Divorce Is a Mitzvah: A Practical Guide to Finding Wholeness and Holiness When Your Marriage Dies

As a practicing Conservative Jew, I found this book and Rabbi Netter's thoughts very helpful and insightful into my own situation. I highly recommend this book for anyone, Jewish or not, going through the pain of a divorce.

In "Divorce is a Mitzvah" Rabbi Perry Netter takes the reader through a Jewish perspective of divorce. A mitzvah is defined as a response to the voice of God that commands us to behave in a particular way. While Jewish scholars have many writings on the importance and symbolic significance of marriage and being an ideal couple, there is a dearth of writings concerning divorce. Rabbi Netter tackles this problem and many of the hardest questions of divorce. Chapters include: "Why is this happening to me?", "Is divorce Kosher?", "What do I do with all this anger?", "How do we tell the kids?", "How do I get to closure?", and "How do we continue to raise children together?". All this is done from an understanding and compassionate position within the Jewish belief system. The book is a highly recommended read for Jewish readers seeking answers on the question of divorce.

For anyone considering a divorce, for those in the throes of one, or for those still recovering from one, the title of Netter's book alone will lighten your burden--Divorce is a Mitzvah, A Practical Guide to Finding Wholeness and Holiness When Your Marriage Dies. In the book, Netter tells us what Judaism has to say about divorce. He also discusses the related topics of love, marriage, anger, and loneliness, using stories from the Torah to make his points. But as anyone who has ever read a Torah passage will attest, virtually every word can have multiple translations--or at least nuances--and this rabbi, a divorced man himself, tends to put a spin on these tales that can salve the souls of the divorced.

"I wish I had read Divorce Is A Mitzvah when I was going through my divorce. Not only would it have given me much-needed moral support but it might have helped to dramatically reduce the levels of anger and recrimination between my soon-to-be ex-husband and myself. I have read other Jewish books on the subject of divorce but none are as loving, caring and helpful as this one; Netter is a human being speaking to other human beings. In addition to offering sage advice, he really does manage to fulfill his aim of ending "the silence in the Jewish world about divorce, and in a small way, help to alleviate much of the unnecessary pain and suffering that seem to be so much a par tof hte ontemporary divorce." This book should be required reading for all couples because the device that it gives and the divine clarity that it sheds will only help them deal even better with their existing marriages -- let alone if they have to come to the sad solution of divorce." ... reviewed in the Jerusalem Post, November 20, 2002