Rabbi Dovid E. Eidensohn/ 2 Phyllis Terrace/Monsey, NY 10952/845-578-1917

Taanis Esther 5773

Weiss-Dodelson – A Response to Attack from Rosh Yeshivas on Rabbi Weiss

1. Rosh Yeshivas recently called for Rabbi Weiss, his father and uncle to be

dismissed from their jobs because Rabbi Weiss does not give his wife a GET. They also called

for him to be publicly humiliated until he gives a GET. They claimed that a Siruv from Beth

Din Machon LiHoroah, claiming that Rabbi Weiss ignored their demand that he go to a Din

Torah with his wife about the GET, requires that we treat him as if he was in Cherem.

2. First of all, such a public call requires a Beth Din not Rosh Yeshivas. Did the Rosh

Yeshivas sit with both sides and then render a verdict? Were they accepted by both sides?

3. I spoke to the Beth Din quoted by the Rosh Yeshivas, and the Beth Din said that

the SIruv they issued was only designed to coerce the husband to go to Beth Din. It was not

designed nor should it be used as a pretext to force the husband to give a GET. If the Rosh

Yeshivas are using the Siruv as a basis of coercing the GET, it is wrong to do so, as the Siruv

has nothing to do with the pesak about the GET.

4. Since the Beth Din never said anything about coercing the husband, only that

he should go to Beth Din to adjudicate the case, it would seem that the pesak of the Rosh

Yeshivas that everyone must coerce the husband with fiscal loss and humiliation was not the

pesak of the Beth Din but of the Rosh Yeshivas. And yet, they never sat in judgment as a Beth

Din, and if the issued a Pesak, it was without a status of Beth Din, but their own idea.

Whoever heard of a group of rabbis led by the cousin of one of the disputants without

listening to both sides issuing a ruling that someone should be humiliated and deprived of a

living?

5. The call of the Rosh Yeshivas to pressure a husband to divorce his wife by

threatening him fiscally, to make him lose his salary, is KEFIAS MAMONE and renders the GET

invalid according to almost all poskim. (Michtav MaEliyohu Simon 19) If the husband is

pressured with fiscal loss and gives a GET and the woman remarries her children may well be

mamzerim. She is an adulteress. Thus, the very purpose of the Rosh Yeshivas, to force a GET,

is destroyed by their coercion. Obviously they don’t know the laws of Gittin and if they do

know the laws of Gittin, they deliberately produce a possible mamzerut and adulteress. (See

Choshen Mishpot Tur and Shulchan Aruch 205:7 in Ramo that monetary pressure is ONESS.

See Beis Yosef and Gro there who support this from the Sugya of Pardess in Bovo Basro 40b.

Also Michtav MaEliyohu Simon 19 that the Rishonim hold that ONES MAMONE invalidates

the GET.)

6. The call of the Rosh Yeshivas to humiliate the husband is wrong as humiliation is

forbidden and makes a coerced and invalid GET. This is the accepted opinion of the Rashbo

VII:414, Beis Yosef EH 154, Radvaz IV:118, Chaim Shoal I:5, and Chazon Ish EH 108:12. The

Rivash 157 does not forbid humiliations in the case of a husband who is commanded by the

Talmud to divorce. But he would also agree that in our cases of MOUS OLEI where the

husband may not be pressured at all, that humiliation is forbidden. I have a teshuva on this

that was accepted by a major Beth Din. The Ramo in EH 77:3 clearly states the shito of the

Rashbo that a husband in MOUS OLEI may not be pressured and the Gro agrees and quotes a

Rosh to support this. But Ramo rules in 154:21 that a husband who must by Talmudic law

divorce may be pressured in certain ways. (But even in this case the Rashbo forbids

humiliating him and the Shach in Gevuras Anoshim agrees.) Thus, in the Weiss-Dodelson case

which is MOUS OLEI and not a case where the Talmud demands a GET, pressure is forbidden.

Surely humiliation is forbidden. Public humiliation is certainly forbidden because Rabbeinu

Yona writes in Shaarei Teshuva 139 that “humiliation is worse than death.” We find in

Brochose 23a that a Talmid of the Yeshiva killed himself when a lowly person humiliated him.

7. Let us now turn to the facts of the case. The Rosh Yeshivas accept the word of

the Beth Din, the one we will refer to here as the First Beth Din, that Rabbi Weiss refused to

respond to their call for him to go to a Beth Din. But a Second Beth Din disputes this.

Included below is a letter from the Second Beth Din refuting the claim of the First Beth Din. If

so, the issue is a dispute between two Beth Dins. Do the Rosh Yeshivas have the right to

assume that one of the two is right and the other one is not? Did they listen to both Beth

Dins? Just how did they arrive at their conclusion?

8. One of the Rosh Yeshivas is a relative of one of the two sides in the case. What

about Choshen Mishpot 7L9 that relatives cannot judge? Another signatory Rosh Yeshiva in

this letter was previously a signer in another case where he was very close to the father of

the wife and he wrote a letter of pesak against the husband to pressure him to give a GET.

9. The letter of the Rosh Yeshivas begins with a statement that the husband went

to secular court and refused to go to Beth Din. The husband’s side disputes this and claims

that they have proof in writing that the wife, not the husband, went to court, as the court

papers clearly label the husband the defendant. I spoke today to a respected Rov who told

me he showed over twenty pages to someone in the wife’s family that prove the claim of the

husband that he was the defendant in court and that he answered the call of the First Beth

Din to go to court. The Rov told me that he told the relative of the wife that if he could refute

any of the material in the many documents the Rov would accept their version of the events.

The relative of the wife never got back to the Rov. The Rov thus claims that the wife’s family

obviously admits that the claim that the husband went to court and refused to go to a Beth

Din is a lie. But this is what the Rosh Yeshivas, led by the wife’s cousin, are saying.

10. When the First Beth Din threatened a Siruv against the husband, the Second

Beth Din issued a Bitul Siruv. It challenges the statement of the First Beth Din that the

husband has violated the Torah and is therefore to be treated as one in Cherem.

Furthermore, the Second Beth Din charged that the First Beth Din, by mounting a false claim

of being in Cherem upon a Jew, may be threatened itself by Cherem. (Moed Koton 17a

Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Dayah 334:43)

11. (The claim of Cherem against the First Beth Din is a complicated area of halacha

see Beer Haytiv there, and I mention it without accepting it, but it certainly is a terrible

crime and sin to claim that somebody is in Cherem when they are not.)

12. The side of the husband claims that they have over twenty documents that

prove that they did respond positively to the First Beth Din and agreed to go to Beth Din, and

also that the wife not the husband went to secular court and the husband is listed there as a

defendant.

13. I have presented the views of two battling Beth Dins. When two Beth Dins differ

and the issue can thus not be resolved, what must be done? Obviously, a third Beth Din must

be established to find out what the facts are. Just because two Beth Dins have a difference of

opinion or whatever is no excuse to destroy peoples’s name and lives. This matter requires a

full fledged Beth Din accepted by both sides. They must invite both Beth Dins to testify and

arrive at the truth of this matter. But only neutral Dayanim should be involved, and only after

it sits and hears everyone involved and brings the proper witnesses and garners all of the

facts.

14. It is not our purpose here to decide who is right. It is our purpose here to

demand that the two sides and the two Beth Dins convene a third Beth Din, neutral and

strong enough to arrive at a truly independent conclusion. This way there will be closure, and

when all is said and done, we hope that everyone will be able to go on with their lives.

15. To conclude, the battling families are not discussed here. We only want to

discuss what happened between the Beth Dins, and how the Rosh Yeshivas’s letter violates

the Torah. Incredibly, if everyone did what the Rosh Yeshivas demanded, fired the husband

and humiliated him, and he gave a GET, it would be invalid and the children of the next

marriage mamzerim.

16. Below are two letters. The first is from the Second Beth Din attacking the First

Beth Din. The second letter, below the first, is the letter people tell me is from the Rosh

Yeshivas. I spoke to the Rosh Beth Din of the Second Beth Din and he confirmed what I wrote

here. But I did not speak to the Rosh Yeshivas whose names appear on the document. I

assume that if such a letter went out that they know about it and if it is a forgery they would

tell us. At any rate, I repeat, I am not here to provide facts who is right and who is wrong. I

am attacking the letter, for whoever wrote it, it is against halacha and can produce

mamzerim.

17. Allow me to conclude this with the following. Years ago I sat before Posek

HaDor Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashev zt”l and presented questions about GET MEUSO. He was

very concerned about the state of Gittin and forced Gittin. At that time, he gave me his name

for my Beth Din and encouraged me to fight against GET MEUSO. And so I did for many years.

But recently, I see that things are just getting worse. We have no great rebbe out there

healthy and strong to fight funny Gittin. Obviously, the coming generation will have many

women divorced with coerced Gets and problems of mamzeruth. Could I just keep protesting

about mamzerim even while they are being born today from wives whose husbands were

beaten or otherwise coerced to divorce? So I devised a new program. It would offer a couple

the opportunity to sign up with a Beth Din, or with myself, how to fulfill the halacha of

marriage in its Shalom Bayis phase. Education would be offered on an ongoing basis before

and after the wedding, and is available even for older marriages. All arguments and

difficulties will be dealt with by neutral third parties, not relatives and not friends. Phase two

of the problem is when a couple will sign up with the Beth Din giving it the right to fine

someone who violates the halacha of Shalom Bayis, either husband or wife. This way, we can

prevent many broken marriages, Agunoth and GET MEUSOs. My idea was accepted by

leading Beth Dins in the world. If anyone is interested in this program, please contact me

either at writeus1@verizon.net, or 845-578-1917. Everything is confidential.