Gittin – “Divorce Document” – The Mind of Dan Perlman

Gittin – “Divorce Documents” – Parting Glances

I suppose it makes sense to follow on a tractate that was ostensibly about trying to rebuild trust in a broken marriage to one where that didn’t work, and the couple decides it’s time to separate. Gittin is the plural of Get, in Hebrew, though the original word get is from the Mesopotamian language, Akkadian. In its original, it apparently just meant “document”. This tractate starts at the end, the fait accompli, the handing over of the document and the dissolution of the marriage, and then works backwards to the initiation of the process. There are nine chapters that roughly cover: (1) delivery of the get, (2) the stringency of the writing, (3) how it addresses the particular couple, (4) a tangent into the betterment of the world, (5) alimony and other monetary issues, (6) appointment of an agent to write it, (7) who can grant a divorce, (8) witnesses to the process, and (9) qualifications and limitations of the document.
le, a tangent into the betterment of the world, alimony and other monetary issues, appointment of an agent to write it, who can grant a divorce, witnesses to the process, and qualifications and limitations of the document.
5/18/23, Chapter 1, Page 2 – The agent who delivers the get into the wife’s hands must state that he personally witnessed her husband signing the document and that the chain of custody has been unbroken. This was particularly important if they were in different countries, ostensibly to avoid later claims of fraud or forgery, but more, that the agent is a witness to the husband’s intentionality in dissolving their marriage, their relationship, their bond. Following on the end of Sotah, it’s about clear, intentional communication.
5/19/23, Page 3 – In modern times the idea of a man “releasing” a woman from the bonds of marriage sounds condescending. Two thousand years ago a divorce document created a new reality for his wife. While he could remain married and have affairs, or in some periods even multiple wives or concubines, the woman in a marriage had no such freedom. She was forbidden to all other men. The get, the divorce document, opens a new reality for her, allowing her to get on with her life. As such, the document must be witnessed by other signatures, and if delivered by an agent, by the agent.
5/20/23, Page 4 – If both husband and wife are within Israel, the messenger bringing the divorce document doesn’t have to witness the signing. The rabbis assumed that the on-site witnesses are available to be brought to court to testify if needed, and that they know the ins and outs of the document. They clearly didn’t envision modern day Israel, where half of the Jewish population identify as secular and wouldn’t have a clue.
5/21/23, Page 5 – Once again, deaf-mutes are lumped in with minors and imbeciles as mentally incompetent (here, in regard to being witnesses or messengers). Now, the Talmudic rabbis were absorbing the cultural milieu extant at the time – most western societies had a similar attitude. Some of it was self-fulfilling – if you start with the assumption of mental incompetence, you don’t educate, and therefore, you end up with ignorant people. What is interesting is that while advances in education, medicine, and technology have changed that outcome, the halacha, the rules around their competent participation in Jewish life (for the orthodox), haven’t kept apace.
5/22/23, Page 6 – At the beginning of this tractate we meet the messenger who delivers a divorce document to the wife. He is required to state that he personally witnessed the intentional writing of the get by the husband and the signing of it, in front of witnesses. That seems straightforward enough, except that today, the rabbis discuss what witnessing actually means, and conclude that as long as the messenger was in the house, even if not in the room, he was a witness. That seems a bit dodgy to me.
5/23/23, Page 7 – There is no excuse for creating an atmosphere of fear among your family, friends, or co-workers, as an attempt to motivate them. Period. End day’s portion of the tractate.
5/24/23, Page 8 – If the get is written and delivered in Israel, the messenger does not need to have witnessed its writing and signing, as it is assumed the witnesses are readily available. If it’s written on a boat in international waters that is headed to Israel, this holds true as well, as the boat is connected to the land via the water. This is contrasted with, of all things, a flowerpot, which, even if sitting on the ground, has an air-gap and therefore isn’t connected to the land. Why someone would be writing a divorce document while in a flowerpot is not addressed, but I imagine this ruling could be extended to, say, air travel.
5/25/23, Page 9 – It is telling that the Talmudic rabbis compared a husband writing, signing, and delivering a bill of divorce for his wife, with a landowner writing, signing, and delivering a bill of manumission for his slave, and found them to be virtually the same. It’s more telling that they didn’t find this to be in the least surprising.
5/26/23, Page 10 – The Samaritans were a group of Jews who followed the principles of the Torah, but didn’t accept the rabbinic interpretations of how that translated into daily life. That’s to say, they were basically telling the Talmudic rabbis to take a hike. So, tit for tat, our learned council basically rules that “since Samaritans don’t really understand our rules”, for the most part, their signatures as witnesses to documents are invalid. Because, you know, we don’t like that they don’t like us.
5/27/23, Page 11 – Witnesses to a get have to be Jewish, after all, like the Samaritans yesterday, they need to understand halaka, our rules. While there were names that might be considered ambiguous, certain names were clearly “not us”, like Hurmiz, Abbudina, bar Shibbetai, bar Kidri, Bati, and Nakim Una. This seems unhelpful in modern times, but I take it they were the ancient Israeli version of Chad, Graham, Harrison, Reid, and Fletcher. If any Jewish guys out there are named one of those, I have questions.
5/28/23, Page 12 – One of the tenets in this discussion of the get is that it is for the advantage of the woman, freeing her from the bounds of marriage. In a weird counter-position, the rabbis discuss that while a decree of manumission for a slave becomes effective as soon as the master signs it, because it is to the slave’s benefit, a get does not become effective for divorce until it is delivered to the wife, because it is to her detriment. Much of the discussion relates to the economics of a freed slave versus a… freed wife. Still, it reframes the narrative.
5/29/23, Page 13 – Once again, intention matters. Or does it? The rabbis turn to the topic of posthumous deliveries. They agree that if a man sends money to another, and then dies, the delivery is carried out. But what about documents of manumission or divorce? No, say the rabbis. Such documents change the life status of the receiver with regard to the sender, and if the sender is no longer alive, that can’t happen. While I understand the logic, it feels, from reading their commentary, like they didn’t understand, or care about, the consequence to the wife or slave.
5/30/23, Page 14 – Two rabbis get involved in a shady deal with a loan shark from the local Jewish mafia. When the don’t live up to the terms of the deal, the lender sends Arda, Arta, and Pili Bereish, perhaps the earliest named enforcers in written history, to beat one of them up. The other stands by and not only doesn’t help his friend, but encourages them. In retrospect, later, it is concluded he had no choice, circumstances forced his hand. Shades of Michael Corleone.
5/31/23, Chapter 2, Page 15 – We saw at the beginning of this tractate that one of the requirements for a valid bill of divorce is that the delivering agent has to swear that he witnessed both the writing and signing of the document, himself. Proving that my people will pick any topic to argue about, today’s page delves into what ifs, like, what if one agent says he witnessed the writing and another says the signing? Nope. What if he witnessed half the writing and then the signing? Nope. Every what if is met with “we refer you to the required condition stated above”.
6/1/23, Page 16 – The rabbis compare two-person witnessing to water purification ceremonies. The two approaches are either immersion within a set amount of pure water, or having that amount poured over you. You can’t immerse yourself in half the amount and then have the other half poured over you, because there’s no guarantee that you’ve purified all parts of your body. Likewise, if two different agents witness different parts of the process, there’s no guarantee that they were seeing the same document.
6/2/23, Page 17 – Given the attention that the rabbis want placed on the correct writing and witnessing of the divorce document, with intention and thought, it is fascinating that they then insist that it must be both written and signed in front of the witness(es) on the same calendar date. It can’t be written, or partially written, on one day and then signed on another, though obviously that doesn’t preclude draft versions of it, just the official document. Also, Persian Zoroastrian Fire Priests have made a return appearance, snuffing out lamps in Babylonia. Just so you know they haven’t been forgotten.
6/3/23, Page 18 – Apparently it was commonplace… well, it is a movie/tv trope too… that a couple getting a divorce might have “one last roll in the hay”. But that would, according to the Talmudic rabbis, invalidate the divorce if the document has already been delivered (it becomes effective on delivery, not on the date of writing). Therefore, they proffer the idea of a ten-day period after delivery before it “really” becomes effective, just in case, you know?
6/4/23, Page 19 – A divorce document can be written on anything, from “an olive leaf to a whole cow”. Those seem oddly specific range choices. It must be written with an indelible substance that can’t be washed away (a list is provided), and likewise, the surface can’t be treated with something that might cause the writing to disappear (like gallnut extract). At the same time, if the husband personally delivers the document, it can be a blank sheet of paper that he simply out-loud says “here’s your divorce document”, and that’s considered valid.
6/5/23, Page 20 – Following on yesterday’s passage, it turns out there are some other limits to on what and with what a divorce document can be written. In some, but not all, circumstances, it is apparently acceptable to chisel it on stone. However, it is not, in any circumstance, acceptable to embroider it on cloth (I’m assuming that relates to the ease of “erasure”). In a modern world where people sometimes make grand gestures for marriage proposals like skywriting or jumbotrons, it’s somewhat amusing to contemplate such gestures when it comes to a divorce.
6/6/23, Page 21 – Some husbands don’t feel like springing for a delivery agent, and are too much of wimps to deliver divorce papers in person, and perhaps they leave the document lying about for her to find. The rabbis rule that because the delivery mechanism is “property”, it becomes one with the document, and she is both divorced and the sole owner of the home where the document was left. Likewise, if the husband uses a slave to deliver the document, the slave becomes her property instead of his.
6/7/23, Page 22 – The rabbis discuss the use of plant leaves, vegetables, and fruits as the writing surface for a bill of divorce. Much hinges on whether or not said plant part is attached to its plant, and whether the plant is planted in the ground or in a pot. Mobility, apparently, is at issue for them. I realize that access to paper or parchment might have been limited to the average citizen, but they really seem to be reaching for offbeat alternatives.
6/8/23, Page 23 – We’re back to minors, imbeciles, and deaf-mutes. In a bizarre turnaround from the usual rabbinical approach, the Talmudic folk announce that any of those may be employed to write a bill of divorce, as long as a competent adult supervises and explains what to write. Stop and think that through, particularly in regard to the first two, and for the third, in an era where sign language and education for deaf people didn’t exist. As a side note, blind people cannot be employed to deliver a bill of divorce because they can’t confirm who gave it to them, who they’re delivering it to, or if the document they’re carrying is a valid bill of divorce.
6/9/23, Chapter 3, Page 24 – A bill of divorce is particular. That’s to say, it has to be written with the specific parties in mind, the husband offering the document and the wife to receive it. You can’t just go buy a pre-written divorce document and fill in the names, you can’t write a general purpose one to divorce the wife of your choosing and decide later, you can’t use one written by another husband who happens to share your name with a wife who shares your wife’s. Of course, you have to be caught for the document to be declared invalid.
6/10/23, Page 25 – There’s no “retroactive clarification” of whom the bill of divorce is intended for. That’s to say, if a husband feels like he has too many wives and wants to cut the number down, he has to write the bill specifically for the one he wants to divorce. He can’t write a conditional bill, saying something like, “whichever one comes out the front door first is the one I’m divorcing”. And yes, that was one of the actual examples used in the discussion, so you know somebody tried it.
6/11/23, Page 26 – A husband should wait until the last minute to hire a scribe to write a divorce document. Why? Because if his wife knows he has hired a scribe, she will immediately know that he is intending to divorce her and start an argument. There’s a lot to parse there, but what strikes me most is the assumption that a divorce document is the only reason a man might hire a scribe.
6/12/23, Page 27 – We have, perhaps, one of the earliest laws around “chain of custody”, a term we all know from TV shows, at the least. If a delivery agent temporarily misplaces or loses a bill of divorce he’s supposed to be delivering, unless he finds it immediately, with no chance that someone else has had contact with it, it is considered invalid. After all, someone could have altered the details, or, in the extreme, the bill he finds could actually be a different one that just happens to have the same names on it.
6/13/23, Page 28 – Once an agent delivering a bill of divorce leaves the husband with the document, he operates on the assumption that nothing has changed. The husband hasn’t changed his mind, he hasn’t died (even, the rabbis note, if he was a hundred years old and on his deathbed – “he was alive when I left him”). Obviously, in modern times, that has changed, since the agent can be contacted at a distance via all of our various communications methods. I still have to wonder about that century-old dying guy deciding to divorce his wife….
6/14/23, Page 29 – We’re getting convoluted in the realm of death and delivery here, though I suppose it was considered necessary. If the agent who is delivering the divorce document gets sick he can appoint another agent to complete the delivery for him, as long as he swears in court that he witnessed the writing and signing of the document. The second agent is then operating as an agent of the court with that affidavit. However, if the first agent dies, the second agent’s delivery is cancelled, because the affidavit is now invalid.
6/15/23, Page 30 – If a husband writes a divorce bill and sends it with the stipulation that it is to be delivered on a specific date, subject to (two examples) whether he arrives before the date and cancels it, or “appeases” his wife before that date. If he fails to arrive because of unforeseen circumstances, even though he intended to, or fails to appease his wife despite making efforts to do so, the rabbis argue over whether his intent, or the outcome, takes precedence as to the delivery of the decree. It’s not resolved.
6/16/23, Page 31 – We’re talking about the four winds today, and the rabbinic folk are clear that the world only survives by having winds from the four cardinal directions blow in balance. That balance is controlled by an angel, Ben Netz (“son of the spark”), in the form of a hawk. He is, as best I can tell, only mentioned in two places in the Talmud, and nowhere else in Jewish scripture. Interestingly, the four winds are individually controlled by the archangels Michael, Uriel, Gabriel, and Raphael. Which kind of makes Ben Netz a big deal.
6/17/23, Chapter 4, Page 32 – A husband sends a bill of divorce to his wife, something she is expecting, but intercepts the delivery agent just before the delivery and voids the bill. But, rather than attempt at reconciliation, the sages discuss the possibility that he’s doing it just to piss off his wife, who was expecting to be “set free”. The question is whether or not this the bill of divorce is then valid or not, given the dishonorable intentions of the husband. They don’t reach a firm conclusion… “it depends”.
6/18/23, Page 33 – If the husband intends to void an already sent bill of divorce and cannot intercept the delivery agent, he can petition a court to declare it void. However, the rabbis note that because of the logistics of making sure his wife knows the divorce bill is void, he must do it in a court in her locale, he can’t just declare it while he’s in another jurisdiction. And if she’s not present in court, he needs, depending on who you ask, either 2, 3, or 10 witnesses to make sure she finds out. All of this, obviously, his way of ducking out of talking to her directly.
6/19/23, Page 34 – Today’s page focuses on the case of a husband who writes a bill of divorce under duress, and his remedies after the fact, but I was caught by one line in the text: “[T]he preservation of the court’s honor is more important than the accurate distribution of the property”. Just stop and parse that for a second, and think about it. We’ve seen it in modern times too, where a judge or court is more concerned about their image than doing what is right. Apparently a millennia-old issue.
6/20/23, Page 35 – The rabbinical courts have decided not to accept oaths from widowed mothers. They have responsibilities caring for their “orphaned” children. Note, once again, that the father dying, while the mother remains alive, was considered “orphaned”. If she takes an oath and fails to fulfill it, and the consequences were to take her away from childcare, it would have a negative impact on their world, so, it’s easier to just not accept oaths from the moms.
6/21/23, Page 36 – Some of the sages were so well known that when they “signed” a document of opinion or witnessed a legal document, they simply used their personal “mark”. Rav, a fish; Hanna, a palm branch; Hisda, the letter samekh; Hoshaya, the letter ayin; and Huna, a sail. Who knew Prince Rogers Nelson was so into the Talmudic process?
6/22/23, Page 37 – In Deuteronomy we learn that private debts are forgiven during sabbatical years, and the Torah admonished lenders to not stop lending just because a sabbatical year was approaching, knowing they’d never collect. But, people are people. At some point the sages decided on a workaround (with some torturous logic) that allows lenders to transfer their debts to the court, making them collectible public debts and then administer them on the court’s behalf, allowing lenders to continue to lend and borrowers to continue to borrow.
6/23/23, Page 38 – Reasons to free a slave: a) your son falls in love with your female slave and wants to marry her – no mention is made of if your son falls in love with your male slave, or your daughter falls in love with either; b) “people” are forcing your female slave into sexual impropriety, and you want to save her the humiliation, again, no mention of male slaves being used inappropriately; c) your slave scrabbles together enough money to pay off his/her cost; d) you need a tenth man for a minyan, and the only one around who knows the ropes is your male slave. How about, just because it’s the right thing to do?
6/24/23, Page 39 – Following on yesterday, if you free a slave to “use” him as a 10th for your minyan, you consecrate him to the Temple so that he is considered a Jew on attaining his freedom. Today, two rabbis argue over his “use”. As a slave, he was property, and if he’s like an object consecrated to the Temple, you can’t use him for anything, only Temple priests can, but if he’s like land consecrated to the Temple, you can. No consideration is given to what the now freed slave wants, which begs the question of what that freedom means.
6/25/23, Page 40 – A man designates one of his slaves as part of a repayment of debt to someone else, and the someone else accepts that deal, but hasn’t “taken delivery” yet. Prior to the transfer of the slave to his new owner, the current owner emancipates the slave. According to rabbinic law, the slave is a freedman, he is still included in the debt repayment, but has the legal right to walk away and not serve the new master. Now, that’s a quirky way to screw over a business associate and give new life to a slave at the same time.
6/26/23, Page 41 – Just so you know that the sages were not ignoring female slaves, you should know that if a slave owner has sex, consensual or not, with a married female slave or servant, the rabbinical court does not consider this to be adultery on either his or her part. After all, you’re just having sex with a piece of property, no different than, say, with a blowup doll, or… a pie.
6/27/23, Page 42 – It was possible for a person to be half slave and half free. If he had two joint owners and one of them freed him, but the other didn’t, he is required to alternate days between being his own master and serving as a slave. It gets more complicated when they discuss if and when he got injured or killed, who is owed reparations, himself, his family, or his half owner, which depends on which day it happened. I’m waiting for the return to the subject of divorce as this seems to be a setup for tying to the two topics together.
6/28/23, Page 43 – If a slave is killed by someone’s ox, normally the owner is liable for the value of the slave to his master. However, if it can be shown that the slave had a medical condition that was likely to cause his or her death within the next year, no payment is due. Quite possibly the first recorded regulation for being denied coverage based on pre-existing conditions.
6/29/23, Page 44 – If a slave owner loses a slave under duress, for example, the slave is conscripted by the military, or a government official takes the slave away (for their own use or for emancipation), the rabbinic council says that the owner is entitled to compensation. Not that Jewish law likely had any impact on governmental entities, at least outside of Israel. That said, though I understand that slavery was common two millennia ago, just a fact of almost every culture, it’s not like I’m going to get worked up over the slave owners’ losses here.
6/30/23, Page 45 – Some themes are as old as recorded history, as we find out today that women in bathrooms gossip about men. And, it turns out that Stockholm Syndrome was Neharde’a Syndrome two thousand years ago, as women embraced staying with their captors who treated them well rather than going back to their families.
7/1/23, Page 46 – We’re moving back into the realm of divorce, with a long discussion about whether a husband and wife who have been divorced can remarry. If, it is asserted, the man has publicly repudiated his wife as part of the divorce proceedings, opening her up to public humiliation because of her wanton behavior (whether true or not), he may not remarry her, even if he finds out he was wrong. If he keeps his mouth shut and doesn’t ruin her reputation, they can remarry.
7/2/23, Page 47 – Nope, we’re not back to divorce yet, but there’s only one more page in this chapter, so…. Today’s page is a series of stories that I would boil down to “enjoy life to the fullest and leave the world a better place when you go”.
7/3/23, Page 48 – If you acquire property or possessions through gift, purchase, inheritance, or marriage (and finally I see where we’re headed, I think, as tomorrow we move into the chapter on alimony and monetary issues), do right by the person you acquired it from. That’s pretty much the sum of it.
7/4/23, Chapter 5, Page 49 – In an agricultural society, one’s lands were divided into the better, middling, and lower quality fields. The sages ruled that debts could only be secured by the middling quality fields. Why? Because if they were secured by high quality lands, predatory creditors might bamboozle an owner into taking out a loan he couldn’t pay back so they could get their hands on it. If the lower quality, no one would be willing to make a loan on it. In the middle? Just right. Goldilocks. In the Talmud.
7/5/23, Page 50 – Regardless of the quality of land promised as collateral to a loan, if it comes to collecting a debt from a man’s children after his death, including alimony or other marriage debts, it can only be collected from the value of the inferior lands he owned. After all, they’re orphans, regardless of their age or whether their mother is alive.
7/6/23, Page 51 – The presumptions of innocence and honesty are made within the legal system, at least within the one administered by the Talmudic rabbis. If someone returned found property to its owner, it was assumed that since they made the effort to return it, they didn’t steal from it, like, say, taking money out of a wallet and giving it back empty. If there was doubt, the person was asked to swear an oath. Once again we have the mystical power of oaths being considered as a proof.
7/7/23, Page 52 – When a father of minor children died, it was customary to appoint a steward to handle their financial affairs until they reached the age of majority. If the father had not appointed one, the courts did. It was assumed that such stewards operated with the minors’ best interests at heart. Court appointed stewards were assumed trustworthy. Privately appointed ones were required, you guessed it, to swear an oath that they were trustworthy. There, sorted, no shenanigans here.
7/8/23, Page 53 – If you intentionally adulterate someone’s sacred, consecrated food or wine, you are liable for a fine. If you do so in tribute to an idol of “another god”, you are guilty of a capital crime and are put to death. The rabbis decide that that’s a sufficient punishment for the crime and you don’t also owe a fine. There was some debate.
7/9/23, Page 54 – We’re doubling down on intentionality, with regard specifically to keeping to the rules. Much is centered around the Sabbath, the Sabbatical Year, and some various other examples. There’s even a brief dip into the world of converts to Judaism (in this case, their intention to be fully Jewish contrasted against someone born Jewish who doesn’t keep the faith, so to speak). As has popped up time and again in the Talmud, intention matters, sometimes more than action.
7/10/23, Page 55 – I’m struck by a short section at the beginning of today’s page. A husband can take advantage of his wife’s learning disability, lack of mental competence, or analphabetism, by giving her a decree of divorce that she’s can’t read or understand, claiming it’s something else (an IOU is given as an example, but I guess he could say it was a grocery list), and still have it be valid once she accepts it, as long as he told witnesses he was going to do so. That is such a WTF, it’s hard to believe it would have been condoned, even back in such patriarchal days.
7/11/23, Page 56 – Suddenly, we’re on the story of the destruction of the Second Temple and the near destruction, but last minute salvation of Jerusalem. And, it all ties back to a story about a self-important man inviting himself to a party he wasn’t wanted at, being kicked out, and setting in motion a plot to destroy the city and its Jews just because he was miffed. A plot that started with a whisper in a king’s ear and, apparently, led to the rise of the Roman Empire and its Caesars.
7/12/23, Page 57 – Onkelos, nephew of Titus, the Roman caesar around 80CE was a necromancer interested in Judaism. He raised up the spirit of Titus, plus the spirits of the prophet Balaam, and that of Jesus. Each told him that Judaism was the correct path and to honor the sages of the Talmud and there were daily afterlife punishments for those who didn’t. According to Titus, it was to be repeatedly burned to ash and scattered across the world; Balaam said being boiled in semen, and Jesus offered up being boiled in shit. Well then.
7/13/23, Page 58 – We seem to be moving back towards this chapter’s theme with a series of stories that basically present the message that if you act on gossip or innuendo, without verifying the information, you are the guilty party in the destruction of whatever relationship is compromised. Yes, you might have been manipulated by one or more conniving parties, and they share in the guilt, but you didn’t do your due diligence, so to speak.
7/14/23, Page 59 – In an interesting discussion of respect for those who are more accomplished in a given arena, there’s one particular standout example. Now, age is not, by any means a solid predictor of wisdom or accomplishment, but within the rabbinical court system, when hearing a capital case, the judges give their opinions one after another, starting with the youngest, and moving on to the eldest, in order to prevent the younger ones from being unduly influenced or silenced by the opinions of their elders.
7/15/23, Page 60 – When writing out the Torah, the “rule” is it must be written out in its entirety, not piecemeal. At the same time, the sages understood the construct of time, and felt that as long as it was written in order, from start to finish, you could take your time with it, for example, writing out your study portion each day. After all, Moses took six weeks to write it… then again, those who have studied the texts objectively rather than on faith, assert that it’s a stitched together compilation of at least 3-4 different texts from different time periods.
7/16/23, Page 61 – Some things are simply illegal to steal. Some things are wrong to steal because doing so goes against promoting the common good, the common peace. While the rabbis feel this is an important distinction for legal purposes, they’re basically all in agreement that stealing is wrong, regardless of whether the particular theft is defined as a crime under statutes or not.
7/17/23, Chapter 6, Page 62 – One thing that has come up repeatedly in the details of the processing of the get, the divorce document, has been a woke cadre denouncing men from two millennia ago as cowards for using agents to deliver the get rather than personally delivering it to their wife. As this chapter starts on “agency”, we find that women used agents to receive legal documents on their behalf. Different era, different culture. I await the same denunciation of these women as cowards…. What, crickets?
7/18/23, Page 63 – This whole agency thing was apparently a very big part of life back in the day. Though so far no real reason has been given, I think I can infer from the way agents were used, that rather than being a way of making transactions arm’s length, they were a way of making them more legally clear, as they created a third party witness (and often other witnesses required) to the preparation, delivery, and receipt of legal documents. In the case of divorce, preventing either party from making false claims as to what happened.
7/19/23, Page 64 – The rabbis argue around in circles over who is most credible in a divorce situation: the husband, the wife, the agent(s), the witnesses? Mostly, it seems to come down to the agents, as they don’t have a personal investment in the outcome other than accomplishing their tasks of observing, accepting, and delivering. Obviously the husband and wife have biased viewpoints, and witnesses likely will as well, given that they are generally friends of one or the other.
7/20/23, Page 65 – If a husband instructs his agent to deliver a bill of divorce to his wife at a certain location and time, and the agent deviates from those instructions as to time and place, is the divorce valid? In general, it seems, no, according to the sages. On the flipside, a wife can’t use that fact by not being or not having her agent be at the appointed place or time, as a way of not acknowledging the divorce document.
7/21/23, Page 66 – As today’s page meanders through deathbed divorce decrees, rival wives and demons creating fake divorce decrees, one starts to wonder about why, exactly, a husband needed to divorce his wife before he died? It brings us back to an earlier tractate, the one on levirate marriage. A widow is obligated to marry her brother-in-law, unless they go through the halizah, the pseudo-divorce. So a deathbed divorce decree, along with a “gifting” of the estate, left a widow both setup financially and free to remarry whom she wished.
7/22/23, Page 67 – Apparently, fake divorce bills were really a thing back in the day. Again, we see examples considered of wives creating their own via agents they’ve contracted, third parties interfering in marriages by creating fakes to be delivered to the wife, agents of husbands intentionally misinterpreting his instructions. And… we’re back to witnesses. I’m beginning to think that society two millennia ago was so deceitful that the rabbis basically decree the need for two or more witnesses to more or less anything.
7/23/23, Chapter 7, Page 68 – We are full tilt into demons with this new chapter. Focusing on a husband who momentarily goes insane, a sort of bipolar fit, and scribbles out a divorce document, only to regret and retract it once he stabilizes. This is either caused by drinking partially fermented wine, or the demon Kordeyakos. To cure this temporary insanity, either eat coal roasted meat with some watered down wine, or, cut a black hen in half and wear one half on your head until the blood dries, adhering it to your scalp. I think I’d opt for the steak dinner.
7/24/23, Page 69 – The litany of Talmudic cures makes for fascinating reading, as it has in the past. Eye infections? Three brushstrokes of dried and powdered seven-color scorpion. Coughing up blood? Eat that tripe, lentil, beet, and leek stew accompanied by a good dark beer. Cardiac pain? Sesame, mint, and cumin in equal proportions. Someone should write these down….
7/25/23, Page 70 – Today we’re on to sexual intercourse and health. Much of it is a litany of the things that cause a man’s sperm to be less effective, possibly resulting in mentally or physically deficient children. Of particular note seem to be not having sex just after returning from a long trip – wait until you’re rested; not having sex standing up – apparently the directional pull of gravity changes things; and not having sex right after pooping, because the bathroom demon is clinging to you for at least a short time. Good tips!
7/26/23, Page 71 – After first using a passage from Psalms to verify that someone who is deaf can’t hear and someone who is mute can’t speak, the rabbis discuss whether someone who is mute can give instructions to issue a valid bill of divorce. They decide that if he can write clearly, then yes. With the exception of someone who became mute after being married. Since he spoke his vows with his voice, he can only negate them the same way, and cannot get divorced.
7/27/23, Page 72 – One had to be very careful about the wording of a conditional divorce. “This is your divorce bill if I die from this illness” was invalid, because a divorce couldn’t take place after the husband’s death, so “This is your retroactive divorce bill to today’s date if I die from this illness”. Or, “This is your divorce bill if I don’t return within a year from this voyage”, and the man died before the year was up was a real conundrum unless he added “or die” and “retroactive” instructions.
7/28/23, Page 73 – If a husband issues a bill of divorce while ill, stating “as of today, if I die from this illness, you are divorced” but then dies because a house fell on him, or a lion eats him (their examples, not mine), the divorce is invalid. If he states “if I die” without a condition, then it’s valid. Also, once the bill of divorce is issued, his wife must not be alone with him, even on his deathbed, as a hint of intimacy might indicate an intention to “remarry” even though the divorce hasn’t officially happened until he dies.
7/29/23, Page 74 – Part of having the sort of Schrodinger’s divorce that was covered on yesterday’s page ought to be really obvious. I mean, your mind went straight to Schrodinger’s adultery, right? The rabbis’ minds went there. Given that the wife was both divorced and not divorced, depending on whether her husband actually died and activated the retroactive divorce, is that if she went out and slept around, she either was or wasn’t cheating. Depends on whether or not he survived.
7/30/23, Page 75 – One of the things the rabbis hasten to remind us is that part of the divorce document proceedings is the actual delivery of the bill of divorce to the wife. It’s not enough for a husband to say “here’s the bill of divorce, I’m putting it away for safekeeping, it will become retroactive if I die from such and such conditions”. He has to actually give it to her, personally or through an agent, or it’s not considered valid. Because, who knows what that safe-kept paper is, or if it’s been switched out for a different document?
7/31/23, Page 76 – As anyone is when confronted by reading a text that was written long ago, the rabbis often find themselves debating what a colloquial phrase actually meant. Faced, in this discussion about divorce, with the phrase “in my/his presence”, as a condition of divorce, the learned folk debate whether this simply means physically being in the same room as each other, or something more… intimate. The majority lean towards the latter, as simple presence seems a silly condition to base a divorce on.
8/1/23, Chapter 8, Page 77 – A husband has to deliver the bill of divorce, either himself or via agent, directly to his wife’s hand. No leaving it lying around for her to stumble across, no tossing it through her bedroom window to be discovered among the dirty laundry, no throwing it at her like a paper airplane gliding across the courtyard. In her hand, or it’s a no go. You’ve been served!
8/2/23, Page 78 – I’ve found the origin of the missing homework excuse! It’s right there in the Talmud! If a man pushes a bill of divorce across the table to his wife, and the dog runs in and grabs it before he says the magic words “this is your bill of divorce” and before she picks it up, it’s considered invalid. The dog ate my divorce bill!
8/3/23, Page 79 – With all the emphasis on making sure the bill of divorce ends up in the wife’s hands, today’s passage is puzzling, as the rabbis discuss tossing the document to a woman on a balcony from either below in the courtyard or above on the roof. The big question is not whether she obtains it in this matter but whether it is valid if it happens to burst into flames in midflight and all she gets are scraps of ash. That there were some on the council who thought yes is, to say the least, bizarre.
8/4/23, Page 80 – By rabbinic law, a bill of divorce must be dated using the Jerwish lunar calendar. But some folk might use the calendar date from the culture in which they live, be it Gregorian or pre-Gregorian. Since this doesn’t fulfill the rules, the divorce is invalid, the woman has to leave whomever she remarried after the divorce, and her children with her new husband are considered bastards. In all the discussion, it never seemed to occur to a single rabbi to suggest putting both dates on the document.
8/5/23, Page 81 – Lax morals! Arabs fondling women! Arabs raping women! Make-up sex! Hate sex! Public sex! With witnesses! Can she marry a priest now? Does she need a second divorce decree? Enquiring minds want to know! This chapter goes out with a bang! Or several…
8/6/23, Chapter 9, Page 82 – One of the conditions of the divorce document is that it severs all marital ties between husband and wife, freeing her to marry again, of her own free will. Although certain conditions being included have been discussed – care of children, elder parents, portions of estates, one that hasn’t been until today’s page is that of limiting her field of options. With only certain niche exceptions, of the “my twin brother”, “my father/son” sort, the rabbis seem to agree that the husband cannot make the divorce contingent on who she chooses to remarry.
8/7/23, Page 83 – The rabbis recognized that sometimes (sometimes?) a husband was overly controlling. So, for example, he was not allowed to put a condition on the divorce that was basically unfulfillable – the case mentioned is one of “I grant you divorce on the condition that you never drink wine again for the rest of your life”. No way José, says every wife and even the rabbis. Though they do allow him to stipulate that same condition for the period until his life ends. Which, I’m predicting, may be sooner than he planned.
8/8/23, Page 84 – Given that the husband has the power in writing the divorce decree, what if he puts in unacceptable, clearly vindictive, conditions? Eating pork, walking across the ocean, flying up into the sky, having intercourse with her own father, or, marrying a specific person? The rabbis debate and decide that if the condition is impossible to achieve, it’s simply ignored and the divorce if valid; but, if the condition is one where she has a choice, no matter how unpalatable, the divorce is only valid if she fulfills the condition, despite any other consequences. This is not exactly what is meant by choice and free will….
8/9/23, Page 85 – On the menu today is a discussion of unnecessary conditions, such as noting that the divorce is valid only if his wife doesn’t marry her own father, or the husband’s father, or a minor boy, or… multiple other examples of things that would have already been forbidden. One that does cause some debate is him stating that the divorce will be annulled if she remarries and then cheats on her new husband. First, why is it any of his business, and second, why would he want her back?
8/10/23, Page 86 – Things that invalidate a divorce bill: lack of witness signatures or lack of sufficient number of witness signatures, undated bill, or a bill dated using the wrong calendar system, giving your wife the divorce document during sex, having sex with your wife after giving her the document, regardless of whether it’s taken effect yet. No rage sex, no make-up sex allowed. Cut the ties. Move on. Nothing to see here.
8/11/23, Page 87 – After spending the last 86 pages making sure every i is dotted and every t is crossed, the rabbis decide that if the date on the divorce bill that the scribe wrote isn’t the same as the date that the husband signed it, it’s invalid. After all the things that they wanted the husband to consider before divorce, if he he takes a day to consider his actions after having the document written, it invalidates the document and he has to start over. The assumption appears to be that if he really wanted a divorce, he’d have leapt into action with his trusty ballpoint.
8/12/23, Page 88 – A husband who does not want to give his wife a divorce, for whatever his reasons, can be compelled to by the bet din, the religious court for the locale where he lives. And while the rabbis recognize that a secular court might order the same, for religious purposes, that divorce is not considered valid. This issue still comes up in modern times when a judge grants a divorce but the local bet din (we still have them) doesn’t follow suit.
8/13/23, Page 89 – When women meet amongst themselves, what are men to make of it? After all, from the patriarchal viewpoint, a woman’s place in the home, married, raising children, keeping house. And inquiring about what they’re up to would be unseemly. Better to rely on rumor, innuendo, and imagination, no? I mean, how could a sewing circle “just” be a sewing circle? And what would women have to talk about anyway? “The same thing we do every night, try to take over the world!”
8/14/23, Page 90 – Unseemly. This is where we end this tractate – which, remember from the beginning, approaches divorce in reverse, from completion to instigation. And so, we end at the beginning, with the prime reason for a husband to divorce his wife. Unseemly behavior. And how is that defined? Well, if she had sex with another man. If she behaves immodestly in public. If he finds a better looking woman. If she burns or over-salts his dinner. You know, the unseemly stuff.
- I don’t generally follow on, but given that this is both the final, and only, page in the tractate that addresses the reasons and instigation for divorce, I wanted to address one thing. Given the culture, the man had/has all the power in writing and delivering the divorce document, the get. But, the rabbis aren’t stupid, they know that sometimes it’s the woman who wants out. So what’s her recourse? Do something that her husband will find unseemly, like those listed above. But, they caution, heading into metaphor territory, an unseemly woman is like a glass of wine with a fly in it. Some men will, indeed, throw out the glass of wine and fly; but some will simply pick out the fly and then drink the wine; and, there are even men who will drink the wine, fly and all. I leave it in your own minds to process that metaphor and it’s potential consequences.

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