The Royal Wedding (Part Two – The ceremony)

(part one)

 

 

The doors to the Great Hall were thrown open, and there she stood, the Queen of Hearts, more than ready to marry her beloved. The crowd parted to allow her to proceed unimpeded to the Chuppah. As she neared the marriage canopy the King of Diamonds stepped out from under it, and walked to meet her and escort her to their canopy. This was not something that the Queen had been expecting and she felt a swoon coming on, but squelched it there and then. This was no time for swooning, even for a Queen. The Queen Mother of Hearts covered her daughter’s face with the veil, and the ceremony commenced.

 

King and Queen stood together under the chuppah maintaining eye contact for what seemed like hours. All who were present were assured beyond a shadow of a doubt that this royal couple loved each other with such a deep and abiding love. Many times during the ceremony they were witnessed to be staring deep into the other’s eyes – truly their souls were communicating.

 

The revered Rabbi made the blessing over the wine. He held the cup for the King to sip from, and then did the same for the Queen.

 

The King was asked if he had the wedding ring – he produced it from his pocket. Two witnesses were asked a very important question – was this ring worth more than one pruta (dollar) – to which they answered that indeed it was. (one would hope so, after all, this is the Queen of Hearts we are talking about here!!)

 

The King was instructed to place this wedding ring on the index finger of the Queen’s right hand. He intoned the words “with this ring you are consecrated to me according to the law of Moses and Israel” – and slipped the ring on her finger. The Queen had explained to the King weeks before that the wedding ring was sized to fit her ring finger, and that the index finger is bigger, so he was not to try to force it over the knuckle. In the solemnity of the moment, this slipped his mind, and he tried to force it over the knuckle. The Queen chuckled, and gently disengaged her finger from his. As the Rabbi continued the ceremony the Queen surreptitiously slipped the ring onto her ring finger.

 

The Rabbi then read out the Ketubah, the marriage document, that spelled out the King of Diamond’s obligations that he has to fulfill as a husband. This is written in Aramaic, and personalized for our Queen and her King. This document was witnessed by two very respected pillars of the King and Queen’s court. The KoD then handed it to his bride, according to ancient tradition.

 

Seven blessings were then recited over another cup of wine – each blessing was given to a visiting dignitary as a sign of honour and appreciation of the part they have played in the KoD and QoH’s life. Again, the bride and groom drank a sip of wine. Once this was done it was time for the King of Diamonds to finish the wedding ceremony by stomping really hard on a glass – a sign to all present that we should remember the destruction of our Holy Temple, even at the happiest times in our lives.

 

As soon as the glass was broken, a huge cheer went up, and people started calling out their congratulations, as that was the signal for the end of the ceremony.

 

Within seconds the little princes came running to congratulate their mother and her new husband, and the newlyweds were surrounded by well-wishers, wanting to kiss and hug and congratulate them. The royal pages were trying very hard to escort the King and Queen to a private room, but found it difficult to navigate through the throngs of people. Finally the King and his Queen managed to break free and made it to their own private suite, where they shut the door on all the merriment outside.

 

(part three)