Please forgive me for beginning with a bit of the history of philosophy, but the study intrigues me and part of my perspective on life comes from my studies. The Greek philosopher Plato wrote Symposium in 385 BCE. In that document, he wrote that humans once had four arms, four legs and two faces. We humans, however, were filled with excessive pride. Zeus, chief of the gods in the Greek pantheon, decided that humans needed punishment and so, according to Plato, ordered that all humans were to be split in half. The destiny of humans ever since has been to walk the Earth searching for our other half.

The idea of having an “other half” has persisted in human culture and mythology ever since Plato in many different forms in different cultures. Faithful Hindu believers hold that people have a karmic connection with another soul. In Yiddish, the term is “bashert” which can be translated “destiny.” The thirteenth-century Persian poet and Islamic scholar Rumi speculated that lovers do not meet, but rather have been in each other all along.

I suspect that the sense that there is one and only one partner for each person - that somewhere out there exists the perfect mate - has been responsible for a lot of misery and sadness. Believing that there is a perfect partner may lead couples to be disappointed in the reality of the partner they have chosen. If there is a perfect match out there somewhere, a bit of disappointment or disagreement may drive some couples to split up and go searching for another partner. If you think about it logically, you can understand that there is no such thing as a perfect human being. It follows, then, that the search for a perfect partner will lead to disappointment, because all of the candidates are imperfect in some way. It may even be the case the couples are less likely to work through problems and solve them because they become convinced that searching elsewhere is the solution. “Maybe this just wasn’t the right person after all.”

The Middle East page of the BBC news website today has a story about Zechariah and Shama’a. They were both Jewish orphans in Yemen, where there was significant discrimination against Jews. At the time, Jewish leaders in their community often arranged marriages for very young orphans in order to keep them from marrying outside of the faith and leaving the community. Zechariah and Shama’a were 10 and 12 years old when they were married. They began their life together in extreme poverty. They were allowed to sleep in a donkey barn provided that first they cleaned it out. Their first child came quickly and ten more followed. In 1948, they fled poverty and emigrated to the new nation of Israel. Today they have 64 grand and great-grand children. They have been married for 91 years. Zechariah says that the secret to their long marriage is that God sent Shama’a to him.

Whether or not you believe in soul mates, it certainly seems that their long marriage is due, in no small part, to the commitment to staying together even when things are difficult. Perhaps because they started their marriage in such extreme poverty they developed a set of skills for facing trials and troubles together. Perhaps it is just luck. But on this Valentine’s Day, I have to believe that they forged their life together out of love.

Susan and I still have 42 years to go before we match Zechariah and Shama’a’s record. And we started out a decade older than they, so that would require us living to very old ages. But at the ages we have now reached it seems obvious to us that one marriage to one person is just the right thing for us. We have no right to judge other couples and we know that there are many people who have found happiness in second and third marriages, but we feel lucky and blessed to have found each other. Actually, we didn’t have to go too far to find each other. We lived in the same state. Our parents participated in the same church denomination. We went to the same church camp. We attended the same college.

Despite my enjoyment of studying Greek philosophers, we didn’t spend our lives wandering the earth looking for each other. We found each other on the normal paths of our lives. What we did have going for us was that we inherited a legacy of love. We both grew up in families with parents who were in love with each other and who lived out that love in deep commitment. Our grandparents, too, were successful in love, finding partners for their lives’ journeys.

We won’t be nearing Shama’a and Zechariah’s record when it comes to children. We have two and that is the right number for us. And we have five grandchildren - again the right number for us. We have, however, been blessed with children who have found love in their lives and married partners who have not only carried forward the legacy of love, but who have become beloved children of ours as well.

According to Christian tradition, today is the day of celebrating love because of the sacrifice of St. Valentine. The exact historical story is difficult to discern. There may be multiple persons who carried the name Valentine who were martyred for their faith. But tradition has delivered the story of a priest who in the early Church, before Christianity became a legal religion on Rome, was executed because he broke the law banning marriage between two persons who practiced religions that were not recognized. Believing in love, Valentine officiated at illegal weddings before the marriage of two Christians became legal in the Roman system. Like other saints, the day celebrated is the day of death because of the Christian belief that death is the entry into eternal life.

So I will be wishing my partner “Happy Valentine’s Day!” And I will do so with the anticipation of many more happy days of living in love together. Whether we were destined to be together before we met I do not know, but it seems to me logical that we now are destined to be together for the years that lie ahead, whatever may come. And that is a very good thing.