[Avodah] IVF and the Rabbinate

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

On Fri, Aug 18, 2017 at 01:55:52PM +0200, Ben Waxman via Avodah wrote:
: I can easily imagine Rav Yosef saying "My psak deals with procedural
: errors, not someone doing it intentionally." Would that have any
: effect to the actual din? I can't see how the rabbinate can give a
: legal objection based on "not wanting to have more yotomim". A
: single woman is allowed to get IVF.

I know that Beis Hillel eventually agreed with Beis Shammai, "ashrei
mi shelo nivra". But...

This child can't exist except as a "yasom". Is growing up fatherless
worse than never existing at all?

(I adapted that line from arguments about aborting a fetus that tests
positive for Downs. How many people with Downs hate their life so much
that they regret existing?)


: Feminists of course could object that this is institutionalizing agunot.

Marriage as described in Bereishis 1, perhaps. "Peru urevu umil'u es
ha'aetz". But the intimacy of Bereishis 2 is not adressed "... al kein
ya'azov ish es aviv ve'es imo, vedavaq be'ishto, vehayu lebasar echad".

My version of "the talk" with my boys started with these two pesuqim.
Explaining that relations are to serve these two functions.

And also, while birth control can address one of these two, extramarital
relations outside of "vedavaq be'isho" translate into exercises in
weakening that bond, that gift HQBH gave us. (Adding now, as this bit
would go over their heads: to approximate Adam Qadmon as humanity is
described before Adam and Chavah are made from one into two.)

And then, after establishing theological context, the talk continued
on the usual biological and psychological planes.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
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