The Lingering Sexism of Jewish Divorce

Initially, the twenty-story Manhattan office building threw me off. I had in my hand the address for a beth din, a rabbinic court, and had pictured a cluttered rabbi’s study in some old world synagogue—like the one in the divorce scene in Hester Street, the 1975 film about a Jewish immigrant couple at the turn of the twentieth century, starring a very young Carol Kane.

I rode the elevator up to find my ex-husband on a couch in the reception area—yes, this was the place—and settled in a full cushion’s distance from the person I’d once revolved my life around, the man whom I’d walked in seven symbolic circles around during our wedding ceremony, seven years before.

We’d been split up a full four years when my ex-husband called out of the blue and asked, too casually, “So…do you want a get?” As if we spoke regularly. As if he were asking, “So…do you want me to pick up a pizza on my way home?”

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Author: Sari Botton

Keywords: Mendel Epstein, Marriage, Divorce, Remarriage, Bill of divorcement, Get, Certificate of divorce, Bill of divorce, Letter of divorce, Remarry, Remarrying, Second marriage, Jewish divorce, Jewish marriage, divorce and remarriage, divorce and marriage

Bible reference(s): Deuteronomy 24:1, Deuteronomy 24:3, Isaiah 50:1, Jeremiah 3:8, Matthew 5:31-32, Matthew 19:3, Matthew 19:7, Mark 10:2-4, 1 Corinthians 7:27-28

Source: “Unchain My Heart: On the Emotional Effectiveness—and Lingering Sexism—of Jewish Divorce,” Longreads.

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