The Agunah Crises and the Famed 'Shavuos Gett' Tikkun Shavuos 5781 YIH/HJC

Below is an excerpt from an essay by Lord Immanuel Jakobovits, 'Preserving the Oneness of the Jewish People: Can a Permanent Schism be Averted?', published in Tradition, 1989:

The Vilna Gaon says that although a bill of divorce is known in the Torah as sefer kerisus, it is commonly known as a גט. He explains that this name is indicative of its property of separation, since the letter gimmel and tes are never found together in all of the Torah. In Taama Dikra, Rav Chaim Kanievsky asks why it is these two letters that were chosen, and not the letters gimmel and kuf, zayin and tes, zayin and tzadi, or samech and tzadi, as none of these pairs of letters appear together in the Torah, either. He answers that this is the first pair of letters that cannot be found together in the Torah, and that is why it was chosen. Rav Chaim’s grandson once asked him if perhaps those pairs of letters appear together with one at the end of a word and the other at the beginning of the following word, and that is why they were not chosen. Rav Chaim thought for a moment and said, “In our parashah (below, v. 17), the Torah uses the words ר ֵגּ ט ַפּ ְשׁ ִמ. If their adjacent appearance in separate words was an issue, then gimmel and tes do not fit the criteria either!” The grandson asked Rav Chaim how long it had taken him to comb the Torah in order to find the instances of two letters that never appear together. Rav Chaim replied that he had simply written those pairs that he did not remember appearing together, humbly adding that he might therefore have been mistaken either by adding a pair that does appear together or by omitting a pair that does not.

^{(1) These are the [reasons] we force him to divorce her and to give her the ketubah: One who develops bad breath of the mouth or nose, or goes back to become a collector of dog feces, or a tanner, or to a scraper of copper from its source [i.e. a miner]. If she wants, she can stay with her husband. Rem"a: And if she knew [about this problem] before she was married, we do not force him to divorce her, for she understood and accepted it (Tur in the name of the Ramah).
(2) If a woman has a husband with bad breath of the mouth or nose, or he collected dog feces, or the like, and he died [childless, causing his wife to be obligated to fulfill the mitzvah of either yibbum or chalitzah]. If [the yavam] has the same blemish of his brother, she can say: "With your brother, I could accept this. With you, I am not willing to accept this." He does chalitzah and he gives her her ketubah[-worth].
(3) If someones says, "I will not give food nor provide for [my wife]," we force him to give food. And if the court cannot force him to give food, such as one who doesn't have anything to provide and doesn't want to make money to become profitable and provide food [that way], if she wants, we force him to divorce her immediately and giver her her ketubah. Rem"a: Similarly, a man who gets angry often and consistently kicks out his wife from his house, we force him to divorce her, for because of this he will not provide food for her sometimes, and he will separate from her from relations more times than her rights to conjugal relations, and that is like refusal to provide food and [which are grounds for divorce] (Teshuvat HaRashba Siman 693). And see earlier Siman 70 and Siman 77. A man who hits his wife, has a transgression in his hand as much as striking his fellow. If he does this, the court had the right to cause him pain and to excommunicate him, to whip him, to use all types of force, and to make him swear he will not do it again. And if he does not obey the court, s
(4) man who becomes blemished after his marriage, even if his hand is amputated or his eyes become blinded, we don't force him to divorce his wife and give her her Ketubah....}

What is Considered FORCE?:

What is Considered FORCE-Part 2:

Lieberman Clause
_______________, the groom, and __________, the bride, further agreed that should either contemplate dissolution of the marriage, or following the dissolution of their marriage in the civil courts, each may summon the other to the Bet Din of the Rabbinical Assembly and the Jewish Theological Seminary, or its representative, and that each will abide by its instructions so that throughout life each will be able to live according to the laws of the Torah.

Shul Chronicles 664
YOUston, HOWston, We All Scream for Houston!
Gittin: A Map of History
The History of the Jews and Rabbanim of Early America
Series 8, Number 9
“Yom chamishi of parshas emor, 5688 (1928),
“To my dear friend Rav Yechezkal Abramsky, shlita, the av beis din of
Slutzk:
“I have received the get from the city of Houston in America on behalf
of an agunah here [in Rav Moshe Feinstein’s town of Luban]. This get
has many problems…”
After seeking and finding an allowance for this questionable get, Rav
Moshe concludes:
“Nevertheless, there is still what to investigate, as it is clear that this rav
is not proficient in these halachos…I am sending this rav (in Houston) a
basic primer on hilchos gittin, for I fear that perhaps some/many other
American rabbanim do not know the halachos of correct gittin…Your
dear friend, Moshe Feinstein”
(shu”t Igros Moshe, ev”h, 1:142)
Rav Moshe then shared with Rav Abramsky a sharp letter he - Rav
Moshe – composed and sent to this rabbi in Houston (ibid. 143):
“ To Harav…of Houston, Texas, shlita
“I received the get, yet I have yet to deliver it for [quoting from mishlei,
24:31] ‘thistles had grown all over it; nettles had covered its face’
regarding matters where one should be more careful…but for an agunah
we may perhaps allow it bdieved…I will judge you lkaf zechus, excused
due to not having a proficient sofer nearby, and perhaps there are other
reasons…but I’m confused in that you honor yourself as a ‘baki’
(proficient) in gittin’ yet still asked that I send you a primer of its basic
laws and then treat it as a joke, clearly [from the get Rav Moshe later
received] not even looking at it…”
Rav Moshe then methodically shares with this rabbi each of the many
halachic concerns with this get, including how even some of the names
in the get were spelled incorrectly.
Rav Moshe concludes the printed teshuva with a rare afterward:
“After waiting a long time -until adar of 5689/1929 -and never receiving
[anything from this rabbi], because she is an agunah, I relied on what I
wrote [to Rav Abramsky]…and she may now marry…may Hashem aid
me in never stumbling, heaven forfend, in a matter of halacha, ever”
A noted posek shared with me a fascinating postscript to the above.
Rav Nota Greenblatt, himself a talmud muvhak of Rav Moshe, told this
posek that this Houston rav “Iz nit gevein ah katil kanya (see Shabbos
95a); eir iz geven ah gantz feiner Talmud chacham -he was no
simpleton, but a real talmud chacham”.
Issues with gittin and local rabbanim can still arise. In 2008, I
composed the following invitation to all Young Israel rabbanim:
“Rabbanim Chashuvim,
“It is a seminal moment for a young rav when HaRav Nota
Greenblatt is called upon to assist in a get…having a competent posek
on ‘standby’ -willing to fly out at a moment’s notice - is an invaluable
resource...one small error on our part can, for example, create a get
me’usah, R”l.
“…We have arranged a ‘shiur klali’ on the topic of ‘Gittin
L’Maaseh’ to be delivered by Rav Greenblatt, and open only to
rabbannim…primarily focusing on matters critical for the ‘local rav’.
This is an exceptional opportunity…”
Aside for the obvious, the patient reader will be rewarded with a
deeper connection the above -and what follows - has with the history
of our early rabbanim.
In gittin, exactitude and meticulousness are indispensable; an error
of omission or commission in any number of details can void the divorce
contract in its entirety, possibly leading to the sullying of kedushas
Yisroel, R”l.
Simply determining the name(s) and spelling(s) can be mystifying
to even the most erudite masmid.
For instance, does ‘Monsey’ derive from the Munsee Indians
(thereby necessitating an aleph)? Why is Muncie, Indiana spelled
differently? (For the full story behind Monsey’s first get, The Jewish
Observer, kislev 1976, by Rav Aryeh Kaplan, ‘A Get In Monsey’, p. 15-
19)
Related confusion was found in Brisk, which was known by three
different names! (On Brisk, see Pischei Teshuva, even haezer, siman,
128:31)
It is astonishing to consider that even the uncommon expertise of
‘historical etymology’ becomes indispensable in writing gittin – ‘hufuch
buh’, indeed!
I will share two examples, which will both show its complexity and
serve the reader in understanding the connection these halachos have
with our history.
A get will include both a city’s name and the name(s) of its water
sources (see shu”t HaRan 42 with Shulchan Aruch, ibid.; cf. shu”t
HaRosh 45;21). Not only does this remove the concern of confusing a
get with that of another other city of the same name, but also because of
consistency, as water sources will often maintain their original
designations, even if/when its nearby city changes its name in the future.
- Queens and Brooklyn include the phrase ‘…al nehar east
river…’EDITOR-keep ellipses, as more waters are named before
and after. While this seems redundant - as ‘nehar’ already means
river or lake, thus translating to ‘East River river’ -Rav Moshe
Feinstein asserts that ‘east’ is not seen as a descriptive alone, but
part of its title (Igros Moshe, even haezer 4:101, end).
- What about Houston, Texas -the city Rav Moshe mentioned
above, in 1928? On the one hand, its pronounced youston, so yud,
vav, samech, tes, nun would be its get spelling. On the other hand,
on the Lower East Side is the famed ‘Houston Street’, which is
pronounced howston! This shift in pronunciation derives from
their two distinct origins. The street is named for one of
America’s founding fathers, George Houston (d. 1813), who
indeed pronounced it howston. The southern city is named for the
Texas revolutionary general Sam Houston (d. 1863), who
pronounced it youston!
While we spell it in a get ‘youston’ (yud, vav, samech…), in Rav
Moshe’s first teshuva above he first spells it ‘howston’ (hei, vav,
yud…), switching in a later teshuva to the way we spell it today.
In the sefer Ha’aretz L’Areha, the posek and get expert Rav
Menachem Mendel Senderovic, shlita, shares a 1963 get from
Houston still spelling it ‘howston’, although he agrees with the
‘you’ spelling utilized today (p. 36, s.v. ‘houston’).
All of the above should make the point that to discover who the early
talmidei chachamim were in any given city, one can start by discovering
said city’s earliest get. Indeed, this sefer is one of my ‘go-to’ references
for this summer series.
In Buffalo -the city we have spent this summer discussing - some of
the earliest gittin were written by Rav Dov Ber Zuckerman (see ibid. p.
9, s.v. ‘buffalo’).
Who was this gaon? And who were the others that served this city
after the passing of the already discussed rebbe, Rav Rabinovitch, and
Vilna’s Rav Franklin?
The reader may be surprised…
To be continued next week, iy”H.

Rabbi Moshe Taub - 2015 (Unpublished)
^{Throughout the centuries other ideas have been introduced to solve various agunah concerns, such as Rav Singer of Galicia’s method for soldiers pre-World War 1. Although this method found prominent support, it offers no advantage in a modern setting for reasons too broad to go into here (see Rav Singer’s great nephew’s Grey Matter [Rav Jachter] for further discussion of this method. See also Igros Moshe ibid. 111).
Other methods have been proposed by such luminaires as Rav Henkin zt’l, but were unfeasible, often dubious and were ultimately retracted (see also Rav Ahron Kotler, Mishnas Rav Ahron 60).
In the 1920’s a sefer was composed titled ‘Ein Tnai B’kidushin’ which came to oppose directly the many innovative ideas that were being introduced at the time. This sefer comes with a haskama and a halachic history lesson by Rav Chaim Ozer zt’l.
These names and histories are important because the relatively modern prenuptial agreement comes to assuage many of the known prior concerns.
The chief novelty of the modern prenup is simple (what follows is not meant as an exhaustive review):
To take advantage of the husband’s halachic obligation to support his wife.
Why not put that in writing, either before (prenup) or after (postnup) marriage stating that, should it, chalila, come to such a point, they will settle their divorce through the arbitration of a reputable beis din? But more: The chosson would further agree that should the marriage dissolve to the point that his wife lives away from him –or he from her- then he should pay her $X per day (about $150 changing for inflation and customary needs) in living expenses [an anyway existing obligation of mezonos or extra mezanos] until such time that a get is delivered.
This would greatly dissuade a husband from withholding or preventing a get, and should secular courts honor such agreements (and it seems as if they would) this would leave him few places to hide.
The geonim, such as Rav Willig, who helped compose this prenup reached out to prominent poskim in Eretz Yisroel, such as Rav Ovodia Yoseph and Rav Asher Zelig Weiss, who either verbally or in writing supported this new idea.
While we will name below the many geonim who outright support this prenup, it is important to point out that some supporters’ positions on this matter is not as black and white as it may first seem.
Rav Asher Zelig Weiss, for instance, certainly does not agree with the composers shlita on every point. Most extraordinary is his point of departure on the knas/fine itself. He points out in his public letter of support that the wife will not in reality have an automatic claim on this money (due to homotzi meichaveiro aluv haraya – as the husband could say ‘kim li’ [a halachic tool beyond the scope of this short monograph])! While he agrees that there is no halachic concern with the prenup, he raises this (and other) weaknesses in the power this arrangement will serve, as well as challenging its historical precedent, most critically that contra Rav Willig, the Nachalas Shiva’s form can not serve as precedent to the modern prenup.
Rav Zalman Nechemia Goldberg is also quoted as supporting this prenup, and is listed as such on the RCA’s prenup website.
However, some have pointed out (see ‘Communications’, Tradition 44:1) that he may have retracted or clarified his position. The idea that the husband obligates himself to waive certain rights and to also finically support his wife daily may only be done, he says, if there is no other ulterior motive involved; it must be done simply so as to attend to his wife’s needs (for reasons made clear below).
In addition, some of the rabbanim who have been quoted in certain non-rabbinic venues and blogs as newly or for the first time publicly supporting the prenup have a far more nuanced position than as described. Some are listed as supporters simply based on the fact that they are known to support people or organizations that themselves support this new prenup. While these poskim may perhaps also support this modern prenup, such chad gadya’s are not the way of discovery on the matter.
One prominent posek named in one such article as a supporter told me over the phone that he would not urge its use (for reasons beyond the scope of this article) and he only said that such a prenup does not invalidate the get.
This is an important leniency in and of itself. A common misconception among the laity is that we can force a husband to write a get. In fact, a get meusah/a forced get is invalid in most instances, to the point that before a husband gives a get the mesader get will ask him if there is anything obligating him to give it!
The Rashba writes in a teshuvah that should a husband even except upon himself a knas (fine) should he not give a get (e.g. “If I don’t give a get in 10 days then I will give $100,000 to Ploni”) such a get would be deemed a get meusa (a forced get) and be pasul. The Rama (siman 134) paskens that we should be machmir like the Rashba.
Some, then, may argue that the modern prenuptial agreement, where the husband sets a fine for each day that he does not give a get, would be precisely what the Rashba ruled is forbidden!
However, one could retort (as does Rav Asher Zelig Weiss, and this other prominent posek with whom I spoke) that this prenuptial agreement does not tie his obligational payment to giving or not giving the get, rather the giving of a get would stop current payment, a payment which anyway his kesubah obligates him to.
While there are certainly prominent poskim who support this prenup, such as Rav Ovadia Yosef (although some contest the strength of this endorsement– see R. Shalom C. Spira, 5th edition, A:26) Rav Chaim Zimbalist, Rav Reiss, Rav Shachter and Rav Willig and many others, there are many who are parve or opposed to it.
Rav Aviner, one of the leading daati leumi poskim in Israel opposes the prenup and quotes Rav Shternbuch of the eidah hachareidis as saying that it could lead to what would be tantamount to a coerced get.
Regarding Rav Elyashiv’s view, it gets a little interesting. One of the central debates surrounding the prenup is the issue of asmachta –a commitment that is dependent on other factors and toward which the agree-er does not really expect to happen. A groom signing this document on his happiest day likely can’t truly and honestly imagine getting into a disagreement with his new bride let alone divorcing her! Therefore, perhaps, anything he agrees to in a prenup is voided!
While many debate this issue back and forth, Rav Willig proves from a teshuvah of Rav Elyahsiv (1:163) that this type of asmachta would be of no concern. However elsewhere, ironically, it is Rav Elyahsiv himself -in a latter teshuva in his next volume - who seems to disallow the entire enterprise of such prenups to begin with!
I recall several years ago there was a meeting with several kashrus organizations. At the time there was an issue relating to kashrus that had kosher world in a dither. There was much ambiguousness among the Jewish world as to what the right thing to do was and whether ‘this’ was allowed or not, as the rabbanim too were divided and, some, unclear on the matter.
Rav Shmuel Kamanetzky rose to speak and after giving his view on the matter at hand he suggested that perhaps in the future before announcing a concern to the public we should first wait for clarity.
While every posek and organization that works with poskim has an obligation to share their view (see hakdama to Igros Moshe), it would be wise for citizen journalists, well intentioned as they may be, not to confuse the masses with tales of consensus before there is any.
On this matter of prenups, boruch Hashem, all parties involved are talmidei chachamim par excellence and lshem shomayim, and consensus, should it come at all, will take time.
In the meantime, each of us should simply follow our own rebbeim on the matter.
Let us hope that our respect for the halachik process will be a zechus toward the agunos of today and help prevent any agunah of tomorrow.}

But we must not forget the other type of Agunah:

It would seem that even without this ban -and also for Sefardim that do fall under this injunction -it would anyway, today, be forbidden to be married to more than one wife at a time:

This is not to mention Chazal's View on this issue:

יוֹם טוֹב שֵׁנִי לְגַבֵּי מֵת כְּחוֹל שַׁוְּיוּהּ רַבָּנַן - BEITZA 6b
With regard to the dead, the Sages equated the legal status of
the second Festival day with that of a weekday

Rav Eliezer Landau of Brody

Shu't Chasam Sofer 1:145 in Response to Rav Shlomo Kluger:

WITH THE ABOVE LENGTHY INTRO TO THIS TOPIC, WE CAN NOW LOOK INTO THE MANY METHODS USED OVER THE YEARS TO HELP AGUNOS....

Shul Chronicles 242
Rabbi Moshe Taub
Killing the Enemy
Ethics of War
(Part 3)
When peace comes, we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons. – Golda Meir
The questions of the ethics of war may seem oxymoronic. Isn’t the purpose of war to kill people and destroy things?
However, halachah is replete with guidelines for ethical conduct in war, to the point of warning us not to cut down fruit trees in the heat of battle. Indeed, after the Iraq invasion of 2003, the American administration was reproached for not defending landmarks and artifacts more carefully. It would seem that as Jews, we should relate to such a charge.
Recently The Jerusalem Post covered issues of halachah and war, in particular the treatment of captured killers and terrorists. While there are many issues that fall under this rubric, we will focus here on the issue of whether a subdued terrorist may be killed. What follows is a discussion of Talmudic law and not of practice.
From the article:
“Several senior rabbis have raised a heated debate in the last few days over the approach in Jewish law toward a terrorist who has committed a terror attack but is subsequently wounded and incapacitated. …
“Rabbi David Stav said that the nation was facing trying and difficult times but insisted that a terrorist who has committed an attack but has been wounded and therefore no longer represents a threat should not be further harmed.
“‘In these days in which the blood is boiling...it is important to preserve our moral superiority: [We must] not harm those who are not involved in murderous acts, and we must not harm those who have already been neutralized and do not represent a threat,’ the rabbi ruled.
“Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, municipal chief rabbi of Safed, reacted to Stav’s comments and said a terrorist who had committed murder should himself be killed.
“’It is forbidden to leave a murderer alive,’ Eliyahu told the Galei Yisrael radio station on Wednesday. He accused Tzohar rabbis of ‘forgetting Jewish law’ and said ‘they are only interested in looking good to non-Jews.’”
This is a most serious issue, one best left to our greatest poskim and those who live in Eretz Yisrael. Following is a review of some of the factors involved in making such a decision.
First, Rav Moshe Feinstein, zt”l, recognized that not all cases are equal when it comes to imposing the death penalty for a criminal act. In a famous teshuvah to the governor of New York,¹ he outlined how halachah views the death penalty. Rav Moshe sought to dissuade the governor from using the death penalty, explaining that one of the reasons the Torah prescribes it is to impress upon us the egregiousness of certain acts and that the halachic bar is set too high to allow regular use of such punishment.
Nevertheless, he ends with the following message: “The above is true regarding crimes of passion…but if people are killing because of cruelty and because the lives of others are meaningless to them…or if there appear to be many murderers,” a country must do what is in its best interest.
It would seem that a country that is under constant attack and is therefore in a perpetual state of war has every right at least to consider whether such terrorists deserve to be put to death by the state.
Noncombatants
The Ramban and Rambam famously debate the general question of war as it pertains to ostensibly innocent civilians. The debate, which is based on Shimon and Levi’s battle over their sister Dina’s abduction, is germane to the question of captured terrorists.
The Ramban believed that Shimon and Levi’s decision to kill all the males of Shechem was an error, one for which Yaakov reprimanded them. After all, why should the city’s ordinary citizens have been held accountable for the action of their leaders? How could they have stopped it?
Rambam, however, believes that the citizens were not powerless; in fact, they had failed to fulfill the universal obligation to establish justice systems. Because setting up courts is one of the seven Noachide laws, those who fail to do so are equally liable to death.
In Gur Aryeh, the Maharal seeks to combine these two views. He suggests that although, on one hand, the civilians of Shechem cannot be held responsible, the rules in a time of war are different. A nation must respond to threat with force so as to end present and future danger, and this means that civilians may be affected. While this position is not an argument for the capricious killing of civilians, the Maharal does seem to support strategic strikes even if noncombatants will be harmed.
A quick look at modern warfare would support a silent secular agreement with the Maharal’s view. From the United States’ recent bombing of a hospital (purported to be an accident) to the more than 100,000 victims of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which brought World War II to an end, it seems that world powers are resigned to such carnage when it is absolutely necessary.
In the case of a captured terrorist, therefore, it seems there may be support for a country under attack to carry out unceremonious executions of captured killers, since this is a means of deterring the enemy.
Rodef
Even when in a situation involving two Jews, the Torah makes it very clear that one is allowed to kill a pursuer (rodef) in self-defense. We should also point out parenthetically that the Bach and the Shach discuss the issur of retzichah and whether it is suspended during a time of war for the zayin amim.²
Although a terrorist is clearly a rodef, a halachic pursuer whom we are permitted to kill, we can only do so if there is no other way of stopping him. As Chazal point out, if one can stop a pursuer by shooting him in a limb, for example, that is all that would be allowed. Someone in captivity is already immobilized, so what allowance would there be to kill him based on the principle of rodef?
One may argue that a subdued terrorist should be seen as a passive pursuer. This means there are times when the mere presence of an innocent person is dangerous³—for example, a case where a baby’s crying will alert the enemy to one’s presence, or when the enemy orders a community to hand over an innocent person on the threat that they will all be killed otherwise. In such a case, halachah will sometimes view the innocent person as a rodef.⁴
Based on this idea of a “passive rodef,” perhaps one can argue that the fact that we choose to keep enemy prisoners alive and in relatively good health during a time of war only emboldens the enemy to continue killing us. Astonishingly, the average weight gain among al-Qaeda detainees in American hands is about twenty pounds!⁵
However, all of this is academic as many poskim contend that the halachah of dina d’malchusa (adhering to modern secular law) outweighs the halachos of redifah. This means that even if a cogent halachic argument can be made for putting to death a captured killer, there would be little an IDF soldier could do about it legally.
Sofek Rodef: A Possible Future Rodef
The issue of prisoner exchanges is a related—and volatile—issue that we have discussed in the past (see issue 43, “Gilad Shalit: Sundry Matters”). According to those poskim who favor such exchanges, killing the terrorist may mean eliminating a real negotiating tool. This is not to support such an argument, of course, but simply to raise awareness of it.
Indeed, strong disapproval of such exchanges based on the argument that they may result in Jewish deaths may actually be an argument in favor of execution, because it prevents dangerous terrorists from being returned to the street. Yet at most, such an argument would only make the captured terrorist a safek rodef (possible rodef).
Aside from the fact that the principle of dina d’malchusa dina eclipses such arguments, Rav Chaim Ozer and many others⁶ argue that a possible rodef is not the same as a rodef.
Geneva Conventions
Even if we could resolve all of the dilemmas raised thus far, perhaps the most critical issue is how the state of Israel and halachah should view the rules of war established at the Geneva Convention, as well as various United Nations agreements.
Rav Chaim Jachter, after a lengthy treatment of the issue of killing innocents in wartime, cites the following passage from The Case for Israel by famed professor Allen Dershowitz, in support of the argument that not all international laws, or countries following them, are created equal:
“Although collective punishment is prohibited by international law, it is widely practiced throughout the world, including the most democratic and liberty-minded countries. Indeed, no system of international deterrence can be effective without some reliance on collective punishment. Every time one nation retaliates against another, it collectively punishes citizens of that country. The American and British bombings of German cities punished the residents of those cities. The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed thousands of innocent Japanese for the crimes of their leaders. The bombing of military targets inevitably kills civilians.”
In other words while there are certainly agreements like the Geneva Conventions, there seems to be surreptitiously accepted understandings, practices and immunities in a time of war. This is without even addressing the latest United States targeted drone killings, which some argue are questionable according to a strict reading of codified international law.
Chillul Hashem
Above all, we must be mindful of chillul Hashem.
Let us conclude with the words of Rav Yehudah Henkin, grandson of Rav Yosef Eliyahu Henkin, one of the great poskim of the last generation, and the father of Eitam Henkin, who was murdered along with his wife, Naama, during Sukkos in what is now viewed as the beginning of the current wave of attacks.
In his halachic work Bnai Banim⁷ he focuses on questions similar to the ones we have raised here. He writes that even in war, regardless of what halachah permits, we also must be concerned about chillul Hashem.
He points to Sefer Yehoshua (ch. 9), in which the Givonim fool Bnei Yisrael into entering into an alliance with them and allowing them to remain alive. The Gemara⁸ wonders why this treaty was not voided as soon as the ruse was discovered. The Gemara answers, “In order to sanctify Hashem’s Name”; Rashi explains that Yehoshua was concerned about the Jewish army’s reputation among the nations if it did not honor its treaties.
It is of interest, I believe, that while the Gemara uses a positive expression (“due to a kiddush Hashem”), the Rambam, in codifying as law the story of the Givonim,⁹ uses the negative (“due to a chillul Hashem”). The indication is that even during a war, when defending ourselves is a top priority, we must find ways to prevent a chillul Hashem—as well as going out of our way (if it won’t put lives at risk) to create an active kiddush Hashem.
May we achieve both of these ideals, maintaining our achdus as we debate these serious matters. And may these attacks end quickly, leaving all such questions academic in nature as we herald Moshiach Tzidkeinu.
NOTES
1. Igros Moshe Choshen Mishpat 2:68.
2. See Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah, siman 158:1. Regarding the application of this concept today, see, for example, Rambam Hilchos Melachim 5:4, and Tashbeitz 93.
3. See Rama Yoreh Deah 157:1 et al.
4. See note 20 in Rabbi Bleich’s “Torture and the Ticking Time Bomb” for further details on this type of rodef.
5. USA Today, 10/3/06. See also the thorough study conducted by Seton Hall’s Center for Research and Development, which reports that 50.67% of the detainees housed there are overweight!
6. See the strong words of Rav Moshe in Choshen Mishpat 2:69:4.
7. Vol. 3, maamar 4, page 4, 185-194.
8. Gittin 46.
9. Hilchos Melachim 6:5.