written in Deuteronomy 7-2, “do not marry them, don’t give your daughter to their sons, and don’t take their daughters for your sons. Because they will cause you to stray from me…”. This is not referring specifically to the seven nations, because the Jews were commanded to kill them all, so there wouldn’t be anyone to marry. Rather, as it is written in the Talmud (Avoda Zara 36b), it refers to marrying any one of the nations. Also, Maimonides (Isurei Biah 12-1) and Shulchan Aruch (Even Haezer 16-1) write this clearly. Now let’s go through the example you mentioned.

1. The fact that Israel wasn’t yet born isn’t the point here, as you can say the same for Sara and Rivka, who married Avrohom and Yitzchok. Rather, it means marrying Jews who worship Hashem. Besides, before the Torah was given at Sinai, there was no prohibition yet. Nevertheless, Ketura was not a real wife with a marriage; rather, she was a concubine (see Genesis 25 1-6), which was permitted then. Additionally, she agreed to become a giores (Yalkut Yehuda pg. 73). The same applied to Osnas, Tzippora, Rachav, Rus, and Yeal.
2. Yehuda married the daughter of Shua, and the Midrash (Sechel Tov chap 38-2) says that she agreed to convert before they married. (Their marriage was real, not a concubine, ibid).
3. Asenath converted before they married; see 1 above.
4. The same applies to Tzippora. See 1 above.
5. It is well known that Rus was a giores.
6. We can’t prove anything from the kings of Yehuda, as they also worshipped idols.
7. Regarding Shlomo Hamelech, the Navi (Melachim 1 (11-7)) says clearly that what he did was wrong, so we can’t bring a proof from there to this.
8. See Ralbag Shoftim 16-4 that Delila converted beforehand.
9. Ezra’s admonishing those who married non-Jewish women doesn’t imply that it was permitted at all. The opposite is true. See Ezra chapters 9-10, where he prayed and made them repent and divorce any foreign women they had married.
10. The Rambam and Shulachan Aruch don’t agree with this, as stated above.
11. The mere fact that he admonishes them shows that it was wrong.
12. The Reform had a policy to obliterate Judaism, including Shabbos, Kashrus, and all other mitzvos, so they are not a proof of anything. And yes, they are much of the cause that so many Jews nowadays, unfortunately, don’t know anything about their heritage.

Best wishes