Nursing Mother Denied The Right To Remarry, Baby Declared A Bastard, By Haredi-Controlled State Rabbinical Court

FAILED MESSIAH – The number of children labeled as mamzerim – bastards; a status that prevents a child and his or her descendants from marrying a “pure” Jew – by the state rabbinate tripled between 2008 and 2013. Here’s a report that helps explain why.

Rivkah Lubitch works with Israel’s Center for Women’s Justice as an advocate in the state rabbinic courts. Lubitch writes an occasional column for Ynet in which excoriates the haredi-controlled state rabbinical courts for some of the outlandish things they do to women and children.

In her most recent column published today, Lubitch points out that the number of children labeled as mamzerim – bastards; a status that prevents a child and his or her descendants from marrying a “pure” Jew – by the state rabbinate tripled between 2008 and 2013.

This is highly significant not only because of the pain it causes to families, but also because halakha (Orthodox Jewish law) mandates rabbis to do everything in their power to avoid labeling someone a mamzer, and the haredi-controlled state rabbinate is clearly not trying to do that.

So the state rabbinate’s secret mamzerim blacklist grows exponentially, and the supposedly democratic state gives the men who keep that list the power to ruin the lives of these unfortunate people and their descendants in perpetuity because the state gives sole power of marriage and divorce to these callous rabbis. There is no civil marriage in Israel and even divorces that are handled through family court have a component that must be handled by the rabbis, and those rabbis can through their inaction and foolish stringency block some of these women from remarrying, sometimes for many years, occasionally for decades.

Lubitch tells a story of a legally divorced woman who applied for a marriage license. The rabbinic clerk who took the application discovered the woman has a baby who is less than two years old. So the clerk – a male, of course – refused to issue a license or register the couple for marriage.

Why?

Because of a little known halakha (Orthodox Jewish law) known as meineket havero, or the law of the nursing mother. That law prohibits a woman with a nursing child who is less than two years old from remarrying. The logic behind the law is that the woman’s new husband is likely to prevent the woman from nursing a baby that is not his own or would refuse to pay for a wet nurse to nurse that baby if his new wife could not produce enough milk.

Some rabbis have ruled that if the soon-to-be new husband makes a declaration agreeing to support the baby and pay for infant formula, if necessary, the marriage can be authorized.

But those rabbis are not in charge of the state rabbinate.

The woman appealed to a state rabbinic court, which asked her detailed questions about her lactation and breastfeeding. (The official protocol for the hearing reportedly stated the woman was having problems producing milk.)

Then, because the baby was only registered under the mother’s name and no father was listed, the state rabbinic court launched an investigation to determine when the mother actually conceived and who the father of the baby really was.

The information it was given was unclear, and after only one hearing the rabbinic court declared the baby to be mamzer and included it’s name on the state rabbinate’s secret mamzerim lsit.

The mother appealed to the state High Rabbinic Court which remanded the case back to the district rabbinical court to continue its investigation by attempting to obtain the mother’s medical records.

But the mother appealed to Israel’s High Court of Justice, and that appeal pressured the district rabbinical court to try to find a way to clear the baby’s name – something the rabbinical court should have done on its own from day one if it were actually following the accepted halakha as practiced for many centuries. The district state rabbinical court found a way to clear the baby’s name and reportedly removed the child’s name from the secret mamzerim list.