32 No. 77 JUSTICE ntroduction The aftermath of World War II confronted Jewish communities worldwide with unprecedented legal and religious challenges. Among the most pressing was the situation of thousands of Holocaust survivors who had lost their spouses in the Nazi genocide but could not prove their deaths. Without official death certificates from valid civil and religious authorities, these survivors found themselves trapped in a religious and legal limbo – unable to remarry under Jewish law (halacha) or under the civil laws of the countries where they sought refuge.1 This article examines how this crisis unfolded in Sweden, where more than 10,000 Holocaust survivors arrived in the summer of 1945 for rehabilitation. An estimated 2,500 of them were widowed survivors who needed to prove their spouses’ deaths to remarry. The intersection of three distinct legal systems – Swedish civil law, Jewish religious law, and international law (both private and public) – created a complex challenge that required creative solutions from both religious and secular authorities. Drawing on previously unexplored archival materials, including the extensive documentation collected by Rabbi Abraham Israel Jacobson2 and preserved at Yad Vashem, this article traces the development of the Aguna3 crisis in Sweden, the efforts by Jewish religious authorities to address it, the practical challenges survivors faced under Swedish law, and the stille chuppe,4 which originally emerged as a pragmatic solution but ultimately created new legal and social challenges. It examines how much discretion Swedish pastoral officials actually had under Swedish law in this regard, the extent to which they exercised it, and the advocacy efforts that eventually convinced some local authorities to accept non-conventional proof of death. This case study illuminates broader questions about how legal systems respond to humanitarian crises, the challenges faced by refugee populations navigating unfamiliar legal frameworks, and the enduring tension between religious law, civil law, and moral imperatives in the immediate post-Holocaust period. Holocaust Agunot in Sweden: Between Rabbis and Pastors Arie Reich and Seth Jacobson 1. For some of the writings on this subject, see Tehila (Darmon) Malka, “Our Unfortunate Sisters, the Daughters of Israel”: Holocaust-Survivor Rabbis Confront the Problem of Post-Holocaust ‘Agunot,’ 47 YAD VASHEM STUDIES (2019); Tehila (Darmon) Malka, “Resolving Holocaust Agunot in DP Camps,” in AND YOU CHOSE LIFE: JEWS CHOOSE LIFE IN THE HOLOCAUST AND AFTER 84 (Itzchak Pas ed., Arnold and Leona Finkler Institute for Holocaust Research, Bar Ilan University 2020) (Hebrew); Pesia Persi, “The Phenomenon of the Soviet Union’s Holocaust Agunot in the Light of Halakhic Literature and Rabbinic Correspondence,” 37 BESHVIL HAZIKARON: A JOURNAL FOR THE EDUCATION AND STUDY OF THE HOLOCAUST 46 (2021) available at https://tinyurl.com/5n95evak; Shelomo Zalman Klein (published with addenda by his son, Yekusiel (Yekutiel) Klein), ATERET SHELOMO: SEFER TAQANAT HA’AGUNOT SHEL MILHEMET HA’OLAM 82-84 (Budapest: Gwirtz Bros. Press 1946) (Hebrew); Meir Feuerwerger, EZRAT NASHIM: VEHU TAQANAT ‘AGUNOT — YESODOT ‘AL-PI SHITOT HASHAS VEHAPOSEQIM LEVERUR SHE’ELAT HA’AGUNOT SHENISHARU AHARE HAMILHAMA HA’OLAMIT (Frankfurt–Brussels: n.p., 1950) (Hebrew). 2. A grandfather of Seth Jacobson, one of the article’s authors; see “Rabbi Abraham Israel Jacobson (1888-1955),” SETH JACOBSON, available at https://www.jacobson.co.il/aij/bio/eng/aij-short-bio.html 3. In Jewish law, an aguna is a married woman who cannot remarry because she is unable to obtain a valid Jewish divorce (get) from her husband, or because she is unable to prove his death. 4. “Stille chuppe” (in Yiddish: “A quiet marriage ceremony”) is a discreet, private Jewish wedding ceremony conducted without public announcement or celebration, and performed only according to Jewish religious law, in cases where civil marriage is unavailable or legally impossible for the couple. I
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