Solutions For Frogs Without Legs

By Rabbi Dovid E. Eidensohn/845-578-1917/eidensohnd@gmail.com

What is the problem of Frogs Without Legs? And what Solutions are there? Men with broken marriages come to me to talk about their situation. Usually they have a lot to say: the Beth Din, the Courts, this one that one was wrong, etc. Then I respond, “You are a frog without legs. A frog can swim, jump and croak. Without legs it cannot swim and jump. It can just croak. And that is exactly what so many men with broken marriages do. They croak, talk, talk, talk, but do nothing that can help their situation.”

What is the solution for the frogs? I urge them to emulate the ladies. It wasn’t so long ago that ladies were utterly denigrated and helpless. But they organized; they got media backing, formed groups to fight for their rights, and raised huge sums of money. Now they are much stronger than men. Why? Because men don’t like to organize to fight women, for whatever reason. And a lone man against an army of women is helpless.

Not long ago the New York Times featured a front page story that tells it all. President Obama threatened that he would withhold funding from Harvard if it did not accept complaints by women against men without any proof, even though complaints by men against women required proof. Forty law professors from Harvard then signed a complaint that if men cannot complain against women without proof, but women can complain about men without proof, there is an unconstitutional gender bias favoring women. This is one of the small attempts by men in America, not the religious men, to assert their rights in a world that backs ladies in an unconstitutional way.  But religious men don’t assert themselves. They are frogs without legs. Thus, even though secular men are starting to fight back against unconstitutional gender bias, religious men lag behind, and suffer terribly.

At this point, the world is so bias towards women that even rabbis and Beth Din force husbands to give a GET simply because the wife wants out. This is absolutely wrong. If a man marries a sister, we beat him to force a GET. If he is unable to satisfy his wife as he is not a man, the Talmud requires a GET but no coercion is permitted other than to tell the husband the the Talmud requires a GET and to refuse makes him a wicked person. But if a woman demands a GET because she despises the husband, no coercion is permitted. Furthermore, a prenup that allows the woman to force a GET whenever she pleases is a violation of a Mishneh in Nedorim 90 that when a woman has the power to force a GET she will be free to marry anyone she wants based on her lies so we don’t allow her to have these powers.

We must keep in mind that this means that based upon the woman’s demands there is no mitzvah. But if the husband is not living with a wife in a functioning marriage, and he may have evil thoughts, or if he has not had a boy and a girl and has to fulfill the mitzvah and this wife refuses to be with him, or even if he has had a boy and a girl but has a mitzvah to increase his family, these mitsvose surely stay with the husband. On the other hand, if the husband fears that if he gives a GET the wife will destroy his relationship with the children or she will take him to a civil court and destroy him financially, perhaps a mitzvah to do a positive command does not force him to endanger his children or himself, and we will not discuss this further now.

By the laws of the Torah, a woman who confesses to her husband that she slept with another man intentionally gets a divorce from her husband because we believe her and she is forbidden to her husband. But since this would empower all women to force a GET and walk out on their husbands and maybe they leave because they just like another man, the rabbis took away her power to confess and get a GET. Now, when she tells her husband she slept with another man we don’t believe her but she must bring proof that she slept with the other man. This is an incredible thing, but it shows who important it is for a woman not to have the power to just force the husband to give her a GET. Some bring proof from a Nachalas Shiva Simon 9 that this is permitted. But the Nachalas Shiva is talking about a different case, when the husband tortured the wife and she demanded a Din Torah, and meanwhile she fled the house. The husband must give her ten gold coins to pay for her food to tide her over away from his house until the husband attends the Beth Din and presumably is corrected by the rabbis regarding his behavior. Furthermore, as long as she is out of the house and the conflict continues he must continue to pay her a monthly ten coins. When the Beth Din has instructed the husband to cease and desist with the evil things he does to his wife, then the couple goes on in a marriage without his tortures. If the husband continues to torment his wife the Beth Din will figure out what to do. But a prenup permits the woman to drain the husband financially until he gives her a full GET without him doing anything wrong. Anytime she finds a nicer man to marry she can force him to divorce her. This is forbidden as we see in the above Mishneh in Nedrom 90b.

All of this is not the fault of the ladies. There is a general feeling, even among rabbis, that women must be supported in their demand for a GET. This is not true. Not only does a husband not have an obligation to divorce his wife when she demands a GET, but the poskim say that the husband has no mitzvah to do so. (See Rashbo VII:414 quoted by Radvaz II Section IV:118 that humiliating a husband to pressure for a GET is forbidden even if the husband is  unable to be a man and is commanded by the Talmud to give a GET. But a husband who is normal and can have children may not be pressured at all see Rashbo VII:414 and Shulchan Aruch Even Hoezer 77 paragraphs 2 and 3 and all commentators there, Shulchan Aruch, Ramo, Gro, Chelkas Mechokake and Beis Shmuel agree that a husband is not coerced to divorce when the wife says he disgusts her and she wants a GET. HaGaon Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashev says the husband has no mitzvah to give a GET see his sources Kovets Teshuvose 174:1[i])

The problem is something else. Women are often moved to break with their husbands because other ladies, relatives, friends, or “professional agitators” urge them on. All of these feel that it is a great mitzvah to destroy the husband. The woman who is scared and unsure what to do is easily convinced by these people to destroy her husband, even if she is a true believer in the laws of loshon hora and stealing.

A husband contacted me who was being destroyed by his local Beth Din that forbade him to visit his children and got him fired from several jobs because he did not obey them and give his wife a GET. Once a Beth Din rules that a husband must give a GET the next step is either he gives it or is destroyed. But this time he came to somebody who could help him.

I wrote a public blog to answer this Beth Din that their attack on the husband was against the Torah. The Chazon Ish says that if a husband is not one of those who must give a GET and a Beth Din said he must give a GET, and the husband obeys, the GET is invalid for two reasons, even by Torah not just rabbinical standards. (EH Gittin 99:2) That produced a new attitude and one rabbi who was very aggressive against husbands began to write to me with very proper remarks. He just never knew the laws of marriage, because very few rabbis know them. Even major rabbis don’t know them.

Frogs of the World! Unite! Cast off your chains! Call me. Rabbi Dovid E. Eidensohn/845-578-1917/eidensohnd@gmail.com

---