Reply To: Siyum Hashas on eBay controversy….

It seems they say if you can’t work it out, they should arbitrate, not a beis din. OTOH, maybe agreeing in advance to a specific arbitrator would be considered communication and working it out…

Again, I am not a lawyer, but the bottom line here as it seems to me is that any terms that are listed in the auction are automatically a part of the legal contract between buyer and seller and are therefore fully legally binding. eBay does not claim the right to ammend in any way the agreement between buyer and seller and they could not even do that if they wanted to – they have no legal standing on any agreement between buyer and seller – their whole standing is individually with each of the buyer and seller and the most they could do is take down a listing in response to a complaint before the auction has ended.

I think it’s unlikely that eBay would be okay with discrimination as long as it’s spelled out in advance.

It’s not either illegal or immoral discrimination to refuse to allow Orthodox Jews to Catholic Seminaries nor discrimination to refuse Catholics to Jewish schools it’s protected First Amendment rights to conduct one’s own religion without government interference.

If it were electronics for sale then that would be potentially illegal discrimination and certainly eBay would be likely to remove the listing in response to any complaint. Furthermore in such a case even if it were successfully arbitrated by the seller in Beis Din the buyer would be able to get the arbitration thrown out by a judge on public policy grounds.

However since we are talking about Torah sponsorship eBay are highly unlikely to want to get involved in an internal religious First Amendment issue and they would not look good having the ACLU on their case (yes, the ACLU will defend such free speech and free excercise issues no matter who it’s for – even Ultra-Orthodox). As far as the law any discrimination challenge would be immediately dismissed for First Amendment reasons.

It would also be unlikely for someone who’s not a frum Yid to accept a psak from a beis din.

Any and all Courts will compel all parties to a contract to accept properly written arbitration clauses even if that arbitration is a Beis Din and there will be no way out of it, Frum or not, Jewish or not.