Rav Feinstein’s pesak that Tamar’s Heter is Invalid
The world is gushing with joy about Rabbi Shalom Kaminetsky’s
letter that he accepts the pesak of Rav Dovid Feinstein that the Heter for
Tamar is invalid. I am not gushing with joy. For one, why did it take forty
days to pasken that the heter was worthless, forty days when Tamar was living
with a man not her husband, and may possibly have a child from him, and the
great Torah authorities throughout the world have ruled that the baby will be a
mamzer. If a baby is born, will it gush
with joy?
Second of all, there is no retraction as yet from the major
players in this evil, Rabbis Greenblatt and S. Kaminetsky. A married woman can
assume that they never agreed that they were wrong and that their opinion is
still valid. I understand that Rabbi Greenblatt has clearly stated that his heter is valid, despite the fact that he
never spoke to Aharon Friedman, and that those who studied his pesak say that
it is lies and distortions and surely worthless in halacha. If so, nothing has
been changed. Women, including Tamar, can still leave their husbands without a
GET and say that Greenblatt accepted it.
I just called Rabbi Greenblatt and asked him if he agreed
with Rabbi Shalom Kaminetsky to accept the pesak from Rav Dovid Feinstein that
the Tamar heter is invalid. He did not answer but just asked me this and asked
me that and finally just hung up. I was told by people who spoke to him or who
studied his approach to this that he believes that his pesak is still valid,
and that it is more valid than the pesak of Reb Moshe Feinstein in these
matters. If so, since this Greenblatt is considered the major Rov of the South
United States as I was told, many women and many rabbis will continue to back
him.
As long as Reb Dovid does not give out a clear pesak in
writing that Rabbis Greenblatt and S. Kaminetsky accepted his pesak that their
heter was invalid, or prove that this is so with either witnesses or their
handwriting, he has failed. He has created a situation where women will
continue to rely on the heter of Greenblatt and S. Kaminetsky. He has failed so
far to forbid Tamar from being with her new boyfriend, so what has he achieved?
At this point, the only one who has publicly recanted if his
letter is not a forgery is Reb Shalom Kaminetsky. If Reb Dovid accepts that and
closes his Beth Din, he has saved the reputations of the other rabbis who were
not attacked. And if that is what he achieved with his Beth Din, he has made
much more problems than he solved. I am not sure that Reb Shalom did not accept
the hit for this mess in order to save his father and reputation with
Greenblatt. Now he will be considered a baal teshuva and will be a very strong
candidate to succeed his father in Philly, and the ladies he permitted can continue
to rely on the old rabbis who permitted it.
We must continue to demand that:
Tamar must separate
permanently from her husband.
) Tamar must arrange a GET
after she moves to Washington so Aharon can visit his daughter properly
Tamar must not go back to
her boyfriend after the GET. If this cannot be worked out properly, Aharon will
have a problem giving the GET.
Until Greenblatt and S.
Kaminetsky openly retract the Tamar Heter, they are to be publicly lambasted as
mamzer makers and reshoim.
If the Agudah retains R S
Kaminetsky as a senior rabbi, it is to be attacked.
It is time to publicly
declare the evil of prominent rabbis who help ladies get a GET that is invalid
and children born from it will be mamzerim.
