Love and marriage are perhaps the most perplexing of issues, coming a close second only to the meaning of life itself. Millions of pounds a year are spent on glossy magazines and there must be hundreds of books that deal with every angle of this subject. The fact that we spend our money on material that will supposedly help us in the "love stakes" is testimony to the fact that matters of the heart are so complex and manage to confuse us.

As with so many things in our lives, we constantly search for sources that will answer our questions and confront our doubts. Yet we fail to realise that we have a guide to these issues - The Guide - The Torah. In our vain attempts to gain knowledge we fail to see what is staring us in the face. Our forefathers had to deal with the same issues and we can learn much from their experience. The search for a wife for Isaac and his subsequent marriage to Rebecca is a good example. As with many episodes in the Torah there is enough intrigue to keep a soap's scriptwriter in business for years. Avraham instructs his faithful servant Eliezer to find a suitable wife for Isaac. Rebecca having clearly displayed her kindness of character, passes the test, and returns with Eliezer to meet Isaac.

"And Isaac brought her into Sarah's tent, and took Rebecca, and she became his wife, and he loved her."

If you study this passage carefully you will notice the strange order - marriage before love. We are more familiar with the sequence being that of "falling" in love and then marriage. Nowadays, marriage is considered the pinnacle of love but we would do well to learn from Isaac and Rebecca. They are a perfect example of marriage being the beginning of love. A love that comes from a commitment to one another in which both grow together in love.

Evidently, instead of searching for modern answers to age old problems we should realise that we have been provided with the answers - we just need to know where to look for them. Episodes such as these are so much more than just "nice" stories, they are profoundly relevant to us today.