-1

Being that it is forbidden to marry siblings may conjoined twins marry? Are they considered siblings or one person?

Dude
  • 4,362
  • 1
  • 14
  • 42

1 Answers1

0

In 1977, Rav Moshe Feinstein ruled on a case of conjoined twins who were joined from the shoulder to the pelvis and shared a single six-chambered heart. I don't believe that his responsum was published by himself; however, I have seen multiple pages on the internet that cite a 1977 Philadelphia Inquirer article about his ruling (including this one, which I'm using as a basis for my summary because I do not have access to the article itself). Their condition was life-threatening to both of the twins to the extent that they would both almost certainly die if they were not separated. However, separating the twins would certainly cause the death of one of them.

Rav Moshe ruled that the twins may be separated, resulting in one of their deaths. He used two analogies to support his decision:

  1. Rodef (pursuer)
  2. A case given in the Yerushalmi where bandits demand that a group of Jews hand over a particular Jew to be killed. The ruling there according to Reish Lakish (which is how we pasken for practical halakha), is that handing over the one designated Jew is permitted so the rest will not be killed.

Both of these analogies clearly assume that the conjoined twins are two separate people. If conjoined twins were considered one person in halakha, he would not need to go to such analogies because nobody would be killed by separating them. Given that they are separate people, it is clear that two female conjoined twins could not marry one man because one man may not marry two sisters. Likewise, two male conjoined twins could not both marry one woman since a woman may not marry two men at all (regardless of whether they are siblings).

Daniel
  • 24,888
  • 3
  • 48
  • 148
  • @LN6595 Good point. I was just addressing what I assumed to be the meaning of the first part of the question (since the fact that male conjoined twins cannot marry one woman is not due to the fact that they are siblings), but I'll add that to my answer. – Daniel Feb 18 '20 at 20:02
  • 1
    The twins can marry two different women and then fulfill the divine degree. – Jonathan Feb 18 '20 at 20:12
  • @Jonathan That might be true, though there would obviously be some practical and halakhic concerns that need to be worked out. But I don't think that's relevant to the question. – Daniel Feb 18 '20 at 20:14
  • 1
    I think it is totally relevant to the question. I agree with you that halakhic concerns would need to be met, and I'm sure they would be acted accordingly. – Jonathan Feb 18 '20 at 20:41
  • If a conjoined twins counts as two people how is one able to decide who should die for the benefit of the other? – Dude Feb 19 '20 at 01:30
  • @Dude Typically, one is clearly more viable than the other. When that's not the case, perhaps neither one can be designated as the one that will die, but they're still two different people. – Daniel Feb 19 '20 at 03:35
  • If one was more viable than the other this question wouldn't be relevant. This is about an adult conjoined twins that is of marriageable age – Dude Feb 19 '20 at 14:23
  • @Dude they are different cases. Rav Moshe's ruling was about baby conjoined twins. We see from that case that conjoined twins are considered two people. Now we apply that fact to your case of adult conjoined twins. – Daniel Feb 19 '20 at 14:30
  • Sounds like a choice between murder and giloy arayos both of which are put on the same level of transgression – Dude Feb 19 '20 at 14:32