Once Esti and Ronnie decided to live together as a couple, they unanimously agreed to keep out of their relationship any governmental element — first and foremost the Chief Rabbinate of Israel. The Chief Rabbinate, acting as an arm of the state, has jurisdiction over many aspects of the lives of Jews in Israel, including their personal status and, inter alia, marriage and divorce issues.

A couple married within Israeli borders will not be recognized as such until it passes the whole process through the rabbinate according to Orthodox Jewish law. However, for many young Israelis this process is not that simple and it is even regarded as humiliating. A statement by a qualified witness that both would-be spouses are single has to be provided. The prospective bride must undergo the Jewish purification ritual of immersion in the mikve. And an embarrassing probe into the family history of the couple is held to verify that the two come from families known to be Jewish for at least four generations back. Couples who are not willing to go through this Via Dolorosa will not be considered qualified, or kosher, to marry under Jewish law.

Esti and Ronnie felt the growing pressure as the date set for their wedding approached. Esti was raised in an ultra-Orthodox family in Bnei Brak, an Orthodox city near Tel Aviv. At some point in her life, she left religion and joined the secular world. Her aversion to religion was so intense that she decided to marry her man of choice outside the Chief Rabbinate.

“What most annoys me is the way the state is forcing me to follow a certain course of action,” she told me this week, declining to disclose her family name. “It is as if the state were telling me: Either you marry my way or go and find yourself another arrangement. And I am asking: What about my own personal freedom? What about my free will and that of my partner? And why should I run my life according to the dictates of rabbis who are total strangers, as far as I am concerned, and who mean nothing to me? Ronnie and I have decided that we are not going to subordinate our relationship to religious dictates.”