Q&A: One Who Brings a Bill of Divorce by Ship
One Who Brings a Bill of Divorce by Ship
Question
In tractate Gittin 7b, contradictory baraitot are brought regarding one who brings a bill of divorce by ship, in the context of the law of saying, “It was written in my presence and signed in my presence.” One baraita says that it is considered the Land of Israel, and therefore he does not need to say it, while a second baraita says that it is considered outside the Land.
Rabbi Yirmiyah and Abaye explain that the case is a ship on the rivers of the Land of Israel, and the law depends on the dispute between the Sages and Rabbi Yehudah regarding the obligation of tithes for a ship that is not touching bottom in the rivers of the Land of Israel.
Simply speaking, the tannaitic dispute is about drawing sustenance from / connection to the ground (it seems that this is a dispute among the medieval authorities there: Meiri, the commentary attributed to Ritva, and Rashi).
And here the son asks: why should the boundaries of the Land of Israel for bills of divorce—that is, where one must say, “It was written in my presence and signed in my presence,” and where one need not say it—depend on whether the ship draws sustenance from the ground (or is resting on the land)? The requirement to say “It was written in my presence and signed in my presence” depends, simply speaking, on the legal boundaries of the Land of Israel that were sanctified (perhaps with minor modifications—the dispute between Rabbenu Tam and Rabbi Yitzhak in Tosafot on “Ashkelon” on 2b). And according to everyone, the rivers of the Land of Israel are part of the legal Land of Israel (to the point that it seems far-fetched to say that according to Rabbi Yehudah it is actually forbidden to go out on a ship that is not touching bottom because of the prohibition of leaving for outside the Land). And it also seems that Rashi explains that this is why Rav Nachman bar Yitzhak rejected this explanation. But what would Rabbi Yirmiyah answer? And this also seems to be the difficulty raised by Tosafot, s.v. “Ha Rabbi Yehudah,” but it seems that the answer to the question he asks is actually in Tosafot, s.v. “Atzitz,” and I did not understand his answer.
I would be glad if the Rabbi would explain the passage.
Answer
Why should this have anything to do with the sanctity of the Land? What does that have to do with saying, “It was written in my presence”? Whether the reason is that people are not expert in writing it for her sake, or that travel routes are not common, it has nothing to do either with the sanctity of the Land or with drawing sustenance from the ground. Obviously they had to define the parameters of the law, and they attached it to some existing definition of the boundaries of the Land.
Discussion on Answer
As I wrote, in any case there is no connection between those boundaries and the enactment of “It was written in my presence.” Therefore they had to choose some arbitrary halakhic definition of the Land of Israel. I do not see any advantage to choosing this one over that one.
The definition is not completely arbitrary—there is some logic to it, as I wrote, because within these boundaries people are generally commonly found and knowledgeable there (as Tosafot explicitly says on 2b). True, not in every place within those boundaries are people necessarily commonly found and knowledgeable, and nevertheless they considered those places the Land of Israel for bills of divorce—so that there would be clear and known boundaries.
But still—why did they choose specifically the boundaries relevant to terumah? The boundaries of the sanctified Land of Israel include more places, and in terms of the logic there is reason to include those places as well as part of the Land of Israel. So why not enact it according to those boundaries? Why be stringent without any logic at all?
I’ve exhausted the discussion.
Why did the Sages decide to define it specifically according to the boundaries relevant to the obligation of terumot and ma’asrot?
After all, the reason that in the Land of Israel one does not need to say it is because people are commonly found there and are knowledgeable, and within the boundaries of the sanctity of the Land people are generally commonly found and knowledgeable there as well (perhaps except for places at the edge of the boundary and far from the academies—Rabbi Yitzhak’s view on 2b). So why didn’t they define it according to the boundaries of sanctity, which include more areas (as in our case of a ship that is not touching bottom—which is outside the Land of Israel with respect to terumot and ma’asrot, but within the sanctified Land of Israel), rather than according to the boundaries of the Land regarding terumah? After all, certainly in a place that is outside the boundaries of the Land with respect to terumot and ma’asrot, but inside the boundaries of the sanctified Land, the people are commonly found and knowledgeable at the same level as in the other places inside the Land!