Stipulations and Errors in a Divorce Bill

Sources

The mishna teaches that if a man said to ten people: Write and give a bill of divorce to my wife, one of the ten writes the bill of divorce and two sign it. The Sages taught: If one said to ten people: Write a bill of divorce and give it to my wife, one writes on behalf of them all. If he said: All of you write the document, one writes it in the presence of them all. If he said: Deliver a bill of divorce to my wife, one person brings it on behalf of them all…

MISHNA: If one says to his wife: This is your bill of divorce if I die, or: This is your bill of divorce if I die from this illness, or: This is your bill of divorce after my death, then it is as if he said nothing, since a bill of divorce is valid only if it takes effect before the husband’s death. But if the husband said to his wife: This is your bill of divorce from today if I die, or: This is your bill of divorce from now if I die, then this is a valid bill of divorce, because once he dies…

Rav Naḥman said: People do not designate a son as an agent in the presence of his father. And Rav Pappi said: People designate a son as an agent in the presence of his father. Rava said that the halakha is: People designate a son as an agent in the presence of his father.

The Gemara continues: And the Rabbis explain that this phrase: A scroll of severance, is required to teach that a bill of divorce must be a matter that severs all connection between him and her. As it was taught in a baraita: If a man says to his wife: This is your bill of divorce, on condition that you will never drink wine, or on condition that you will never go to your father’s house, that is not severance; the bill of divorce is not valid…

Rather, Rava said that the baraita should be interpreted in the following manner: This woman may marry neither the man who was specified in the condition nor another man. She may not marry him lest people say that these men are giving their wives to each other as a gift, and she may not marry another man because she is required to fulfill the condition. And if she marries the specified man she need not leave him, as we do not remove a woman from her husband due to a decree…

Gittin 84a:10-85a:26

Rather, Rava said that the condition in the bill of divorce of a dying man should be worded in the following manner: If I do not die this will not be a bill of divorce. If I die this will be a bill of divorce, and if I do not die this will not be a bill of divorce. The Gemara explains the necessity for such a formulation: The husband first says: If I do not die this will not be a bill of divorce, because a person does not hasten a calamity upon himself. Therefore, he first mentions the possibility that he will not die…

Gittin 75b:7-77a:8

§ Rava raised a dilemma before Rav Naḥman: In the case of a husband who wrote for her a bill of divorce on a plate [tas] of gold and said to her: Receive your bill of divorce and also receive the payment of your marriage contract through this act, as the piece of gold is worth enough to pay for the value of her marriage contract, what is the halakha? Rav Naḥman said to him: Her bill of divorce has been received and the payment of her marriage contract has been received.…

Rav Naḥman said to Rava that we learned an answer to this dilemma in the mishna: And we are concerned about her statement, and she must perform ḥalitza and she does not enter into levirate marriage. The mishna states that the court gives her statement some credence in either case, both when her testimony would exempt her from levirate marriage and when it would allow her to marry her yavam. This indicates that levirate marriage is considered neither in her interest nor a disadvantage for her. Rather, its classification is uncertain.

Yevamot 118b:15

Rav Safra said to them: But isn’t he an agent who is not granted the ability to effect divorce, as he was given only the authority to transfer the bill of divorce to Abba bar Minyumi? Therefore, he cannot transfer the agency to another person. These Sages were embarrassed that they ruled improperly. Rava said: Rav Safra struck [kappeḥinhu] a blow to three ordained Sages, as although he was from Babylonia and not ordained, he was correct. Rav Ashi said: With what did he strike them? He did not conclusively refute their opinion, as…

Gittin 29b:10-17

§ The mishna teaches: If a husband said to his wife: This is your bill of divorce on the condition that you will give me money from now until the conclusion of thirty days, if she gives the money to him within thirty days she is divorced, and if not she is not divorced. The Gemara asks: Isn’t that obvious, since everything depends on whether or not the condition was fulfilled? The Gemara answers: No, the halakha that the divorce does not take effect unless she gives the money by that time needs to be said…

The Gemara answers: Actually, you should explain that this case is that of a single judge, and it is as Rav Ḥisda said that Rabbi Yoḥanan said: Vows may be dissolved even by a single expert, and a three-member court is not always necessary. Here too, it is referring to a single expert refusing to nullify her vow. It is taught in the mishna that if a woman performed refusal or performed ḥalitza before a judge, he may still marry her, as he was part of a court…

Yevamot 25b:10-26a:6

MISHNA: With regard to one who divorces his wife, and afterward she spent the night with him at an inn [befundaki], Beit Shammai say: She does not require a second bill of divorce from him, and Beit Hillel say: She requires a second bill of divorce from him, since they may have engaged in sexual intercourse at the inn and thereby betrothed her once again. When did they say this halakha? When she was divorced following the state of marriage…

Gittin 81a:16-82a:9

The mishna proceeds to teach an additional halakha concerning a bill of divorce written not in accordance with its halakhot: If he changed his name, i.e., he wrote a different name in the bill of divorce, or he changed her name, or if he changed the name of his city or the name of her city, and she remarried on the basis of this bill of divorce, then she must leave both this first husband and that second husband. And all of those above-mentioned ways of penalizing a woman who remarried based on the bills of…

The baraita continues: With regard to this kind of wife, it is a mitzva by Torah law to divorce her, as it is stated: “Because he has found some unseemly matter in her, and he writes her a scroll of severance, and gives it in her hand, and he sends her out of his house…And she goes and becomes another [aḥer] man’s wife” (Deuteronomy 24:1–2). The verse called the second husband aḥer, other, to state that this man is not a peer of the first husband…

§ The mishna teaches: But if the husband said to the agent: When you transmit the bill of divorce to my wife, take for me such and such an item from her, then the agent may not appoint a second agent, as it is not the desire of the husband that his deposit be in the possession of another. Reish Lakish says: Here, Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi taught that a borrower is not allowed to lend the item that he borrowed to someone else, and a renter is not allowed to rent out the item that he rented to someone else. In those cases, the same reasoning applies, i…

Gittin 29a:17-29b:1

And it was further taught in a baraita: Any of those with whom relations are forbidden by Torah law do not require a bill of divorce to dissolve a union, except for a married woman who remarried by permission of the court. The Gemara infers: It is only a woman who married by permission of the court who requires a bill of divorce, but if she married based on testimony of witnesses she does not require a bill of divorce. The Gemara further inquires: Who is the author of this baraita? If we say it is…

Yevamot 91a:16-91b:12

Do we say that what he forbade initially he then permitted, enabling her to marry anyone, including Reuven and Shimon, in which case the severance is complete? Or perhaps what he forbade initially he then permitted, permitting her to marry Reuven and Shimon, and what he permitted initially he then forbade, i.e., he permitted her only to Reuven and Shimon, excluding all other men? If you say that what he initially forbade he then permitted, enabling her to marry anyone she wishes…

Gittin 82b:16-83a:3

Ravina raised an objection to Rava from a mishna (Gittin 13a): In the case of one who says: Give this bill of divorce to my wife, or: Give this bill of manumission to my slave, and then he dies, one should not give it after his death. But if one says: Give one hundred dinars to so-and-so, and then he died, one does give the recipient the money after his death. This indicates that a gift of a person on his deathbed that includes only a part of his property does not require an act of acquisition.

Bava Batra 151b:9

When [a man] divorces [his wife] according to a conditional arrangement, and the condition is fulfilled, the divorce is effective. If the condition is not fulfilled, the divorce is not effective. All the laws governing conditional agreements have been explained in Hilchot Ishut, Chapter 6.
There it is explained that when [a man] divorces [his wife] according to a conditional arrangement, and the condition is fulfilled, the divorce is effective from the time the condition is fulfilled, and not from the time the get is given to her…

Mishneh Torah, Divorce 8-10

Contrary to Rav’s opinion that a woman who remarries based on one of these bills of divorce must leave her second husband unless they have children, Levi says that she is never required to leave him, whether or not they have children. And similarly, Rabbi Yoḥanan says that she is never required to leave him.

Family Lawדיני משפחה

Laws of Circumcision

Principle Concepts of Marital Law

Laws of Betrothal

Financial Ramifications of Marriage

Laws of Divorce by Agency

Stipulations and Errors in a Divorce Bill

Permissibility for a Woman to Remarry after Separation from or Death of Husband

Laws of Rape and Seduction

Laws of One Who Defames

Ordeal of Drinking the Sotah Water

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