“Tradition should not be used as an excuse for limiting gender equality.”
Babes against Bnai Brith!!
According to Haaretz, Jewish feminists are very angry at Bnai Brith in Ontario for the organization’s support for bringing Sharia law to Ontario.
As we recall from our last discussion, brief as it was, some Muslims in Ontario seek to receive the legal right to use “private arbitration based on Islamic law for the resolution of their marital, custody and inheritance disputes.”
So, as CK pointed out, certain Jews have been enjoying the benefit of arbitration under Jewish law, and realized that if Sharia was denied, they might find their benefits denied.
If Ontario allows arbitration under Sharia, it will be the first Western society to do so.
Under Sharia, male heirs receive almost double the inheritance of females. Alimony is limited to a period ranging from three months to one year, unless a woman was pregnant before she was divorced. Only men can initiate divorce proceedings, and fathers virtually always are awarded custody of any children who have reached puberty.
Still, this was a minor obstacle to Bnai Brith, which fears that if Sharia prospects are diminished, then rabbinical courts and oversight over certain aspects of Jewish life will also be placed under scrutiny and ultimately become illegal. So they went ahead and defended the Torah, as their lawyer put it, by advocating for Ontario to permit Muslims to abide by Sharia under the protection of the law.
It is pointed out by one of the so-called feminists that the rabbinical courts enabled men to withhold gets from the wives they were divorcing and that these unfair actions were sanctioned by the state because of its provision for the legal basis of these courts. She also noted that it took a change in civil law – refusing to grant a civil divorce until the religious divorce is given – to rectify this problem.
In other words, while years went by before the law was modified to reflect the clash of rabbinical laws with Canadian law, many women were made to suffer by these traditions that do not reflect our modern society and its attempt to seek equality for all of its participants.
As for allowing Sharia? The report given to the Ontario government,
would allow women to waive their right to independent legal advice – something critics feel often may be done under spousal coercion. The report also did not recommend that those unable to afford a lawyer be eligible for legal aid.
It doesn’t take too much effort to figure out that the same problems, and probably more severe, will affect Muslims and Muslim women if Sharia law is allowed to exist alongside Canadian law. Yet, this was the recommendation to the Ontario government has been given: allow it.
It’s a farce, in my humble opinion, and a genuine mistake.
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please stop creitising islam , please please go though it and learn about islam except just saying non sence about it. we muslim atleat and inded have a book called QURAAN for all hunam kind please go through it you will sure then be a good man then after ,stop following TALMUD , the enemy of hun bieng. awake please and be a good person on earth .
thanks.
Ck, all that garlic you’re eating is liquefying your brain. Man, check the links I posted above, written by Canadian Muslims who are very concerned about giving jurisdiction to these courts. Read them and then do some googling. You want to know something? It’s not about my “bias” because my “bias” appears to be against all forms of religious courts, particularly if their laws might differ from the laws of the state.
So how about you debate this in impersonal terms, by looking at what Muslims, and Jews who oppose the Batei Din, have to say. I’ve made it easy by providing some links. It’s not about me or my feelings or my bias or my anything, it’s about what a lot of people – reasonable and well educated people who believe there is place for religion in life and in society – think.
ook, you are surmising that there won’t be coercion or somehow the law will prevent it. No, I’m not; I’m surmising that there is coercion, and that the law will lessen it. Of course, you can’t debate that point because in your fourth paragraph, you concede it. Oh, I don’t just concede it; I emphasise it. It’s very much the point here.
You tell us that people are already violating the law even if it’s not government sanctioned and may go against our laws and our cultural institutions. No. They’re not violating the law, because it’s not against the law for people with a dispute to go to a sharia court and have it settled. That’s because sharia tribunals are outside the law.
Like, if you and I decide to play pattycakes to decide a dispute, we’re allowed to do that. If there’s communal pressure for us to play pattycakes to decide a dispute and I hate pattycakes that might suck for me, but I’m not going to want to be alienated from my community — I’m gonna throw down those pattycakes.
Now, if the law steps in and says, okay, anyone who wants to decide a dispute in Super-Duper-Officialized Pattycakes Tribunals has got to pass our no-duress consent test — then, yeah, there’s a net benefit. Which part do you disagree with?
Well, hell, I think I’d like to start a new religion and have my own courts.
Then, cripes, go start your own religion. Right here in Quebec. Under Quebec law. And if you can convince any two of your Québécois adherents to settle disputes between them according to the rules of competitive rock paper scissors then, lo, so it shall come to pass.
Heck, you can even tell any two of your adherents that anyone using the evil secular “court” system instead of the majestic principles of RPS shall be turfed from the religion. And that, too, shall come to pass. No, they’re not going to be able to use RPS against anyone who doesn’t want to use it — but these nutty cult figures only deal with each other, so RPS is good enough for them.
But not in Ontario, O RPS Guru. If you want to get that going there, people are going to wonder why you didn’t get your RPS Courts officially licensed. And when you finally do, the courts are going to be checking whether the both-parties-have-opted-for-RPS-arbitration players are really consenting, or just nervous about being turfed from the religion.
Seems like a good thing, no?
T_M,
Bob and Doug have a dispute and go to their mutual friend Farley to help settle it. “What’s the capital of Quebec? Why Montreal of course!” says Farley. Bob then pays Doug the $5 he bet him.
Sanjay presented Rubina with an expensive engagement ring and Rubina agreed to marry him. 6 months later Rubina catches Sanjay fooling around with Amira and breaks off the engagement. Sanjay wants his ring back but Rubina says it’s hers to keep. They ask Rajneesh, a priest, who is right. Rajneesh decides that the just thing to do is to give the ring to the local Buddhist temple.
Channah Leah is upset. She goes to the Mikva every month, but her husband Rachmaniel still hardly touches her – they have sex maybe twice a month. Rachmaniel says he’s often too tired from his demanding job as a programmer for a Jewelry Web site. They decide to go to their Rabbi for advice. Rabbi Amsel tells Rachmaniel that he has to have sex with his wife at least 4 times a week and suggests Rachmaniel eat more garlic (like the Sephardim) to help gain strength for the task at hand.
None of these cases of alternative and informal conflict resolution is “a “surreptitious” or “illegal.” That you would erroneously claim that the application of Sharia in similar cases is a violation of Canadian societal values and laws is telling and reflective of your own biases, rather than an accurate summary of the existing law.
Canadian society in fact encourages the use of alternative conflict resolution. As it is our court system is jammed to the gills, with civil cases taking years to resolve and some criminal charges being thrown out because timely justice is impossible. Administrative type tribunals that eschew or discourage the use of lawyers are common, not just in religious settings. In fact, far from being a violation of Canadian law, they are as Canadian as back bacon, hockey and the Hudson’s Bay Company.
You presume that Sharia courts will result in massive injustices. I on the other hand presume nothing but am willing to rely on the over arching legal system to keep an eye on things to assure that justice in fact be done. That’s the sensible thing to do. That is in fact, the Canadian thing to do.
Look, you are surmising that there won’t be coercion or somehow the law will prevent it. I argue that you’re wrong and there are all kinds of pressure that can be applied to the parties involved in disputes to have them consent to participate in a process that may not be beneficial to them. Just because a law might exist that somehow might place controls over communal or family pressure, that doesn’t mean that anybody will obey it.
Of course, you can’t debate that point because in your fourth paragraph, you concede it. You tell us that people are already violating the law even if it’s not government sanctioned and may go against our laws and our cultural institutions.
So if I understand what you’re saying, you’re telling us that since there already exists a tacit, underground violation of Canadian laws by surreptitious application of Sharia, we can only confront it and make it better by legalizing it. Now this might be a line you want to use in advocating the sale of marijuana, but we’re talking about taking people’s civil rights and providing official consent to having them taken over by a legal system that may violate the spirit of Canadian law. Why would any sane society do that? Shouldn’t that society enforce its own civil rights and demand that its citizens abide by them?
I mean, if we were living, say, in the Ottoman Empire, and Istanbul only cared about levying taxes, and to promote peaceful subjects encouraged each community to proceed as before, I’d understand what you’re saying. However, Canada is a society that has taken decades to achieve many of the progressive laws that now make it a very open and civil society. At the peak of this openness, and in fear of not being respectful of another culture, it is opening the door for elements of that culture to run parallel to its society’s own achievements.
Well, hell, I think I’d like to start a new religion and have my own courts. No, you can’t deny me that because I have every right to be judged within my own faith. Oh, and don’t worry, we will allow our adherents to opt out and be judged by Canadian law, if they so choose. We just won’t, you know, talk to them too much in the future, and find that all the open spaces in our preschools are suddenly filled, and you know, disallow any social contact with them. But don’t worry, it’s not a bad thing to do to respect our religion, it’s a good thing.
I can’t speak to your last two paragraphs because I don’t have statistics in front of me. I’d love to know who is using the Beit Din and who isn’t. I know Conservative Jews who marry and divorce with a Beit Din. They think it’s not Jewishly authentic otherwise. They may believe they won’t be able to remarry. I don’t know which.
I do know that if the system didn’t exist and wasn’t a substitute to the Canadian courts, many of these people would not go to a beit din. Now you may pooh pooh this, but I will bet you that a rabbi, sanctioned by the state to perform marriages, will not wed a Jewish couple if the wife had been divorced and did not receive a get. I bet this would happen with a Conservative rabbi, as well.
Religion is a funny thing in the way it influences people and lives. Except it’s not funny-ha-ha.
In any matter where there is an advantage to one or more parties to resolve a matter through Sharia, expect those people to move to those courts. No — both parties must agree for the matter to be resolved through sharia. What’s more, that holds true whether or not sharia tribunals are recognised in law.
But when they are recognised by law, extra steps are taken to ensure that both parties’ consent for the alternative arbitration was not secured under duress like, say, communal pressure. Those steps aren’t available now. Your next point is that even if they try, both parties have to consent. That’s not my point; it’s the law. If both parties don’t consent, the law is inoperative.
You then argue that communal pressure will come to bear, so the consent will be under duress: Making Sharia laws legitimate and provided for under the auspices of the Canadian legal system will open the door for the potential coercion of wives and daughters who might be faced with the severe disapproval of their community…
Well, the door’s already wide open and people are walking through it daily. Anyone for whom a Sharia court is legitimate is already using one — “official” recognition or not.
Your argument seems to be that in Toronto, Jewish women apply for gets, but in Montreal they don’t bother because there’s no law recognising them as “official”. I think you’re wrong. Or to put it another way: setting legal standards for which sharia courts are licensed will not have the negative effect of greatly increasing the number of people who actually use sharia courts.
That’s because only the very religious are likely to, and most of the very religious already do regardless of what the Ontario (or Quebec) laws are. I have yet to hear any convincing argument that, all things being equal, more people in Toronto use batei din than in Montreal. And I have yet to hear any convincing argument that more people will use sharia courts that governments check up on, than sharia courts that governments don’t.
But I’m willing to be convinced.
Well you use the get issue as an example of your discomfort. However, I’d like to think that the issue playing out in the open, under the scrutiny of our legal system here in Canada, ended up being for the best. As a result of the controversy, civil divorces are not granted to Jews until religious divorce (get) is granted. Thus a man who refuses to give his wifea get is in fact compelled to do so by the state – Under the Canadian Divorce Act, if a husband refuses to give a wife a Get, or if the wife refuses to accept it, then the other spouse can be refused the right to bring or defend a motion, the right to ask the court for any order in their favour, or have their pleadings or any court documents struck. Ontario’s Family law act further allows separation agreements or settlements to be invalidated if the granting of a Get was taken into consideration in making the agreement or settlement.
So yes, while Rabbinic authorities have been tragically negligent in dealing with agunahs, in Canada, the government has stepped to remedy an uncoscionable situation. I expect the same would happen with Shariah courts should they ever get out of hand. Better the legal scrutiny than none. And remember, we got Irwin Cotler and Rosalie Abella keepin an eye on stuff ….
Wolf, I don’t deny that it’s a complex issue. The fact that I can quote, at length, Canadian Muslims who oppose the institution if Sharia law while showing a lengthy debate where others speak in favor of it, speaks volumes about the complexity involved.
The answer about the “good of the state” seems to be that its elected representatives and its judiciary which is able to decipher the laws of the state are the people who decide. If the Ontario government decides to go ahead with this proposal, then that is their right. Within the confines of a democratic debate, you can attempt to lobby them to change their minds, or alternatively support a party that opposes this matter.
I believe the greatest fear about Sharia stems from the fact that we know nations that abide by Sharia law (admittedly for all laws, including criminal laws which Ontario would shun), and they do not represent the Canadian civic model. At all. I think another fear is that some of these laws seems to contradict basic Canadian rights, and that it’s difficult to monitor whether people or overtly or covertly compelled to participate within this parallel legal system.
When I think about democracy and law, my goal is always to think about individual rights, but also to prevent allowing individual rights where they may restrict future individual rights or undermine democracy and the social contract of that democracy. It seems that many Muslim voices feel that Sharia being instituted in Ontario could lead down that undesired path. I am not expert enough to say unequivcally that these people are right, but from what I’m reading, it seems that way and the arguments of their opponents who seek to institute Sharia have not been as convincing.
T_M:
Your final statement in the last post is the most interesting. “The good of the State comes first.” I would tend to agree with that assessment, but it brings up a good question, who gets to decide what is good for the State. You obviously have a different opinion of what is good from the people who are tring to formalize the use of Sharia. For them it is for the good of the State that they be able to ‘legally’ use those religious institutions.
I am not sure what the answer is, but in a world where Muslim Fundamentalism is creating an expanding terrorist base everyday, I am always a little nervous when that is built upon for them.
Bnai Brith seems to think so. I, on the other hand, do not wish to have members of my society resolve their problems with a subcontracted judicial organization with values that may contradict my state’s and may undermine the values of my state entirely. I keep coming back to the issue of the get because it is a problem and serves as an example.
I’m too tired this morning to figure out and address the puzzle of how education and the right to a religious education differs from the right to be a member of a state with a judiciary and yet not have the right to have another, parallel, religious judiciary provide legal resolutions to non-criminal conflicts.
The easy answer is that the state should never be involved in matters of religion, and that all its members need to adhere to its codes and values. Also any parallel system that may undermine those values should be eliminated. However, I realize that in a free society, there is a conflict for those who are devoutly religious in religions with particular laws that differ from the state’s laws. I guess my answer is that the good of the state comes first, but it’s not an answer I’m happy to give.
So equal funding for all religious schools from government coffers is ok. Equal access to informal faith-based administrative tribunals however, isn’t? I mean look, I’m not exactly comfortable with Shariah law being given even a low level of legal sanction, but what do you do? Say no? On what basis? Aren’t Muslims entitled to the same privileges that others have?
Executive summary? Read the press release by the CCMW and read the link in post #11 because it’s a rule that falls under family law.
My point is simple: this is bad for Canadian society and bad for some Canadians who are Muslim. I happen to think beit dins have a lot to answer for as well, but I don’t believe their purview over people’s lives is as great…although it might be to some Orthodox Jews. If they exist informally, so be it. It is up to the government to crack down on them. That is infinitely better than supporting legal forums that may violate fundamental rights that Canadians enjoy.
Don’t get me going about separation of church and state again, dude.
So how will we justify Beit Dins and exclude Shariah tribunals or whatever? I mean I am well aware of the controversy, but as it’s been noted, these tribunals can either exist informally and far from the light of legal scrutiny, or they can be subject to judicial and governmental oversite. I prefer seeing it all out in the open frankly.
Also… you have editing privileges. Try to combine multiple posts into one. It’s just neater that way.
Finally – I’m going to Israel in like a day! I can’t read ALL that stuff! Executive summary dude!
Oh, thanks to Tarek, who I quote above and who is a Muslim NDPer who seems to be critical of certain aspects of Conservative Islam (as well as any religious courts, be they Muslim or Jewish), I have this link for you that you simply must visit.
Now back to those infantile women.
Here is the Canadian Council of Muslim Women.
Read it CK, from top to bottom.
Here’s their letter to Marion Boyd who wrote the report.
Read this one as well, CK.
And finally, CK, here is an overview for the press.
Are you getting the impression that I’m taking some Muslim women to be modern and mature, and deeply respect the opinions of some of them?
Fascinating discussion at this discussion forum about this topic.
Here’s one jewel:
Dear Salaam,
Perhaps Professor Taj Hashmi wishes to blow the lid on deeply entrenched myths about the Sharia. The fact is that Sharia is a man-made law that is masquerading as Quranic. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Almost all of the Sharia texts have been written 100 to 200 years after the Quran was revelaed and after the death of Prophet Muhammad.
Prof. Hashmi has appeared on my TV show and I asked the same question you raise. How can you say Shariah is un-islamic?
His reply was simple. Any laws that have been written by men serving Kings and Sultans and that violate the spirit of the Quran, cannot be equated as divine and are un-islamic
As an example, and with some embarssament, I would like to share some passages from the Sharia. All of them are written and I have quoted refercnes, incluidng page numbers.
1. If the husband’s body is covered with pus and blood and if the wife licks and drinks it, still her obligation to her husband will not be fulfilled.
–Imam Ghazzali – Ehya Ulum Al Deen – Vol 2 of 9 – page 311.
2. “Wives enter into their husband’s slavery after marriageâ€
– Imam Ghazzali – Ehya Ulum Al Deen – Vol 2 of 9 page 310.
3. “A Muslim man is allowed to beat his wife or wives.â€
– Imam Shafi, “Umdat Al Salik,†Shafi’i Law # M.10.12, Page-541 & O.17.4, Page 619.
4. “A Muslim man is allowed to have four wives at one time.â€
– Imam Abu Hanifa, “ “Hedaya,†Hanafi Law- Page 31.
– Dr. Abdur Rahman Doi, “Sharia the Islamic Law,†page 147.
5. Women inherit half of what men do
– “Sharia the Islamic Law,†Dr. Abdur Rahman Doi – page 299.
All of these laws are accepted by Muslim clerics as divine intructions applicable for all times. This is a myth that has been inflicted on Muslims for centuries and a handful of us are taking huge risks in exposing this fraud.
Muslims who brake this code of silence would be declared apostates and put to death. Few non-Muslims can understand the terror the accusation of apostacy carries with it. Already a few of us have been declared as apostates.
The person heading the campaign for shariah in Canada had this to say; a line that means nothing to a non-Muslim, but can scare the hell out of a Muslim.
Mubin Sheikh, an Imam at a Toronto Mosque sent two emails celebrating the Marion Boyd Report. The first he wrote to a non-Muslim woman activist opposing shariah courts:
“GET BENT LADY – take your bigotry to an edge of a cliff, close your eyes, and let the wind take you over.”
This death-wish email was copied to staff at the AG’s office and Marion Boyd’s assistants.
In another otherwise innocous email sent to AG staff and copied to me, he wrote:
“Tarek Fatah and others who PROFESS to be Muslim are not.”
Such a line may cause a chuckle ot two among non-Muslim Canadians, but in the Muslim narrative, it is a charge of apostacy; the logical conclusion of which is a death sentence.
These statements, wishing death to one person and accusing another of apostacy, didn’t come in a closed room gossip. They were made in a public forum and copied to every person who made a submission to Marion Boyd.
Furthermore, it comes from the man who worked very closely with Marion Boyd; a person she quoted as the shariah expert and will be entrusted to be an arbitrator in the shariah tribunal system. These were his first pronouncments after the rush of victory.
Most canadian Muslims have close families in Muslim countries; places where it does not take much to rouse religious passion and physically attack an accused apostate.
Folks, this is multiculturalism gone amuck. Not till someone dies in Toronto will the liberal-left wake up. By that time the Fortyns of our world will have the intitiative, not those who are paralysed in indecision.
Cheers.
Tarek
Article By Taj Hashmi
MuslimWakeup.Com
Of late the proposed introduction of a Sharia Arbitration Board in Ontario has created much controversy, among both Muslim and non-Muslim Canadians. Former attorney-general Marion Boyd’s 150-page report favouring the introduction of Sharia, or “Muslim principles” (in her language), in the proposed Arbitration Board has become the proverbial last straw.
While the proponents justify the Sharia Board in the name of equal opportunity for the Muslim community, the opponents regard such a move as being contrary to Canadian constitution and anticipate gross violations of Muslim women’s right to custody, inheritance and post-divorce alimony.
To the uninformed, Marion Boyd sounds quite “reasonable” in the way she has argued her case. In her view the “Muslim principles” should be considered an acceptable method of religious arbitration as long as they do not violate Canadian law – very similar to how Catholics, Jews and Ismailis have made use of a 1991 Act.
Surprisingly, she tells us: “We’re being very clear, this is not Sharia law.”
What is even more surprising is that Syed Mumtaz Ali, the main advocate of Sharia arbitrations in Ontario, is “delighted” with the Boyd Report given that many of the 46 recommendations of the Report came from him. Ali glorifies the proposed Board as “a model for the world to see how Sharia law can be used in a Western society.” The ambivalence in Boyd’s and Ali’s statements on the true colour of the Report smacks of duplicity. It seems, Boyd is playing a hide and seek game with us, trying to introduce Sharia with a different name.
*snip*
read the rest at the link
—————————
Dr. Taj Hashmi is a professor at the York Centre for Asian Research, York University, Toronto and a member of the Muslim Canadian Congress.
Wow, that was a big word with lots of syllables. Mommy, help me!
I love this infantilization of women. I also gotta take offense to the notion that all Muslims are backwards nutbars. It’s simple – we have, for better or worst, Jewish religious courts, Beit Dins, recognized by the law and subject to its scrutiny. There is no legitimate reason why Muslims shouldn’t have the same benefit.
I disagree. I think there is plenty of room for abuse of the system. For example, if the laws benefit male heirs over female heirs, you may end up seeing more estate resolutions conducted under Sharia law. In any matter where there is an advantage to one or more parties to resolve a matter through Sharia, expect those people to move to those courts. How many divorcing Jewish men, angry at the spouse whom they were leaving, used and use the get to screw over these women? They did it because they could, even if they were secular. I know secular Jewish men who used the leverage of the get for years to ensure their wives would not be able to marry Jewish again during their fertile years. I’ve seen them make demands in order to sign the get. This Sharia business is no different, and perhaps worse because my understanding is that Sharia covers much more ground in terms of the issues that can be affected, than the purview of the Beit Din. Lots of not-so-religious Muslims will use these laws if they can see an advantage.
Your next point is that even if they try, both parties have to consent. Note that many of the Muslims in Canada today are immigrants and have brought their traditions over with them. Making Sharia laws legitimate and provided for under the auspices of the Canadian legal system will open the door for the potential coercion of wives and daughters who might be faced with the severe disapproval of their community and family if they don’t agree to have their disputes resolved by Sharia courts. So I don’t think your second point holds up either.
Many of the rules within these laws are the opposite of the spirit of Canadian law, and yet we are creating a space for people to follow these different laws by putting no less than the authority of the government behind them.
Hmm. That didn’t quite come out right: to summarize, I guess I’m saying that setting legal standards for which sharia courts are licensed will
(1) have a positive effect in making them accountable and fairer, including steps to ensure that both parties truly consent to contracting out of the regular system, and
(2) not have the negative effect of greatly increasing the number of people who actually use sharia courts: only the very religious are likely to, and most of the very religious already do regardless of what the Ontario (or Quebec) laws are.
So the point is that the good wrought by (1) outweighs the potential harm likel to result from (2).
It doesn’t take too much effort to figure out that the same problems, and probably more severe, will affect Muslims and Muslim women if Sharia law is allowed to exist alongside Canadian law. Yet, this was the recommendation to the Ontario government has been given: allow it.
This is incorrect. The recommendation has nothing to do with whether or not to “allow” sharia; it has to do with whether or not to allow contracting out of certain civil procedures in favour of sharia courts. (Well, really, whether or not to change the law to ensure that people can’t use sharia courts. Right now they can use whatever they want.)
Point being that neither Ontario, nor any other government, is in a position to allow or disallow sharia or any other religious court. They exist, people use them, and people will continue to use them. The only really relevant question is what effect incorporating them into the legal system will have.
The assumption you’re making is that doing this would greatly increase the number of people who mutually agree to have their dispute taken to a sharia court. I doubt that that’s true. A good way to check would be to see whether radically more Torontonians than Montrealers use batei din. Somehow, I doubt it.
Its in my opinion that in normal cases everyday, the outcomes favor the women right now lol. So why don’t men complain about normal divorce cases? hmm? Its craziness all the way around. If the people involved are very religious and want to have the sharia as their “court system” then thats their right. Sometimes it drives me crazy how femenists always take anything that may put women lower even if that’s their belief system and thats what they want. Ever heard of the saying “To each his own”?
I strongly disagree!
The Gov. is not a baby sitter for adults. If a woman wants her case to be resolved by sharia law thats ‘her’ choice. It is not for any femmist jew or otherwise to impose their view of ‘fairness’ on anybody. Nobody ‘forces’ anybody to appear. they appear only because they agree for whatever motive to have their case decided by what they believe ultimately to be the will of God.
Freedom to practive religion should be paramount to all other rights.
In the case of Beth Din should the gov negate a signed agreement by both parties in an orthodox jewish divorce to abide by the beth din, all what the women will be left with, is being in limbo.