Q&A: We Split the Ruling
We Split the Ruling
Question
See the responsa Zikhron Tzvi by Rabbi Horowitz (Mossad HaRav Kook), section 20 (found on the HebrewBooks website).
The gist of his discussion is that only after the husband’s death or after giving a bill of divorce is it possible to say that she did not betroth herself with this in mind; and this would explain well why this concept is not found in the Talmud except regarding a yevamah who fell before a man afflicted with boils. According to this, there is a basis for the ruling around which your honor’s words revolve.
I would be glad to hear your honor’s opinion regarding what is said in the above-mentioned book.
Yours, with appreciation and respect
Answer
Yes, several other halakhic decisors wrote this as well, even before him.
I commented on this in my column (and also in the article linked there), and I said that in my view this is neither a reasonable interpretation of the Talmud nor a reasonable position in Jewish law.
The passage there deals with that case either because it is more common, or because if she fell to a husband who himself was afflicted with boils, then it is obvious that she leaves without a bill of divorce, since that is a mistaken transaction. Here the discussion is about the reasoning of “she did not enter into it with this in mind” (where the defect is not in the transaction itself but in something incidental, and according to several commentators the defect here arose after the moment of betrothal and was not hidden from her at the time of betrothal), and not about a mistaken transaction.
And in Jewish law, that is what I explained in the column itself.