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Mar 28, 2022Liked by Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg

I have been following your excellent work making these points clear on other platforms, and I'm glad you decided to bring them here too. To quote a rabbinic tale, "This, too, is Torah, and I need to learn!"

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Mar 28, 2022Liked by Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg

I have never been so grateful not to live in the United States. Wishing you all strength in this battle. 💖

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Mar 28, 2022Liked by Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg

Rabbi, thank you for this article and for the action items at the end!

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FWIW the whole thing in Judaism is that the fetus is regarded as a potential life, which does not have the same status as someone who's been born, but that has a status of some sort (especially after the 7-8 week mark). What that means to different people emotionally and how they make sense of it varies--a legal status is not the same thing as an emotional connection and relationship. And that's where we can hold pastorally that people's experiences emotionally of pregnancy loss and pregnancy termination might be quite different, and that's OK.

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So I saw a number of times in the texts you quoted the phrase "there is room to be lenient," which suggests that there is in fact a prohibition, but one whose importance should not be considered to outweigh other important factors such as the health or emotional well-being of the pregnant person. This seems to be the general understanding underlying all the responsa: that while one must take any risk or need (of whatever kind) on the mother's part seriously, abortion is not permitted _unless_ there is such risk or need.

What I can't figure out is: what is the source of said prohibition in the first place? What is the ostensible halacha that we are being lenient _about_?

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The thing that always gets me is the statistic that very religious communities tend to terminate pregnancies at the same rate as other communities. The hypocrisy and deceit is unnerving.

Thanks for all of your work and activism around this, Rabbi.

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Another available resource for pregnant people who need assistance getting information and abortion services in the US is the auntienetwork subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/auntienetwork/

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I always take heart from the nuance presented in these discussions. My own mother, based on lifelong health issues, was given the option to terminate her pregnancy if it looked I wasn't going to be a viable birth. She made up her mind to carry the pregnancy even if it affected her own life, but she never begrudged any other person who'd choose differently. So, despite what the bumper stickers in my town say, her child was, in fact, her choice.

I like the idea of the Hebrew concept "pikuach nefesh," protecting a life above all other factors. It's something I wish other religious figures would take to heart on issues like these.

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Question about the Emden text, about the adulterous woman! Is the adultery just part of the background of this specific case, or is the argument being made that the woe/shame of having an illegitimate child is itself the justification?

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