Last year the Religious Action Center began proceedings to try to force the Religious Council to open up mikvahs to all women regardless of marital status.

The women running the mikvahs are currently instructed by the religious council to not allow single women to immerse - I assume they are instructed to ask a woman as to her marital status in a situation in which they are suspicious that the woman might not be married. I don't know how else the balanit is expected to know who is single or married, and I know they don't ask every woman who walks in.

While they initially petitioned the Religious Council to change their policy, eventually this organization brought their petition to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court has now ordered the Religious Council, the Chief Rabbis and Minister Yaakov Margi who heads the Religious Council, to respond as to why they oppose opening the mikvahs up to the public, including single unmarried women without discrimination.

There is a rabbinic prohibition against unmarried women immersing, as it is is deemed inappropriate to allow such a thing. Allowing such immersion would be akin to allowing premarital sex. The Religious Council operates on that assumption, following the rabbinic ban. Obviously it is only rabbinic, as all adult women used to immerse for the purpose of impurity, as it was important for keeping food and utensils pure and they had to immerse monthly to do so.

The Religious Council is in a bit of a bind, as from a liberal democracy's perspective, services are meant to be supplied in a non-discriminatory fashion. It is discriminatory to ask women if they are married or single and provide services based on the answer. On the other hand, the Religious Council is meant to operate along religious guidelines, based on rulings from the rabbis, especially the Chief Rabbis, and to follow halacha.

This is the type of problem that arises when there is no separation of Shul and State, and there are no guidelines for how to integrate the two. Instea dof a formal policy, the governments religious body works by politicking just like any other governmental body - and sometimes those running it get what they want, and sometimes they don't.

What they probably should do is not agree to open it to unmarried women, but agree to take a step back and be less intrusive. It is not really their job to make sure everyone else keeps halacha. it is their job to provide the religious services to those who wish to use them. So, it is not really their business if the person requesting to immerse is single or married - they should just be providing the ability to immerse to those who want it. it is up to the women to keep their side of the halacha, in all that entails. So the Religious Council should respond and say that they oppose unmarried women immersing (with the exception of immersion for the purpose of ascending Har HaBayit), but it is not their job to enforce and prevent unmarried women from immersing. And they should instruct the balaniot to stop asking.



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