The theocratic power that could jail a man for 19 years for ‘insolence’ is the same power keeping women chained to marriage
By Susan Weiss
Published in the Times of Israel Blogs
NOV 11, 2019, 2:25 PM
Right before Rosh Hashana, the highest of holy days of the Jewish New Year, the State of Israel released Meir Gorodetsky from prison. He had been sitting in jail, sometimes in solitary, sometimes sleeping on the floor, never with canteen privileges, for 19+ years. His crime: stupidity and insolence surrounding his refusal to grant his wife a religious divorce (a get). The reason he sat for so long and in such harsh conditions: arrogant fundamentalism of the theocratic arm of the state; persistent short-sightedness of many of the women’s not-for-profit organizations; and the lily-livered, abandonment of values by the secular arm of the state, in particular its Supreme Court.
The theocratic arm of the state, the rabbinic courts of Israel and its reigning rabbi-popes, wanted Meir to stay in jail. Until his death, if necessary. Meir is their poster-boy of how the theocracy thinks it should manage the problem of husbands who refuse to give their wives a get — throw them in jail, take away their liberty, just as they take away their wives’ freedom. Even better yet, flog them, as the Talmud suggests. It’s just too bad, so goes the theocratic logic, that the secular arm cramps their halakhic style.
This, of course, is all wrong and a gross example of transference. Instead of blaming themselves and how they do or don’t do justice, rabbinic judges blame bad husbands. But they’re not the primary reason for this quagmire of injustice; they’re just mean guys taking advantage of fundamentalist, patriarchal marriage and divorce rules that give them the legalized power to ultimately decide if their wives remain married to them, or not. These rules should not be on the books of a democratic state in the first instance. And if they are, they should be marginalized by those in charge of enforcing them and made to comport with democratic and modern justice standards through reinterpretation. And certainly, the theocratic arm of the state should not be blaming its secular arm for placing some minimal civil-liberties brakes on the power of the state over its citizens.
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