[Avodah] Why do they break a plate and glass?

[Prof. L. Levine]

Yesterday my 5-year-old grandson Yisroel Meir Levine ask me the following question.

"Zaidie,  why do they break a plate and a g;ass at a Chasanah?"

A google search yields

The breaking of the glass holds multiple meanings. Some say it represents the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. Others say it demonstrates that marriage holds sorrow as well as joy and is a representation of the commitment to stand by one another even in hard times

I told him about the destruction of the Temple.

(I did not give him the cynical reason that I have heard,  namely, "This is the last time that the chosson gets to put his foot down!"😈)

I had no idea why the mothers of the chosson and kallah break a plate as part of making tenaim.

A goggle search yields

https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/tenaim-the-conditions-of-marriage/

An Old Ceremony

From the 12th to the early 19th century, tenaim announced that two families had come to terms on a match between their children. The document setting out their agreement, also called tenaim, would include the dowry and other financial arrangements, the date and time of the huppah [the actual wedding ceremony], and a knas, or penalty, if either party backed out of the deal.


After the document was signed and read aloud by an esteemed guest, a piece of crockery was smashed. The origins of this practice are not clear; the most common interpretation is that a shattered dish recalls the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, and it is taken to demonstrate that a broken engagement cannot be mended. The broken dish also anticipates the shattered glass that ends the wedding ceremony.


In some communities it was customary for all the guests to bring some old piece of crockery to smash on the floor. There is also a tradition that the mothers-in-law-to-be break the plate–a symbolic rending of mother-child ties and an acknowledgment that soon their children will be feeding each other. After the plate breaking, the party began.

Does anyone have any more insight into the reason for breaking a plate?

YL
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