This item is from a year ago - unfortunately he hasn't been caught yet because he clearly has misguided figures who are providing him with support.
YNET reports: Rabbinical Court shuns divorce refuser.
Panel of judges, rabbis issue ads condemning Jerusalem resident for refusing to grant his wife divorce for five years, asking public to refrain from allowing him to join any congregation, associating with him, or granting him lodging. In an unprecedented move, the High Rabbinical Court on Sunday called on the observant public to shun a resident of Jerusalem who has been refusing to grant his wife a divorce for five years.
The man, Israel Meir Briskman, fled the country despite a hold-departure order filed against him, and is presumed to be residing in the United States. In ads published in Israel and abroad, a panel of rabbinical court judges calls out to the public to refrain from allowing Briskman to join a congregation or from associating with him for business or pleasure.
The judges also ask that the public refuse him any lodging, with or without pay, including patient visitation rights."The High Rabbinical Court in Jerusalem calls on the Israeli communities and the judges and rabbis of Israel wherever they may be to implement these rules of alienation and refuse the 'divorce refuser' Israel Meir Briskman any financial, physical, or legal aid until he carries out his sentence and grants his wife an unconditional, immediate divorce," the judges stated in the ad.
Briskman has been known to employ any and all tactics in order to evade the pending divorce. After the court granted his wife custody of their children, he announced that he would not allow for the divorce until he receives custody of his son. Later he made claims to property his wife's father was said to have promised the couple.
YNET reports: Rabbinical Court shuns divorce refuser.
The man, Israel Meir Briskman, fled the country despite a hold-departure order filed against him, and is presumed to be residing in the United States. In ads published in Israel and abroad, a panel of rabbinical court judges calls out to the public to refrain from allowing Briskman to join a congregation or from associating with him for business or pleasure.
The judges also ask that the public refuse him any lodging, with or without pay, including patient visitation rights."The High Rabbinical Court in Jerusalem calls on the Israeli communities and the judges and rabbis of Israel wherever they may be to implement these rules of alienation and refuse the 'divorce refuser' Israel Meir Briskman any financial, physical, or legal aid until he carries out his sentence and grants his wife an unconditional, immediate divorce," the judges stated in the ad.
Briskman has been known to employ any and all tactics in order to evade the pending divorce. After the court granted his wife custody of their children, he announced that he would not allow for the divorce until he receives custody of his son. Later he made claims to property his wife's father was said to have promised the couple.
Briskman's sentence prevents him from receiving "permission by one hundred rabbis" to wed another woman, as the sentence to grant his wife a divorce has been forced upon him by the court. The court also sentenced Briskman to a prison term of up to one year, or until he grants the divorce.
If you know the whereabouts or other information regarding Yisrael Meir Briskman, please contact the Directorate of the Israeli Rabbinical Courts immediately:Tel: +972 – 2 – 6582823 Tel/Voicemail: +972 – 2- 6582833Fax: +972 – 2-6515499 Email: Panatz@rbc.gov.il
If you know the whereabouts or other information regarding Yisrael Meir Briskman, please contact the Directorate of the Israeli Rabbinical Courts immediately:Tel: +972 – 2 – 6582823 Tel/Voicemail: +972 – 2- 6582833Fax: +972 – 2-6515499 Email: Panatz@rbc.gov.il
Does anyone in America know where he is? What is his background and where do his parents reside? Why would anyone be in cohorts to protect him?
ReplyDeleteYour posting has no details. How can any individual draw any conclusions as to the legitamicy of your claims? Did his wife go to Arko'oys?
ReplyDeleteShe may be entitled to a get al pi halochoh, she may not but from this post no-one can tell and putting up a post like this, in my humble opinion, with no information, is unacceptable because whatever the facts, it's based purely on emotion.
There's a pure pitiful chained woman out there whose husband is a Rosha!
Do you rely on the Rabbanut for kashrus? Did you rely their heter mechirah all those years (bar the last shmittah)?
You may well be right but this post is only encouraging women who break halochoh to make themselves look pitiful. i hope you choose not to censor this comment.
Defense attorney said...
ReplyDeleteYour posting has no details. How can any individual draw any conclusions as to the legitamicy of your claims? Did his wife go to Arko'oys?
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I gather you are a friend of Meir Briskman. It seems that the family and friends are aware of where he is and yet are supporting this disgusting behavior.
If you reread the posting it does not refer to him as a rasha. It doesn't say that he has no justification for his actions.
But it does indicate that he fled the country illegally, that he has refused to give his wie a divorce for at least 7 years. That he is not in communication or negotiations to resolve the issue.
You are the one who has filled in the dots and concluded that anyone who has done such is a rasha.
If you or someone one else would like to present his side of the story - I would be willing to publish it in full. It is clear he is still alive and enjoying the good life - he has succeeded in publishing several seforim. He is a brilliant - but...
R. Eidensohn,
ReplyDeleteWhilst the second comment on this page may not have used the King's English and perhaps it may have been written more eloquently, his point is quite valid and correctly made. Just because you disagree with him, is no reason to conclude that "you are a friend of" one of the parties.
I know almost nothing of this case, and certainly nothing of the involved parties (nor B'H am I or was I familiar with any similar cases), yet agree with that commentators sentiment.
Is the wife in this case is entitled to a divorce? Not every time a wife wants a divorce is she entitled to one. Perhaps, in fact, (depending on the circumstances) the husband can demand through Beis Din that she return to his home. This is halacha.
Did the husband in this case accept the jurisdiction of the zionist Rabbinate's court? Did he participate in its proceedings? Judging from the photo you posted of him (as useful as that may or may not be), he doesn't appear to be of the religious zionist persuasion. And you, AFAIK, aren't much of a fan of the religious zionist beliefs either.
What I find most troubling is that the mother was awarded custody of the children. Halacha, as a general rule, grants custody to the father (except in cases of very young children -- i.e. of nursing age). This seems to indicate that the divorce proceedings that took place, did not occur Al Pi Din.
Again, I stress I have no knowledge about this (or even similar) cases, and these are my general feelings on this issue.
But where is he? Why is he giving that poor woman a hard time? She just asking for a get that's all. Why dont the beit din contact his family? He might be brillant but he's also selfish.
ReplyDeleteJoseph said...
ReplyDeleteR. Eidensohn,
Whilst the second comment on this page may not have used the King's English and perhaps it may have been written more eloquently, his point is quite valid and correctly made. Just because you disagree with him, is no reason to conclude that "you are a friend of" one of the parties.
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It doesn't take genius to realize he is not responding in appropirate fashion. He demanded custody of his son plus a large amount of money for granting the divorce. If he really cared about his son - why has he been hiding for two years. If he thought he had a valid case why didn't he stay and work with the beis din or work through his rabbonim?
Pardon my stupidity but I simply can not imagine any rational explanation for his behavior that conforms with Torah. Perhaps you can explain how a talmid chachom could justify having his wife be an aguna for 7 years?
It doesn't take genius to realize he is not responding in appropirate fashion. He demanded custody of his son plus a large amount of money for granting the divorce. If he really cared about his son - why has he been hiding for two years. If he thought he had a valid case why didn't he stay and work with the beis din or work through his rabbonim?
ReplyDeletePardon my stupidity but I simply can not imagine any rational explanation for his behavior that conforms with Torah. Perhaps you can explain how a talmid chachom could justify having his wife be an aguna for 7 years?
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If indeed he has demanded a large amount of money, that would be indicative that he is wrong. How do you know he is demanding such? Allegations made by his wife's family? And how are you convinced he made no attempts to work through his Rabbonim and was rebuffed by his wife?
And you refer to her as an "agunah." Perhaps halachicaly her actions in fact constitute being a moredes?
He is a brilliant - but...
ReplyDeleteWHEN oh WHEN will our Torah World stop obsessing over brilliance? A brilliant mind without midos & ehrlichkeit is POISON? Who would be buying these sefarim published by a 'torah bore'?
Your attack on me, the 2nd posting is appaling. I have never met the individual Briskman and don't much about him at all. I don't really care if you believe me or not!
ReplyDeleteI just find it inappropriate that you have called on people to publicize his whereabouts without providing proper details.
We live in a sick world where women are all the time going to the courts, refusing to go to bais din, getting money and awards that are not in line with halocha and then when they are finished, they run to a sympathetic bais din to coerce a get out of their husbands. Well, you as a talmid chochom should know that many poskim hold that they are not entitled to a get.
perhaps briskman's wife falls into that category perhaps not? But unless someone knows the story, based on your blog, why should they reveal his whereabouts?
Your personal attack was disgusting and i will not be mochel you until you ask on this forum for mechilah!
I don't know Briskman but I do know many men who have been harmed in the way i described above and these sad agunah stories are often the fault of women who trample on Halochah!
His parents supports him!
ReplyDeleteHis father is "Rav" of the community Shimon Hatsadik of San Simon area in Jerusalem.
observer said...
ReplyDeleteHis parents supports him!
His father is "Rav" of the community Shimon Hatsadik of San Simon area in Jerusalem.
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Perhaps you could explain how they justify keeping her an agunah for over 7 years?
Perhaps she is a moredes?
ReplyDeleteAre you still looking for him??
ReplyDeletehttp://www.app.com/article/20101020/NEWS/101020088/Lakewood-couple-charged-with-kidnapping-assaulting-Brooklyn-man
He just got the hell beaten out of him by someone in Lakewood.
ReplyDeletehere he is, someone come and get him!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.app.com/comments/article/20101020/NEWS/101020088/Lakewood-couple-charged-with-kidnapping-assaulting-Brooklyn-man
"Bail was set at $750,000 for David Wax and $400,000 for Judy Wax and both are being held at the Ocean County Jail in Toms River."
ReplyDeleteThese two thugs are gonna be spending some years breaking rocks in the slammer.
Unfortunately, a Bais Din that takes a lot of money is worh less to the point of worthless. "Lo toguru mip'nei ish" - but mip'nei isha toguru. It is political correctness nowadays, especially if she put down a lot of money!
ReplyDeleteAnd my impression of the Rabbanut, in any case is an arm of the secular Israeli government. It is unfathomable as to where such negius can lead...............
I read the ruling at
ReplyDeletehttp://www.getora.com/Seiruvim
)with the appendix
/Briskman%20Psak%207.16.08%20-%20combined.pdf for the document in question)
but I wonder what purpose it serves these days. After all, we are not locked into a shtetl where he has nowhere else to go.
If this Bryskman really is "brylliant", what is to prevent him from just giving up on Orthodox Judaism and becoming "frei"? To place him in cherem is to push another out of the club (by definition). That used to be the point when such people had no other place to go (he couldn't very well go hang out with cossacks in the old country). But now he can take the law boards and do whatever he wants, living another kind of life and leaving his wife and aguna forever out of spite.
He's a yeshiva guy, so he grew up believing that legalisms are everything. Now (we are told) he's playing his legal games, supposedly holding out for money. The other side doesn't want to come up with the money, so (we are now told that) people are beating him up for not giving a get. Really, they seem to be beating him up so that the parents don't have to give the money, which seems a lot less holy to me. I've met some shomrim (NOT the NYC Jewish Police ones, rather the vigilante ones) and I know we now have Orthodox Jewish thugs in our midst. Getting beaten up by Orthodox Jews does not automatically mean the victim was evil.
I don't know the story here, as the reports are one-sided. But it strikes me as curious that those same courts that did nothing for so long with the Tropper, Kolko and other cases get the public so excited with this case that they spur vigilantism in the populace. It reeks of money.
And even if this guy is as evil as he is made out to be, he is the product of a system that rewards legalistic behaviour and ridicules moral behaviour. I find it frightening to speak with Orthodox rabbinical candidates today. The whole mindset that states there is no absolute good or evil, only what can be proven in beit din to be legal and therefore good, chills me to the bone. But maybe I just live close to the wrong school.
Funny, I originally visited this blog because of the Tropper story, as I knew one of his students. But here we are years later, and I am told that Tropper still lives in Monsey but uses another of his homes on weekends, and that his students are buying houses with money gotten from Tropper's schemes. He trained the next generation in his image, and they are thriving.
But who gets beat up? A guy in a fight with his wife. And where is the outrage? He wouldn't give a get. Hey, I feel sorry if she wants to marry someone else, but make a deal for the money and go on to deal with the real problems of the Orthodox community. Put your outrage to better use.
I read the ruling at
ReplyDeletehttp://www.getora.com/Seiruvim
but I wonder what purpose it serves these days. After all, he is not locked into a shtetl with nowhere else to go. These days he can assimilate, take the law boards and do whatever he wants, living another kind of life and leaving his wife and aguna forever out of spite.
He's a yeshiva guy, so he grew up believing that legalisms are everything. Now (we are told) he's playing his legal games, supposedly holding out for money. The other side doesn't want to come up with the money, so (we are now told that) people are beating him up for not giving a get. Really, they seem to be beating him up so that the parents don't have to give the money, which seems a lot less holy to me.
I don't know the story here, as the reports are one-sided. But it strikes me as curious that those same courts that did nothing for so long with the Tropper, Kolko and other cases get the public so excited with this case that they spur vigilantism in the populace. It reeks of money.
And even if this guy is as evil as he is made out to be, he is the product of a system that rewards legalistic behaviour.
Funny, I originally visited this blog because of the Tropper story, as I knew one of his students. But here we are years later, and I am told that Tropper still lives in Monsey but uses another of his homes on weekends, and that his students are buying houses with money gotten from Tropper's schemes. He trained the next generation in his image, and they are thriving.
But who gets beat up? A guy in a fight with his wife. And where is the outrage? He wouldn't give a get. Hey, I feel sorry if she wants to marry someone else, but make a deal for the money and go on to deal with the real problems of the Orthodox community. Put your outrage to better use.
Yisroel Meir Bryskman is a family friend of ours and he is a great guy!
ReplyDeleteWhy is this being brought up now, several years later?
ReplyDeletehttp://daattorah.blogspot.com/2015/03/epstein-torture-trial-david-wax-links.html
Really sad that his wife is living in sin. It's also sad to see what had to happen to the misguided people who decided to beat him and extort him. Oh, lets not forget how they wanted to make him pay for the bloody carpet.
ReplyDelete