Today was quite a day in Israel's Supreme Court.
Chief Justice Barak and Deputy Chief Justice Beinish were overruled by their colleagues, in a clear signal that when it comes down to it, when Jewish State collides with Post-Modern Liberal State, most justices will vote for the latter.
Then, the Supreme court rejected a ruling of both the regional and supreme rabbinical courts. The court ruled as inadmissible photos and testimony of a wife, in flagrente delecto, committing adultery. The rationale was violation of the right to privacy. The striking thing is that this is a classic case of where secular law and Halakhah, prima facie, cannot co-exist. If the testimony is acceptable על פי דין the Supreme Court would appear to be in violation of the rights of the husband who, by law, must divorce his wife.
We live in interesting times, no?
4 comments:
I think you mistakenly wrote "latter" when you meant former. As the headline of the second article explicitly states, "Ruling favors Jewish state over democratic."
So the first paragraph, at least, al panav, is a good thing.
Actually, Barak and Beinish won. Judge Levy - by no means a post-zionist having been the only minority vote in the 10-1 Gush Katif decision - actually sided with them but said that it's too early to approve the petition and gave the states 9 months to change things. I don't think this makes a difference as both Barak and Cheshin will be gone if this case comes up again in 9 months or so, so we can expect the law to be overturned if the voting stays the same otherwise.
I'm wondering how Barak feels about the freedom of occupation for the private investigators vs. the rights to privacy of the adulterer/ess. He basically put them out of business as they are part and parcel of divorce proceedings in many instances.
Is that to say that he may not divorce her, or simply that he may not use that evidence to make his case for the financial settlement? If the latter, I don't see as great of a conflict...
My impression was the former, ie that the Bes Din can't force a get with this evidence.
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