 CHAPTER
FIVE:Those Who don’t Fit the Model: Family Situations and Status
in Judaism and the Jewish World
5C. The Agunah – The Woman Unable to Remarry
It has just been said that, without a get, according to Jewish law, a
marriage continues to be valid: only death or a get can end a marriage.
Civil divorce is not recognised by Jewish law.
One of the outcomes and issues arising from this is the situation of
the agunah, (the “anchored" or "bound" woman –
 )- a woman unable to
remarry, because she cannot secure a Jewish divorce from her former partner,
with whom she no longer lives or wishes to live. This includes a number
of different categories of women:
- Those whose husbands are missing;
- Those whose husbands might have been killed in a war, but whose
bodies have never been recovered, or without valid witness;
- Last, but far from least: the wife whose husband simply refuses
to give her a divorce. This is a highly problematic area for women which
has caused – and continues to cause – enormous misery to
many women.
Even without the benefit of a get, however, husbands can remarry
under civil law, without any disadvantage to the status of their children
under Jewish law; however, for the reasons above, undivorced or un-widowed
women are trapped.
Many attempts have been made to help the status of potential or actual
agunot in Jewish law. So far, however, no major changes have
emerged/transpired.
The Conservative movement as a Halachic movement has come up
with some innovations designed to help such women, but Orthodoxy, on the
whole, has proved resistant to change.
Over the last twenty years or so, major attempts have been made to pressure
or encourage orthodox leaders to sanction those innovations necessary,
first and foremost to ease the situation of agunot, as well as to make
the situation of men and women more equitable in relation to divorce.
In this respect, it is significant that, over the last few years, pressure
groups of Halachically knowledgeable women from within the orthodox world
have appeared at the helm and are pushing for change from within.
This is a relatively new phenomenon, gathering force from year to year,
both in Israel and the Diaspora – specifically the United States
– and it will be interesting to see if indeed these groups do manage
to promote the programme for Halachic development that they consider vital
to improving the status of women in divorce proceedings and easing the
plight of the agunah.
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