Turning to the American scene, a state appellate court in Indiana issued a ruling an April 4 that mentioned Jews and Judaism over 70 times. The court decided that, in certain circumstances, Jews can claim a religious right to abortion that overrides state restrictions. Michael A. Helfand explains:
Jewish law’s approach to abortion is generally understood—as much as anything within Jewish law is “generally understood”—to place the well-being of the mother, including physical and emotional well-being, at the center of its analysis. As a result, where an abortion is necessary to protect the well-being of a mother, broadly construed, Jewish law sanctions—and often requires—the termination of the pregnancy. If a mother, motivated by these underlying Jewish values, were to seek an abortion in a state that imposed significant restrictions on such procedures, her religious commitments could run afoul of state law.
Advocacy addressing this tension between Jewish commitments and abortion restrictions is not new. Back in the late 80s and early 90s, Agudath Israel of America, [the more religiously conservative of the two U.S. Orthodox umbrella organizations], filed friend-of-the-court briefs encouraging the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade. But, prefiguring much of the contemporary debate, it also argued that those religiously motivated to seek abortions—such as American Jews—ought to have religious-liberty protections for such decisions even in the absence of a more general right to abortion.
With an easy-to-follow blueprint now available, last week’s decision may signal that a Jewish right to abortion is no longer merely a theoretical argument.
Read more on JTA: https://www.jta.org/2024/04/11/ideas/an-indiana-court-ruled-that-jews-have-a-religious-liberty-right-to-abortion-heres-why-that-matters