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Exams and “tracking” (arranging students in classes based on how they do in exams) are something “new” even for the goyim form whom we copied them. They should be considered suspect since they are a “hiddush” and are a “hiddush” that was copied from the goyim. And among the goyim, there is much concern that the focus on exams and the resulting tracking is counterproductive and detracts from education.
147: Nothing in American history suggests that religious persecution and harassment would lead to large scale pogroms or death camps. It might lead to us moving elsewhere, probably to one of the more conservative countries. A fact to consider is that many Christian groups are being subjected to similar persecutions (so perhaps one impact might be a movement, already happening, of frum Jews moving out of New York to “red” states, rather than to a foreign country (particularly since the conservative countries tend to be very poor such as in Africa or persecute frum Jews such as those run by zionists or Muslims). Also remember that most anti-semitism (defined as persecuting orthodox Jews) comes from secular Jews, and secular Jews are very concentrated in the “blue” states – a “holcaust” would have to come from goyim and we get along fairly well with American goyim.
It’s actually not round but more like a slightly misshapen circle.
If you managed to walk on a give line of latitude or longitude you would end up at the same place except for problems such as ocean, mountains and other obstacles.
Everyone has always known the earth was roughly “round”. It isn’t hard to figure out since if it were flat the horizon wouldn’t disappear. The issue in 1492 was the size of the earth (Columbus had it wrong and thought the earth was much smaller, the general scientific consensus was correct as to size, and had the Americas not been there a crew sailing west would have died of thirst and starvation before reaching Asia). No ever thought that anyone believed it was flat (except so not very bright public school teachers, who probably moonlight teaching in day schools).
DaMoshe: In the old days they had all these sorts of rules – in the public schools. It’s not that we have been building up chumros, but that the goyim (and that includes non-frum Jews) have become less tznius than in the past. We haven’t changed, but it is more noticable.
Today, if you see someone wearing a skullcap in public, you assume it is something unusual and probably religious (orthodox Jews, some Muslims, and some Christian clergy – but no one else). In the past in western countries skullcaps were common among all goyim, and back then no one thought that a yarmulke was a distinctly Jewish thing. It isn’t we adopted a chumra to wear a kippah – rather our style of head covering is no longer fashionable among the goyim.
Who came up with the idea of single couples going to a hotel lobby. To the rest of the world it looks incredibly improper.
If the minimum wage is set at or below what would normally be negotiated for an unskilled, untrained workers, it has no impact other than for n individual is not very good at negotiating, in which case the minimum wage helps him/her. If on the other hand, the minimum wage is set at higher than what would be worked out by the law of supply and demand, it helps those individuals who get the jobs, but results in employers cutting back employment (using automation, outsourcing, etc.). For example if the minimum wage is $10/hour, an employer will choose not to hire an employee who is not producing $10 of extra profits every hour – the higher the wage, the harder it is to justify the employee.
The Democrats believe that most employers are making a huge profit on each employee, and therefore the employers will not reduce employment if forced to raise wages. The Republicans tend to feel that the law of supply and demand works so that wages stay in sync with profits, and therefore raising the minimum wage about what would be produced by a free market results in lower employment.
Blame the goyim and the frei Yidden. When the goyim went around with respectable clothes, no one noticed that we were wearing proper clothes as well.
lesschumras: There are no expenses requires for a Bar Mitzvah, nor for a Bas Mitzvah. Almost any shul will give the boy an aliya, and if you do it on Monday or Thursday they never expect a donation. Actually, the aliyah is just a way of showing off that “I am now an adult”. Suppose he did something else like enter into a contract to show he had reached adulthood– not a good idea. You become Bar MItzvah automatically on your birthday – no ceremony required.
Ah, you like to spend lots of money on parties — well that’s a different matter and is totally unrelated to the halachos of Bnei Mitzvah.
The situation is quite common with Baalei Tseuvah, and will increasingly be so in the future since after several generations it will be impossible to determine the validity of the conversion of one’s maternal-side great-great-grandmother.
However if someone has grown up thinking they are Jewish, and is already Shomer Mitsvos, and then discovers a reason to believe they may not be Jewish afterall, geirus is not a big deal (nothing to learn since they’ve learned it already, no concern about observance since they have been observing). The “problems” with conversion deal with the convert having to learn enough to know what they are getting into so they can make a valid choice, and resolving doubts about sincerity — none of which are applicable when someone who is already living a frum life discovers the non-Jewish ancestor that creates the safek.
Most translations are little better the gibberish, at least if you are translating Hebrew into English. Hebrew into Aramaic is much better, as well as Yiddish into English. The published translations are usable if you read and can understand the original and read them together (using the translation as a de facto dictionary with words in context). Assume that if you’ve relied on a translation, you get about half the content of the original. If you believe you have learned something and have relied on a translation, you have deceived yourself. A big reason the goyim have weird ideas about Taanach is their “Bible” is a translation.
The problem is that Hebrew is a Semitic language, meaning it has only two tenses, and since it is inflected can get away with a fluid sort of syntax (English has a rigid syntax relying on word order and over a dozen tenses, not to mention moods).
The percentage of orthodox Jews (the only market for sefarim) who speak English is falling steadily since the Hebrew-speaking and Yiddish-speaking components of the Jewish world are better at reproducing.
Translations between Semitic languages, such as those of the Judeo-Arabic classics (e.g. Kuzari), or translations of Aramaic into Hebrew (e.g. restatement of the gemara into Hebrew) are less problematic.
1. Unless you hold there is a prohibition of celebrating a birthday, why not celebrate her 12th. It’s a birthday party.
2. For boys, the ceremony involves doing things a boy at 13 can do which he couldn’t previously, but is limited to things that are not dangerous (having an aliyah and leading a minyan). Most other things one can do as a Bar Mitzvah (sign contracts, get married, be liable for criminal punishments, etc. – are not done for obivious reasons). For girls, the only big change is they can do all the “dangerous” things boys can, but which we don’t want them to. There really isn’t anything as 12 year old girl can do, that we want her to, that she couldn’t before.
1. In the United States, non-government schools are not legally required to use teachers with any specific academic training, degree or certification. Interesting, the leading private schools (the “prep” schools frequently hire teachers based on competence and academic skills while ignoring teaching certification.
2. The more “modern” a school is, the more likely the teachers will have American academic credentials, but that is a matter of preference, not law.
catch yourself: Eighty years ago fedoras has a status similar to baseball caps today. Who know’s someday, baseball caps will be worn only by Jews, and will become formal expensive dress hats. Would anyone 300 years ago imagine that a round fur hat would some day be seen as something “Jewish”? Fashion changes rapidly among the goyim.
The only beged with an halachic status is the tallis (gadol and katan), and perhaps the gartel. Everything else is just a fashion statement – which isn’t today that Yidden, like everyone else, need to pay attention to what fashion statements they make.
They are a style. Halacha is only you have to wear a hat at certain (okay, almost all) times.
The goyim no longer wear fut hats. In America, they ceased being popular about 200 years ago. In Eastern Europe they lasted longer. Some cavalry were still wearing them up until the 20th century (when hats lost popularity among the military since they had to switch to metal helmets).
In America it has become a style among Jews. That gives it a halachic status, more so then when it was a sort of hat everyone wore. Similar things have happened to frock coats (our kapotes) and fedoras.
Like all clothing, they tend to “make a statement”. The only way to avoid making a statement with one’s clothes is to dress like everyone around you, and then you are making a statement that you are like everyone around you.
Avi K (on Jews being left wing in terms of economics)-
We have a “welfare state” mentality – under halacha, the community had a duty to help the poor – the Beis Din could order you to give more tsadakah when needed. Communities heavily taxed individuals to support the poor. This is unlike the goyim who until the 20th century considered welfare to be something that was none of the government’s business. Whether in Israel or America, Jews take naturally to the idea that the poor should be helped, and that explains why we tend to be comfortable with the left-wing position on government welfare, entitlements, etc.
The traditional conservative position was that giving tsadakah deprived the poor of an incentive to work and created dependency – and therefore one shouldn’t give them anything since it would hurt them in the long run. This was part of the “protestant ethic” in western culture but is alien to our culture. Indeed, one can argue that the introduction of public welfare and the many entitlement programs was an example of Jewish influence in America.
1. They aren’t “pro-Islam” but rather they are frequently in a situation of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. Radical Islam is opposed to the western civilization, and dislikes Jews and Christians in particular – meaning they are opposed to something the “Left” dislikes.
2. The Muslim worlds is very left-wing in economics (as are orthodox Jews), and for the most part ignore racial and ethnic boundaries.
3. The western left is increasingly isolationist meaning they prefer not to be involved with all those foreign cultures (whom they consider horribly inferior though they don’t say it). Not wanting to fight Muslims doesn’t mean they like them – they want to ignore them. For example, many Brits were very isolationist in the 1930s, and didn’t object to Hitler until he tried to conquer their country.
Barukh ha-Shem we live at a time when people feel they need to spend thousands of dollars on weddings and tens of thousands to establish a household. Seventy years ago (1945 to be exact, BTW, happy V-E day) most frum Jews would be happy to be able to manage with an improvised hupah and enough rolls to be able to make a shevah brachos and a roof over their heads.
People have been schmoozing in shul for centuries if not millenia. We know this from all the halachic literature complaining about the problem. So we should all shut up, be self-righteous (we aren’t the ones doing it), and live with it.
Francorachel3: There is no halachic or legal requirement that parents must by the newlyweds an apartment, or anything for the matter. If they have no money, the parents must make a gift of money to pay for the ring (or whatever) since the halacha is that the hasan has to own the ring in order to give it to the kallah.
People who think they are too fancy to be poor will eventually come to their senses. They should do tseuvah and return to the traditional derekh of the Bnei Torah, who focused on midos and building families – not showing off material wealth.
Is the complaint about getting married (as opposed to being single or “living in sin” as the goyim say), or about making a wedding.
Being married is probably cheaper than living separately, and if everyone waited until they were fully able to get married humanity would probably have become extinct a long time ago (which is probably why we are designed to have a biological urge to get married at an age when most people are unlikely to be financially secure). It’s always been this way. Among many goyim they put off getting married until they are ready, and then are too old to start a family.
A wedding isn’t all that expensive. There is no halacha about needing a fancy hall, fancy meal, photographer or band. A kesubah is inexpensive. By most opinions, if the wedding ring is too expensive it might be a shailoh (since expensive would involve easy to fake gems). You should have ten adult males present but that’s a humrah. The seudah requires rolls to wash on.
Is there a heter for ??? ?? to be thieves? If not, why would the question arise.
What if a rav tells you something is kosher, but you with your greater knowledge of subject know it is treff. Consider something such as beer and spirits with most rabbanim hold by ingredient kashruth, meaning someone with greater knowledge of the industry may be aware something is not kosher.
While it would be hard to come up with a scenario of a holocaust-like destruction of American Jews (death camps, etc.). It is easy to come up with a situation in which Orthodox Jews are persecuted to an extent that would force emmigration (bans on Bris Milah and Kashrus, ban on “homophobic” schools, no tax exemptions for religious institutions that don’t endorse the gay and feminist agendas, etc.). But that wouldn’t be “racial” (in fact, secular Jews would be the leading advocates of such laws), and would affect many other religious minorities (some of whom are only now finding out they are minorities).
GingerKale: The Zionists claim that HASHEM had no role in their conquest of Eretz Yisrael. And it was them who were do the conquering. Note how they honor their army, not HASHEM, on their independence day.
And while the community in Eretz Yisrael was seriously damaged by the Romans (a.k.a. Byzantines, who were the same thing) and the Crusaders (“Franks” a.k.a. European Christians), it was immediately rebuilt (and under Islamic rule, BTW).
Joseph: Does that make them anti–[whatever}
Well yes.
Bnei Torah worry about frumekit and midos, not politics, income, ethnicity, physical appearance. In other words, the things that matter according to halacha and Jewish tradition (which from our perspective, are the same).
An Am ha-Aretz might worry about other things, a Ben Torah doesn’t.
gavra-at-work: If Israel goes to war against the United States (declared or otherwise, enough if the US is support sanctions similar to those used against North Korea today or South Africa 30 years ago), it would probably lead to an awkward situation for most American Jews, but still wouldn’t lead to a holcaust. It might lead to most zionists being forced to move to Israel, but that’s all. Under American law as now understood, one couldn’t round up Muslim citizens (though aliens of a hostile country can be interned and deported). The only acts of genocide in American history (the “middle passage” and the Indian removals) were both illegal at the time, and did not involve systematic mass murder, and wouldn’t of happened with better communications.
If Israel and the United States ever find themselves at war, it would perhaps lead to expulsion and forced migration, not death camps.
If the parents are frum, talk to their rabbi. Almost by definition, a frum family is more concerned about the frumkeit of a prospective son-in-law than any other factor. Halacha says you can disregard them (i.e. “elope” most probably), but their rabbi might persuade them to be cooperative.
If her family isn’t frum, ignore them and elope (they will be angrier about her becoming frum than what the grandchildren look like).
“Folk stories” have a life of their own, sometimes existing over many centuries. The names get filled in as relevant to each telling. They aren’t historic documents. I suspect on further research you’ll find versions of the story going very far back.
To use an American example, the folk story of George Washington and the cherry tree is clearly impossible, yet it is a valid folk story on the importance of honesty. That it is historically impossible doesn’t detract from it.
The caption should have been in the singular. There are many yeshivos today (Baruch ha-Shem) with many styles of learning.
A ordinary thing that is a problem according to halacha and kabbalah:
Raising an army and conquering Eretz Yisrael from the goyim. You would think its a normal thing to do since it is our homeland and we were there first (ignoring the DNA evidence suggesting the Palestinians are largely descended from Jews – something they vehemently deny). Yet it is prohibited.
Since you dealing with “alternative history” you need to define a “point of departure”.
The most common scenario involves the United States losing World War II (the war presumably ends with the East Coast under German occupation, and the West Coast under Japanese occupation). While the US was planning how to resist a German invasion (e.g. plans for falling back from the coast, disucssing the possibility of seizing Canada if after a British surrender they also surrendered, etc.), that really wasn’t so likely. Once the United States cut a deal with the Brits that if the British Isles fell, the Royal Navy would not be turned over to the Germans, this wasn’t a big threat. However if one comes up with a way the Germans win (probably starting with a British surrender, with the Royal Navy being surrendered intact to the Kriegsmarine), and assuming the Germans managed to pull it off, it is reasonable to ask what Americans would have done. I suspect that Americans would have been a lot tougher to occupy than Europeans, given a stronger tradition of local government, a militia tradition, extreme xenophobia, and a strong tradition of private gun ownership. The fact that racism in America was always directed towards Blacks more than Jews makes it further unlikely.
The other possibility is to come up with a scenario for an anti-semitic government to be elected in the United States. The truth is that isn’t likely unless you point of departure is incredibly early (perhaps going back to George Washington’s decision to establish a non-sectarian Continental Army, which led diredctly to a federal government that separated Church and state (remember the official church in New England was banned in most of the rest of the country). However once religious diversity became ingrained in American culture, oppressing any religious group became unlikely (at least, unless the group itself became hihgly political, such as the Mormons in the 19th century). The fact is that onoly anti-semitic politicians were always seens as jerks and marginalized, and in addition, bigots in America were more focused on Blacks and Catholics than Jews.
Thus a holcaust aimed at Jews in America would really be quite unlikely.
1. The Baltimore-Washington Metropolitan Area is one city. People commute both ways. In many ways, Baltimore is the “Brooklyn” of the Metroplitan Area (somewhat depresses, less expensive, more ethnic, more working class).
2. The riot was no where’s near the frum community. The major impact was a curfew forcing stores to close early, and minor disruptions for commuters using the trains (those driving to DC were unaffected). There was no sign of anti-semitic mobs, and the police kept rioters out of non-black residential areas. New Yorks complaining about Baltimore don’t know what they are talking about it.
3. Most cities run by Democrats are going down the tubes, which is to say most cities. The state governments may be more of a factor since they enact anti-business legislation (which cuts off the opportunities for urban blacks to become middle class through the private sector). One should note that over the last generation there has been a steady migration of urban blacks back to the “red” southern states where there are greater economic opportunities for those looking for more than welfare or a government job. The frum community really should reconsider being concentrated in the blue states.
The frum community in Baltimore is pleasantly ghettoized, and separated from the rest of the city by a very wide avenue (Northern Parkway), several very large institutions (Sinai Hospital and Pimlico Racecourse) which are non-residential (okay, a lot of horses live in Pimlico, but there have been no report of criminality among them), and the Jones Falls (a small river and expressway).
The only serious impact of the current riot on the frum community is a city wide curfew, which I doubt will be strictly enforced in our area, though it is forcing stores to close (to let employees go home early) and interferes with late minyanim. When one looks at a crime map with little dots for reports of crimes- our neighborhood sticks out as the area with few dots.
The anti-crime community groups are usually so desperate for news that they report toys being stolen off of people’s lawns as major crimes. The fact that one can walk through the community and see toys left on the lawn speaks for itself.
But if you are really paranoid, take reassurance in the fact that one of the largest National Guard armories is in the neighborhood, along with the State Police headquarters.
Frankly I’ld worry about New York City more. You have a lot of anti-semitic leaders with real clout such as Al Sharpton. Until recently you had a mayor who made cracking down on Bris Milah as his leading health care priority. To a large extent, secular Jews control much of New York politics, and we are always “in their sights”. Several areas with large frum populations in New York have serious crime problems – which are likely to increase given your current mayor. Leaving New York City might be a good idea – and you’ll really like it in Baltimore where its quiet and safe.
The internet is whatever you make of it. Do you use email to spread lashon hora? the fault is not with the email server! Do you use the graphic browser to look at inappropriate pictures rather to access resources for learning to Torah? The fault isn’t in the browser software, its with the person who is browsing. Any bad (or good) that you can do with obsolete methods of communication and interaction (books, scrolls, talking to people, shopping, learning, working, etc.) , can be done online.
If a criminal walks up and shoots you and takes your stuff and puts it in a bag, do you blame the gun and the bag (okay, a liberal would, most conservatives would blame the theif).
If the husband moved away, the wife was still in his home. If he wanted to move his home, he would have to take her with, or give her a get. In his absence, the Beis Din would seize his assets to support his family. The American style of the husband running away and leaving the wife to go on welfare wouldn’t have worked, and the American style of trying to blackmail the wife’s family to pay for a get wouldn’t work since the Beis Din as well.
Relying on an external force to coerce a get raises a shailoh.
An agreement that the husband agrees to support his wife until a get is issued (at a level reflecting the family’s past standard of living or his income, whichever is higher) would easier to enforce than an agreement requiring him to give a get. What is a reputable Beis Din, what is coercion, etc., are tough questions. Money isn’t. And with such a contract, the woman could sue in a civil court under the contract without trying to get the government to collect support which is a much more complicated proceeding. And such agreements avoid all the issues of the various pre-nups.
The Kesubah is a pre-nup. In fact, in some states you can file a notarized kesubah in lieu of having a marriage ceremony. In court cases, some American courts hold that the kesubah requires that when the marriage ends, the parties agree to end it in accordance with halacha, as specified in the kesubah. The kesubah already requires the husband to give a get if the marriage ends, so if you make a secondary agreement contradicting the kesubah, it is inherently dubious. The secondary agreement (the secular pre-nup) implies the first agreement (the kesubah) is invalid.
And that’s before the complaints of many poskim, some of which have to do with whether an act taken pursuant to a civil court order is voluntary, and if under duress, is it then invalid.
My suggestion is to examine the historic reason why this wasn’t a problem, and I suspect you’ll find that the way it used to work was that if the husband wanted to ditch the wife, he would rush to give a get so he wouldn’t be getting the bills (since the wife could shop for anything she considered a necessity, and the husband would get the bills). Desiring to cut off paying the wife’s bills was not coercion, and would discourage refusal to give a get.
No real similarities. This wasn’t even a case of police brutality. It was a case of serious incompetence getting an accused (of very minor offenses) person killed. It’s not like they shot him or beat him. The neglected to make him wear a seatbelt (which, BTW, is illegal in Maryland). Then when the person was obviously injured they failed to get medical attention. In the future, police will make sure that prisoners be transported in the modern day “Paddy wagon” wear seatbelts – and if the person can’t breath he is rushed to the hospital.
Damage from the riot was minimal and limited to the central business district. The major disruption involved Orioles fans being told to not to leave the game early (good move, the O’s won in extra innings – dramatically since they had blown a sure win earlier in the night).
Most shuls have a large room that can be used for a wedding. The only requirement is that the room doesn’t have fixed chairs (i.e. pews), since one needs to have space to dance.(though music and dancing at a wedding while customary is not a requirement for a wedding). One should note that many rabbanim have strongly suggested a one man band at most. Actually, recorded music is cheaper.
One should note there is no halachic requirement of a video or even a professional photographer – in fact, until less than a century ago no frum wedding ever had photography.
The only requirements that can NOT be skipped are a kesubah (available at bookstores), a hupah and poles, kiddushin (a ring in most current traditions, some use a coin – and the ring can’t be too expensive since it isn’t supposed to include fancy jewels), and kosher witnesses as well as a minyan.
The government marriage license is an added expense, but skipping it causes paperwork issues and may be illegal (though the person presiding over the wedding is acting illegally, not the couple), though it doesn’t affect whether the wedding is valid under American law.
Statistics prove that most people who die have been treated by doctors. There is also strong evidence that most people treated by doctors eventually perish.
zahavasdad: The Poles had a very big army, with lots of weapons and training, and it didn’t do them much good. The French put all their resources into their army, and they got conquered after a few days of fierce combat. The truth is that Poland and France never recovered from World War II (which is why the FBI director hit a raw nerve when he criticized the Poles last week).
We put our resources into Torah and Mitsvos, and we are here. We won. You can say we won because the Americans were clever, and the British and Soviets were determined – but really, we won because instead of putting resources in warfare, we put it into serving Ha-Shem.
Sooner or later the Islamic world will get its act together, and the zionist dream will go up in smoke. The battle for Jewish survival is the one being waged today in the yeshivos, and homes, of the Bnei Torah – the battle being fought by the Israeli army is an irrelevant distraction.
Miracle, only in the sense of “Hashgacha Pratis.” Consider:
1. The Brits wanted to keep their Empire, but the Americans wouldn’t let them. By 1948 Britain was little better than a client state of the Americans. Remember the British plan was for the Israelis to lose and then ask Britain to return and save them, thereby showing how necessary the Empire was (same strategy used in Ireland and India, and failed everywhere).
2. The British and French had prevented the Arabs from building up Arab armies (since they didn’t trust them), so while Israel was invaded by “five” Arab armies, they were armies in name only – untrainined and poorly equipped. They had no meaningful naval or air forces. While the Israeli equipment was a “mash up”, Israel had a large number of well trained, combat experienced veterans including those who served in British units (both the ones recruited in Palestine and elsewhere), not to mention veterans of various resistance groups, and veterans of the various allied armies.
3. The Israelis were fighting on internal line, whereas the Arabs were split so, for example, the Egyptians couldn’t help the Syrians. The fact that the different Arab units couldn’t stand each other was also an asset.
4. Public opinion in the west strongly supported Israel. When the US arrested people for sending weapons to Israel, the juries refused to convict. While the Americans stayed neutral, and the Brits were still hoping to return, the rest of the world was anxious to see the Israelis win since it would bring down the British Empire once an for all, thus groups as divere as the Irish Republican Army, the Mafia, and the KGB helped the Israelis fet weapons.
Is a Yamaha keyboard a musical instrument? Is computer-generated music really music? Does the prohibition on listening to music apply to music produced by a sound card rather than an instrument?
Beitei medrash and shuls are open. Not everyone is goofing off. You should hang out with Bnei Torah.
Regular yeshivos wouldn’t work since people visit out of town relatives (and believe it or not, even rabbanim, not to mention talmidim, have relatives).
There is and has always been a wide gap between the halacha in the sefarim and what happens in the real world. This occurs in most legal systems, especially in domestic relations matter. Most people getting divorced do not take out a Shulhan Arukh or a gemara to research the grounds – they have decided they can’t stand each other.
One or both of them want the other to be out of his/her life. One of them, usually the man, wishes to free of having to support the wife, and that can be exploited in getting him to give a get. It is very rare that someone is refusing to give a get, and also sending money to the wife since what he wants is for her to give him money (and if the man is cheerfully paying his wife’s expenses, it suggests the issue is that he wants a reconciliation and a rationale Beis Din will stall in the hope of it happening).
The various types of coercion (throwing him in jail, beating him up, etc.) are highly dubious since in all systems a legal act done under duress is invalid. Creating an economic incentive to give a get is no coercion – thus my suggestion that the Beis Din make sure the woman (in the typical case) has a free law who can enforce the support requirements and by representing the woman if the husband goes to civil courts, create a strong incentive for him to settle (fear of having to litigate against someone with deep pockets is NOT coercion by any standard, even if it has the same effect).
Joseph: But there is a chiyuv to support one’s wife (and children) which ends when you give the get – and its a lot easier to chase after money. The problems with gittin involve men using the get for leverage, typically for money. If we focused on enforcing the financial obligation, if effect by having a collection agency attached to the Beis Din, it would incentivize the reluctant male to give the get. And while courts are reluctant to let people arbitrate complex equitable actions such as child custody, enforcing money judgments is less problematic.
The ideal solution in a failed marriage would be to structure things so the man comes running to the Beis Din, begging for permission to give the get, ASAP, before his soon to be -ex spends all his money. And if he has to worry that she’ll end up with a free lawyer – that’s more fearsome than having his shul stop giving him an aliyah. And since none of this is “coercion” in a halachic sense, no shailoh about the halachic correctness of the get.
lesshumras: One shouldn’t forget there are usually two sides to any story. Very few men claim they are not giving a “get” because they feel they can profit by blackmailing the wife’s family into giving lots of money, even though the man admits he deserves nothing. The beauty of a enforcing the rule that the man gets dunned for her expenses is that it incentivizes him to give a get withour dubious forms of coercion. Similarly, if the Beis Din can threaten to pick up her legal expenses (or his if she is being a problem, which is rare), that will greatly encourage compliance out of self-interest.
The folk saying can also refer to people who are very vulnerable should think twice before commenting, e.g., a frum person supporting laws that prohibit Islamic dress, or laws that limit the “rights” of Christians who observe a Sunday day of rest.
If the husband can not convince the court (preferably a Beis Din) to give him at least joint custody, his opinion is probably irrelevant. If the wife is guilty of serious misconduct the husband needs adequate representation in a court, but he’ll probably get custody. Allowing a husband to submit the matter to Beis Din, knowing that if the Beis Din supports his arguments, and the wife refuses to accept the Beis Din’s decision, the Beis Din will arrange adequate legal representation for him in the civil courts will probably convince the wife to compromise (and in any event the Beis Din will demand the man issue the “get” as a condition of getting support).
The problem today is that often neither party can afford legal counsel (or worse, only one can), and refusing to give the “get”, or “kidnapping” the children is the only affordable alternative for an aggreived party.
Is there a halachic issue with drinking or smoking (at proper times, of course)? Current science generally disapproves of tobacco (that wasn’t always the case, people were prescribed use of tobacco products as recently as the 20th century), and alcohol is still suggested by many reputable physicians. Neither substance is banned in the United States, meaning the Congress and state legislatures have considered the matter and believe their use should be lawful (whereas marijuana is banned by federal statute). Is this an issue of Dina malchusa dina (the American laws ban these to minors)? As long as a kid is older enough to know what alcohol and tobacco are, how is this analagous to a “blind” person.
In a community that recognizes Jewish law (there are currently none in the world except perhaps a few Muslim countries with few Jews in them), the man would be responsible for his wife’s spending until he gave the “get”, which is probably why this problem only arose recently (in modern terms, until he gives the “get”, she keeps the credit card, he keeps the bills). We should be arguing that the marriage contract includes the condition that the man will pay for the woman’s support until a “get” is given – which poses fewer problems than in arguing that the marriage contract is an agreement to arbitrate, since most state object to anyone submitting a divorce to binding arbitration (i.e. a contract to submit a divorce proceeding to a Beis Din is void as against public policy, unlike strictly monetary disputes).
The overall most effective solution would be a takanah that no one can go to a civil court to ask for a divorce or separation until they have given (and accepted) the “get”, and (THIS WOULD BE RADICAL) if one side doesn’t cooperate then the Jewish community would pay all the legal fees for the other side (probably through a public interest law firm). Faced with having to fight someone with deep pockets (i.e. the frum public interest law firm, relying on tax deductible contributions and pro bono lawyers to supplement paid staff), most people would avoid litigation.
It should be noted that whenever anyone loks for statistics, most so-called “agunahs” resolve themselves in a short period of time, suggesting that most get-refusal involves men who hope to “save the marriage”, which is normal but is also a self-limiting problem (they give up after a while).