Anguille
Bane of the Urbane
- Mar 8, 2008
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What makes you think that Religious Tolerance.Org is biased?Wow Ang could you find a more biased source!Sir, what you presented was disingenious and misleading. In Israel Jews, Muslim and Druze authorities all rule over Jewish, Muslim and Druze marriage like each party wants. Its hardest on secular Jews, since they need rabbical authorities to grant it. Just like in America many Priest will refuse to grant the marriage. However, its misleading to believe secular Jews can't marry. All my relatives in Israel are secular non-religious Jews and they are legally married. Muslim authorities reside over Muslim marriage. So if a Jew wants to marry a Muslim they would have to get approval from the Muslim authorities. Ditto for Christians. Ditto for Druze. May time the religious leaders of each sec don't want interfaith marriages. However, they can still marry overseas such as in Cyrus!
Marriage in Israel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
From your wiki article:
"Views on civil marriage
Since the establishment of the rabbinical courts, the status quo agreement has been subject to criticism, but also to the strong support from the religious community. The main argument of the supporters of the system is that a change of the status quo will divide the Jewish people in Israel between those who marry according to Jewish religious standards and those who marry in a civil marriage. These would not be registered or scrutinized by the rabbinate, and thus their child may be considered illegitimate, or a mamzer, if they wished to marry a child of a couple married in accordance with halakha. Opponents of the status quo consider the system to be contrary to people's civil rights.
Although most of the debate relating to civil marriage in Israel is conducted in the Jewish community, the issue has the same implications for all other religious communities in Israel.
[edit] Support for religious marriages
Supporters of the status quo argue that:
- The marriages in the rabbinical court preserve the holiness of the state of Israel, and supposedly add a spiritual and religious dimension of family purity according to Jewish religious laws.
- Civil marriage will lead to the assimilation and intermarriage. Marriage in the rabbinical court, it is argued, is a guarantee to the continuation of the existence of the Jewish population in the state of Israel.
- A secular legislator is incapable of understanding the importance of religious halakha standards to the religious community.
- From a religious standpoint, a religious ceremony causes no harm even though it imposes halakhic standards on non-religious Israelis - it is even considered by the religious community to be a mitzvah, a noble deed.
[edit] Support for civil marriages
Supporters of civil marriage in Israel argue that the status quo violates the rights of Israeli citizens by:
- imposing religious standards on those who do not desire it.
- creating difficulty for the marriage of people who belong to different religious community, or people who do not observe any religion.
- not permitting marriages of those who are prohibited by halakha, such as marriage between a person considered to be a mamzer, or a Cohen wishing to marry a divorcee. It also prohibits widows who did not have any children from a previous husband from getting re-married without passing halizah.
- abridging religious equality by refusing to delegating authority to Reform and Conservative communities.
- discriminating against women, by the inclusion of institutions as Aginot and "recalcitrant wives", and by refusing to permit women to officiate as a rabbi in the rabbinical court.
[edit] Arrangement attempts of the legal situation
[edit] The verdict
At the times when people petitioned the Supreme Court of Israel, trying to convince the Supreme Court to form an authority of civil marriages, the Supreme Court refused to do so, declaring that this was the responsibility of the Knesset. In cases when people requested to proclaim themselves as being "non-religious", in order that the court would be able to recognize his or her marriage according to an acceptable civil judgment, the court rejected their assertion. The only time in which the Court determined that the Ministry had to recognize a marriage between a Cohen and a divorcee was when it was based on the religious law that determines that those are forbidden marriages from the start but allowable post factum.[citation needed]
[edit] Alternative methods
Over time a number of alternative methods have been used by couples who wished to marry but did not want to marry in a religious ceremony, or who were unable to marry in Israel.
One method is to have a wedding outside Israel. Cyprus became the most convenient venue for many Israelis. Also, Paraguay became another jurisdiction where marriage would be conducted, because these could be effected by mail, without the couple being in Paraguay.
Another approach is to resort to a common-law marriage. A common-law marriage entitles the partners to most of the rights of a formally married couple in relation to inheritance, pensions and the landlord and tenant matters. However, the status of common-law marriage is not equal to the formal marriage in many fields. For example, the exemption from military service for a married woman only applies to a formally married woman.
The jurist, Frances Radi, supports these attempts to "bypass the law in legal ways", but points out that the necessity of an Israeli to resort to the use of a foreign state in order to get married diminishes value to the alternative ways to get married. In her view, "the existence of those minor alternatives only points out the lack of the respect to the secular values that the Israeli judiciary demonstrates".
[edit] Political attempts to resolve the situation
In the late 1960s the Independent Liberal party attempted to enable civil marriages for couples who could not marry in rabbinical courts; however, this attempt caused a governmental crisis.
The Meretz party, and its historical component parties Mapam, Ratz and Shinui have been leading a struggle for civil marriages in Israel for a long time, but without success. At the start of the 21st century several rabbis claimed (including the chief Sephardi rabbi of Israel, Shlomo Amar) that the great alienation which this situation creates does not serve the religious interest. As part of the coalition agreement for Ariel Sharon's second government, the Shinui party demanded that a legal solution be found for those who could not get married within Israel. A committee which was formed to find a solution for this problem came up with the "coupling arrangement" solution (ברית הזוגיות
. This committee, which was led by Israeli parliament members Roni Bar-On, Yuri Stern, Nisan Slomianski and Roni Brizon, and represented parties from the wide political religious spectrum, from the Shinui party to the Mafdal party, eventually submitted a bill by which there would be a separate status recognised for people who came in the pact of duality which would not be considered as "marriage" but will be similar to the marriage institution as much as possible. The bill never reached further legislation procedures.In July 2007, Israel's Justice Minister, Daniel Friedmann, and the chief rabbi of Israel Shlomo Amar reached an agreement on a limited bill for civil marriages in Israel, which would only apply to the marriage of Israelis who do not belong to any recognized religious community. This agreement has to date only been discussed in the media, and has not yet been presented in legislative form.[16]"
Why should Israeli citizens have to leave the country to get married if they don't want to be married in a religious ceremony?
Just like the magnificent nineteen aren't discussed either with envy! 
