Leading US rabbi says that there is no such thing as rape within marriage

New Jersey rabbi Steven Pruzansky holds very controversial views about marital rape, survivors of assault and the epidemic of rape on campus

Steven Pruzansky said the contractual obligation of marriage means the problem of rape is 'solved' (YouTube)

One of the most outspoken and prominent rabbis in the country has said a woman’s problems of rape and sexual assault would be solved if she were married.

Steven Pruzanksy, of the large Orthodox synagogue Bnai Yeshurun in New Jersey, said in his blog that marriage will “solve all these problems, the “rape culture,” the “he said/she said,” the feelings of rejection by the party who had an emotional connection with another person who just sought a physical connection.”

Mr Pruzanky said a wedding is a contractual obligation “grounded in mutual respect”.

“Problem solved…” he wrote.

Cheryl Rosenberg, author of the blog My Jewish Learning, said: “This presumption that sex within marriage is always consensual is not only wrong, it is dangerous.”

Now the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance is calling for the removal of the Teaneck rabbi from a synagogue conference in June.

“[...] this is the straw that has broken the camel’s back,” Sharon Weiss-Greenberg, JOFA’s executive director, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Bnai Yeshurun, with Mr Pruzansky at the helm, is one of the largest modern Orthodox synagogues in the US, with more than 800 members.

Mr Pruzansky, who has previously expressed views on how to murder Arabs and that transgender people should not use public bathrooms, also wrote in his blog that too many women are blaming men for sexual assault weeks after the crime took place, misinterpreting sex for rape and reporting crimes as vengeance for “feeling used”.

“Certainly, one [assault] is too many, but few of these claims involve the old-fashioned and execrable assault by a stranger in some dark alley,” he wrote.

The narrow and commonly accepted definition of rape inspired 90.6 per cent of students at Stanford University to demand a new student sexual assault survey this year, claiming that sexual assault was only given such a name when it involved the threat or use of violence. Stanford University has so far refused to re-do the survey.

Mr Pruzansky continued: “There is a problem of “culture” on college campuses, but it is the culture of promiscuity and entitlement that poses the greatest dangers.“

A woman called Madi Barney at the Christian Brigham Young University in Utah reported her rape to staff and was reportedly emailed back a month later over whether she had “violated” the university’s “honor code” which tells students to avoid sex.

A petition to scrap that code and help victims, not investigate them, has reached thousands of signatures.

While Mr Pruzansky also claims the rape culture boils down to between 10 and 20 assaults per year, official statistics show that one in five women experience sexual assault on campus.

The shockingly high numbers of assaults brought about an initiative called “It’s On Us”, championed by Vice President Joe Biden, to educate men about the responsibility everyone shares for the rape culture and to fight against it.

Mr Pruzansky, a former lawyer, also questioned women who did not immediately report their rape. He accused them of “loving and cherishing” the perpetrator in the moment, and only “realizing” that woman had been assaulted weeks later after the relationship had “soured”.

“If indeed there was a “rape culture” on American campuses no intelligent woman would want to attend college,” he added. ”The fact that more women attend college today than men itself belies the accusation.”

Responding to the outcry, Mr Pruzansky wrote another blog, in which he said: "Heeding our moral laws can only benefit men, women, marriages, families and society itself. That was and is my point.

"The fruitless debate over statistics aside, I would hope that even the professional feminists can subscribe to that."