Freeing an agunah whose husband is in a vegetative state

 update:  Rav Sternbuch's objection & R Z N Goldberg's clarification

update:  Original Psak

update Haaretz     Rav Zalman Nechemia Goldberg approves

בעקבות סירוב הרב יוסף להצטרף לפסק הדין, הדיינים בראשות הרב אוריאל לביא פנו לדיין בכיר מחוץ למערכת הרשמית של המדינה, הרב זלמן נחמיה גולדברג, העומד בראש בית דין רבני פרטי בירושלים. גולדברג כתב, כי לאחר שקרא את פסק הדין של לביא, כי "דבריו נכונים מאוד ואני מצטרף לדעתו להתיר במקרה המיוחד שלפנינו". ל"הארץ" נודע, כי בשבועות האחרונים פנו גורמים רבניים לרב גולדברג, בדרישה שיחזור בו מתמיכתו בפסק הדין. 

בין המתנגדים לפסק הדין ישנם דיינים במערכת הרשמית, שאחד מהם אמר אתמול כי"פסק הדין הזה שווה כקליפת השום". בשבועות הקרובים צפוי להתפרסם פסק דין של בית דין רבני מחיפה שהתבקש להתיר עגונה שבעלה נמצא במצב של "צמח" לאחר ניסיון התאבדות כושל. גורמים במערכת בתי הדין אומרים, כי פסק הדין מחיפה הולך להיות גם תגובה נוקבת נגד הדיינים מצפת על עצם השימוש בגט זיכוי. 

בינתיים, מי שיצא באופן נחרץ נגד פסק הדין הוא הרב עו"ד דב הלברטל, מומחה למשפט עברי שהיה גם מקורב למנהיג הליטאי המנוח הרב יוסף שלום אלישיב. "זו שערורייה ליברלית", אמר הלברטל על פסק הדין. "אין צורך אפילו לקרוא את פסק הדין כדי להבין את זה. לא ייפלא שהרב אלישיב לחם נגד רבנים מהציונות הדתית שהם דיינים והנה אנחנו רואים תוצאה שהרכב של בני ציונות דתית מוציא תחת ידו פסק דין מרחיק לכת כזה. הרי הבעל הוא אדם חי, והאשה היא אשת איש. זה כבר מעבר למדרון החלקלק של הפקעת נישואין, מייצרים כאן פתרון קל לכל בעיותיהן של עגונות או של אומללות בחיי נישואין. לא היה פסק דין כזה למעט אולי פסק הדין של הרב גורן הממזרים (1972), לא היה פסק דין חמור כזה שמשחק לידי הליברלים. יכולות להיות לו השלכות חמורות ביותר".

   kikarhashabat

פסק דין תקדימי של בית הדין האזורי בצפת התיר עגונה שבעלה מוגדר כצמח. הדיינים נעזרו בהליך שנקרא "גט זיכוי", על פיו, הדיינים קובעים כי רצון הבעל הוא להתיר את אשתו, ובכך לאפשר לאישה להינשא מחדש. ההחלטה, שפורסמה לראשונה ב"הארץ", ניתנה לפני כחודשיים, ואמש פרסמה הנהלת בתי הדין הרבניים את פסק הדין מאת הרכב הדיינים בראשות הרב אוריאל לביא 

.

הראשל"צ, הרב יצחק יוסף, נשיא בית הדין הרבני הגדול והרב הראשי לישראל, סירב להצטרף לפסק הדין התקדימי, כמו גם מספר דיינים חשובים נוספים. עם זאת, הדיינים פסקו בלעדיו, כשהם מסתמכים על אסמכתות מהרב צבי פסח פראנק והחזון אי"ש, ומוסיפים אסמכתות מעשרות מקורות אחרים 

.

הדיינים ציינו כי פסיקתם הובאה גם לפני הרב עובדיה יוסף בסוף ימיו, אבל מפאת מצבו הבריאותי לא זכו לתשובה. יחד עם הרב לביא, ישבו והחליטו על פסק הדין הרבנים חיים בזק ויוסף יגודה 

.

בפסק הדין כתבו הדיינים כי "על יסוד החומר שבפנינו ושמיעת חוות הדעת הרפואית, הגענו למסקנה ברורה שאין בה ספק - הבעל במצבו הנוכחי אינו כשיר לחלוטין לכל סוג של תקשורת עם הסובב אותו, אינו מודע ואינו מבין ברמה המינימלית והבסיסית ביותר אף את צרכיו הבסיסיים שלו 

".

בעקבות כך, החליטו הדיינים כי האישה היא "ספק אשת איש", וחובותיה כלפי הבעל, המוגדר "שוטה", אינם מלאים 

.

בית הדין ניסה בתחילה להתיר אותה בטענה ל"פסילת קידושין", אך לאחר שמצא כי לא היה פגם בהליך הנישואין לא אפשר את התרתה על בסיס זה.

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What does Judaism mean by happiness?

Happiness in Premodern Judaism Virtue, Knowledge, and Well-Being

by Hava Tirosh-Samuelson

Properly understood, I contend that in Judaism happiness does not mean possessing material goods, having fun, feeling content, or enjoying physical pleasures, although some of these elements may be part of the happy life. 

Happiness is not a subjective feeling manifested in a given moment or for a short period of time. Instead, it means flourishing, thriving, and experienc­ing well-being appropriate to human beings. It is an objective state of affairs that pertains to human nature and to the quality of a human life as a whole,from the perspective of its entire duration.

Moreover, the intrinsically good life is inseparable from a set of religious beliefs, the most important of which is that God, the creator of the world, has a special relationship with the People of Israel, to whom God revealed His Wisdom and Will in a form of law: the Torah. The challenging question, then, is not "How can Judaism be concerned with happiness?" but rather, "Can the notion of happiness in Judaism make sense independent of the belief in Torah and the life that flows from it?" I answer that question in the negative. Until Baruch (Benedict) Spinoza in the mid-seventeenth cen­tury, all premodern Jewish thinkers held that Jews could flourish only if they lived the life of Torah and devoted themselves to fathoming God's Wis­dom. Nonetheless, their views were not all struck from one mold. Over time, those thinkers gave different answers to the basic questions "What does Torah mean?" "How does the Torah ensure human happiness?" "How does Torah relate to Wisdom?" and "What results from following Torah and pursuing Wisdom?

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Review Commission for purported Marranos - Oporto, Portugal

   

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Schlesinger Twins: Beth urgently requests Chabad to let her attend her sons' birthday party

The following is a letter that Beth Alexander asked me to publicize. I am greatly saddened and disgusted that she had to publicize this request. It is inconceivable to me that anyone who  has a Jewish heart would refuse her - and yet so far she has been unable to get permission from Chabad. This is especially troubling given the importance that the Rebbe and Rav Moshe Feinstein held of birthdays. 

Furthermore I have been informed that my publicizing Beth's plight irritates members of the Vienna community - including its rabbis.  I have been told that there is muttering about "Why air this on the Internet?" I in fact share your concerns but I see no alternative at present. I welcome any suggestion that would take care of these matters of common decency - without publicity. So far private requests have accomplished nothing!
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update - The Law of Austria regardiing child custody European Commission

http://www.help.gv.at/Portal.Node/hlpd/public/content/10/Seite.100022.html
In the case of sole custody, the non-custodial parent has the following minimal rights.

The right to information, statements and representation

The custodial parent is obliged to inform the non-custodial parent about important matters and changes in the life of a child of both parties (eg change of school, change of address, illnesses which are not just minor, success at school).

The non-custodial parent has the right to make a statement about these topics. The custodial parent also has these rights, ie the parents are obliged to inform each other about these things. The non-custodial parent also has to care for and rear the child and represent him/her in everyday matters, as long as circumstances permit, e.g when the custodial parent is not present and the child is lawfully spending time with the non-custodial parent.

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I address this simple request to Chabad International; to every Chabad Shalich, Rabbi, Rebbetzen and Chabadnik, in every country and in every continent of the world:

You are the so-called emissaries of the Rebbe. You have chosen a very noble role; to publicly take upon yourselves the onus of 'caring for' and 'reaching out' to Jewish souls all over the world. Your ethos: when you hear a cry of distress, you rush to help. When you see suffering, you do everything in your human power to relieve the pain.

Samuel and Benjamin Schlesinger will be 5 years old this Shabbos. I've been told the normal procedure on a child's birthday is as follows:

The Chabad kindergarten in Vienna, Rav Biderman's school, celebrate with a party in the class and crown the child a birthday 'king or queen.' The child's parents are invited to be there to join in.

Since my twins' birthday is on Shabbos, I assume this party will take place on Friday.

My little princes will have their turns as the birthday 'kings.' Their class will sing 'yom huledet sameach' and their friends will congratulate them and give them gifts. There is just one thing missing from this wonderful occasion: the life source who carried them and brought them into this world: their mother.

Every other child takes it for granted that their 'mama' is invited by the kindergarten to their birthday party, that their 'mama' brings them in the morning and picks them up in the afternoon. Sammy and Benji are not that fortunate.

Michael Schlesinger cancelled my visit this Tuesday without giving any reason and the visiting centre cancelled my visit this Sunday.

I therefore have ONE request from you:

TO ALLOW SAMMY AND BENJI TO HAVE THEIR MOTHER AT THEIR BIRTHDAY PARTY IN THE CHABAD KINDERGARTEN IN VIENNA

Such a simple request yet one which would mean all the joy and happiness in the world to me and my boys. Do not turn me away. There is no court order prohibiting me from attending the kindergarten. No law will be broken if I am present and yet how many Chabad principles will be broken if I'm denied this simple wish?

It is not my intention to inconvenience anyone. I only want to be there for my babies - the children to whom I GAVE BIRTH - on their BIRTHday.

Please have compassion. See our tears and hear our cries. Let the twins' 5th birthday be a happy memory we can look back on and cherish.

Such a lofty mission as you embraced was never meant to be easy. You can choose to take the easy route and ignore me, letting us suffer further, or you can take on the challenge like warriors and honour the name of the Rebbe throughout klall Yisroel.

I charge you, every single Chabadnik around the world, to do EVERYTHING in your power to make Rav Biderman's Chabad school in Vienna do the right thing by Samuel and Benjamin and let my two little boys enjoy their birthday party in the presence of their mother.

Thank you.

Beth

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Dozens Arrested in New York State Child Pornography Investigation

NY Times In what law enforcement officials have described as the largest-ever enforcement operation in New York going after people who “possess, produce or distribute sexually explicit images of children,” 70 people have been arrested across the state and charged with crimes involving the exploitation of children.

The people arrested include two police officers, two registered nurses, a paramedic, an au pair, and an individual who served as both a den master with the Boy Scouts of America and a Little League baseball coach.

The arrests, made in recent weeks, came after investigators were able to surreptitiously infiltrate peer-to-peer file-sharing networks in the New York City metropolitan area used by people seeking to distribute and acquire images and videos of children engaged in sexually explicit activities.

During the course of the investigation, known as Operation Caireen, law enforcement officials monitored activity on some 150 Internet Protocol addresses for more than a month, from April 4 to May 15. [...]

On Jan. 23, Brian Fanelli, chief of the Mount Pleasant Police Department in Valhalla, N.Y., was arrested and charged with the possession of child pornography.

The charges stunned the small northern Westchester County community where Mr. Fanelli was well liked and had taught children in religious classes at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church in Shrub Oak, N.Y., how to be alert to sexual abuse.

On March 5, Samuel Waldman, a rabbi and an instructor of Judaic studies, was arrested at his residence in Brooklyn. He was also charged with possession of child pornography.

Law enforcement officials said those two cases provided critical information that led to the broader operation.

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Schlesinger Twins: Letter of British Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis

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Epstein-Friedman divorce: Actions of Rabbis Kamenetsky and Schacter

Guest Post by Izzy

The actions of Rabbis Kamenetsky and Schachter in the Epstein-Friedman matter unfortunately illustrate the severe problems caused by rabbonim and roshei yeshiva who have very close family and/or financial and personal connections to one party in a dispute intervening in a one-sided fashion to further inflame the dispute – all the while being treated as impartial and neutral arbiters and judges in such dispute.

Epstein and Friedman brought their dispute to the Baltimore Beis Din, which held several hearings into the case and did not require that Friedman give a get or issue any other ruling against him. Epstein violated the Baltimore Beis Din’s orders regarding dismissing the civil court trial that Friedman had delayed by eight months in order to bring the case to the Baltimore Beis Din. Epstein successfully argued in civil court that her unilateral relocation of the child from Maryland to Pennsylvania should be treated as a fait accompli because of the time that had elapsed between the relocation and the trial. Epstein also successfully asked the court to arrange a custody schedule where much of the child’s time with Friedman was rendered moot because of Shabbos.

Epstein then involved the Washington Beis Din, which ruled that it could not get involved given that the parties had brought the matter to the Baltimore Beis Din whose orders Epstein had violated.

Epstein turned to Rabbi Kamenetsky who issued public letters attacking Friedman and his family. Rabbi Kamenetsky has longstanding personal and financial relationships with Epstein’s family, which are widely known and have actually appeared in various newspapers. Rabbi Kamenetsky should have been widely condemned for weighing in on this matter in favor of a family to whom he has such close ties, and his completely contradicting the decision of the Beis Din to which the parties had actually brought the matter. Instead, many in the Orthodox community simply disregarded the Baltimore Beis Din and gave credence to Rabbi Kamenetsky’s denunciations of Friedman.

Rabbi Hershel Schachter and ORA, of which Rabbi Schachter serves as posek, then jumped into the matter claiming that the position of the beis din chosen by the parties should be disregarded because Rabbi Kamenetsky had taken the opposite position. Even while the Baltimore Beis Din said that Friedman had not committed any wrongdoing and that actions against him were wrong, ORA insisted upon demonstrating against Friedman and also against the Washington Beis Din for refusing to intervene against Friedman.

Think about this: two parties brought a matter to a beis din. One party didn’t like the beis din’s decision, so that party gets a rosh yeshiva with whom that party has close personal connections to publicly attack the other party?! And then Rabbi Schachter declares that the beis din is irrelevant because the rosh yeshiva is a godol and incites communal attacks on the other party?! This outrageous behavior makes a mockery of halacha, the very concept of a beis din, and the Orthodox community.

If the tactics were meant to coerce a get, the tactics were not working. But the fact that Rabbis Kamenetsky and Schachter were able to get away with such outrageous behavior, not only against Friedman and his family, but against the Baltimore Beis Din and the Washington Beis Din, just incited them to more outrageous behavior.

Eventually, Rabbi Kamenetsky was able to cobble together a so-called beis din to purport to issue a “seruv” against Friedman. The “beis din” did not even pretend to function as anything other than a kangaroo court. The “beis din” did not bother issuing even a single hazmana, but started off with a “hasra’a acharona” [final warning] demanding that Friedman give a get, thus issuing its ruling before even commencing any proceedings. Rabbi Kamenetsky signed the purported “seruv” while Rabbi Schachter added his signature. Another signatory was Rabbi Moredchai Wolmark, who was recently arrested by the FBI, along with several others, on charges of ordering a kidnapping and beating of a man in order to obtain a get. Several of the co-conspirators have already pleaded guilty. The competence of Rabbi Wolmark, or the complete lack thereof, was demonstrated by the fact that Rabbi Wolmark ordered the kidnapping and beating of a fictional husband regarding a marriage that did not exist. Two other signatories have been alleged to be involved in similar beatings in the past. That anyone would assign any credence to the actions of this “beis din,” particularly given that the parties had previously brought the matter to another beis din, is beyond absurd – but yet many did.

Subsequently, Friedman was attacked by several masked individuals while returning the child to Epstein’s house on Tisha Ba’av in July 2012, in an apparent attempted kidnapping and beating. The attack endangered not only Friedman’s life but that of the child. But still, few rabbonim were willing to denounce the outrageous behavior, and instead many continued to publicly attack Friedman and his family instead.

This just further emboldened Rabbi Kamenetsky to believe that any actions he undertakes, no matter how directly contrary to halacha, will receive wide acceptance if those actions are undertaken on behalf of a wealthy and influential family. But all the public attacks against Friedman were not working. And the attractiveness of ordering another assault against Friedman apparently diminished after the FBI sting operation. The idea that Epstein should come to a reasonable resolution of all matters, despite the fact that she is part of a powerful family accustomed to getting its way, seems to be something that Rabbi Kamenetsky never even considered, proclaiming that there was nothing to negotiate. When another rav in Philadelphia attempted to initiate negotiations, he was told in no uncertain terms by the Epsteins to mind his own business.

So it should not be that surprising that in December 2013, two months following the aforementioned FBI arrests, ORA publicly announced that Tamar is “free” although she has not received a get – apparently approved by Rabbi Kamenetsky. Given the acceptance of his outrageous behavior until now, it should not be surprising that Rabbi Kamenetsky would believe that this too will be accepted.

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