It’s not a problem! Yeah, you! Come over here. Shhhh! Where there’s a will there’s a way, right?
Here’s how it works. I know a guy….a facilitator if you will. We’ll call him Shlomo. He can get you around the heter meah Rabbanim. It’s not a problem.
Here’s how it works – first you need to pay the fee. If you have the money, great. If not, Shlomo can help you raise it. The standard fee is around $50,000. These things aren’t easy to orchestrate, you know. Listen, he has a beis din that he normally works with. You tell them the situation, and they are almost always sympathetic. They see it all the time. Women can be emotional…not see that the divorce is for the best. See, I understand? Am I right?
If for some reason the beis din doesn’t agree, it’s also not a problem. Shlomo can get a new beis din together easy, just for your case. It’s all kosher – these are shtark Dayanim, all of them. Shlomo only works with the best so the heter will never be questioned. He guarantees it. Heck, Shlomo even acts as one of the Dayanim if he can only get two guys on such short notice.
Will your wife find out? No! Chas v’shalom! She will be totally unaware that any of this is happening! You don’t have to worry that she will make trouble…it’s all part of the service. Beis din should be simple, you walk in and tell your story, they give the heter that you can remarry without the get. Don’t worry, your surname won’t be used…no, no identifiable information about you or your wife. First name basis only!
Here’s where the kollel community comes together. It’s a beautiful thing, really. Shlomo will take the heter to various yeshivos, accompanied by a donation. He needs to get 100 signatures. Yes, that’s part of where your fee goes – you think Shlomo is a ganif? A tzadik is more like it! The halacha is that the signatures need to be from at least three different countries, so the heter will be sent to kollelim in Eretz Yisroel, the United States, Europe, and sometimes South Africa.
Actually, some hold that three different states in the United States constitute medinos (countries). But, we try and be machmir. Now, ideally all the signatures come from rabbanim, but sometimes we can’t get rabbanim as quick as we need, so we have kollel yungerleit sign. They aren’t that familiar with gitten or beis din, but they’ve learned enough that it’s patur.
Do you have to worry that those signing will want more information? I’ll tell you a secret. Most of them don’t even read the heter. They just sign. If their rosh yeshiva tells them to sign, they’ll sign. They don’t need to know who, or why, or what. They don’t need to know names. If it’s good enough for their rebbe, it’s good enough for them.
Ok, once we get the signatures, Shlomo contacts your wife and tells her you are free to remarry. He gives her the address of the beis din (he operates out of a small office in ____), where she can arrange to receive her get and kesubah. That’s her choice. At this point, you are free to marry and build a bayis ne’eman b’yisrael! Mazel Tov!
By now you are probably thinking that the scenario above is the fantastical imaginings of a freminazi (frum feminist nazi). I wish you were right. However, the information came from a July 6, 2011 Hamodia article written anonymously by a “respected Rav.” The article, Tragic Abuse of Heter Meah Rabbanim, spoke out strongly against this practice. Being that this is the first time I have heard of such a practice, I wonder how much of an impact this article actually made when it was written.
The general practice of getting a heter meah Rabbanim was pointed out to me when I asked a Facebook question about the RCA’s recent statement, RCA Condemns Refusal to Deliver or Receive a get. My question was whether or not there was a precedent of a woman refusing a get? Had there ever been a chained man? It was pointed out to me that there was a scenario within the past 30 years or so, where a prominent Rosh Yeshiva’s wife refused to leave Eretz Yisroel and come with him to America so that he could take over his father’s yeshiva. The rabbi went to the United States without her and tried to give her a get, but she refused. In a rare move, he received a heter meah Rabbanim, and was permitted to take a second wife, which he did within a few months.
If the wife doesn’t want the divorce, she’s being emotional – unreasonable. If the wife wants the divorce, she’s being emotional – unreasonable. We can’t win. Men can divorce us even if we want to stay married. Men can keep us married even if we want to be divorced. Where is the heter meah Rabbanim for women to take a second husband, get be damned? Where is the loophole for agunot? Nu, if we can free men from needing a get to remarry, where is a leniency for the ladies? This kind of halachic creativity should work both ways, no?
