Ketubot 91: Equalizing Inheritance?

Today's daf is concerned with fairness.  If a man has two wives and each has sons, who inherits the man's accumulated wealth after he dies?  What if he does not have wealth enough to pay off both of his wives' ketubot?  What should be done if his wives predeceased him and the contents of their dowries still exist?

The rabbis walk us through their thinking about these matters.  They note that even one dinar (the smallest exact coin larger than a peruta) more wealth than what the man owes, for example, his wives' ketubot (to be inherited by all of his sons) is reason enough to split the total sum of the ketubot equally among the sons.  A new Mishna shares the rabbis' thoughts about this subject.

Clearly the rabbis are concerned with minimizing family conflict regarding inheritance.  We learn again that unless something specific is stipulated in their contracts, people must abide by the conditions of those contracts.  The rabbis consider situations where land that is liened either appreciates or depreciates in value.  They consider what to do when two wives have differently valued ketubot and their husband dies without any surplus funds - should they receive their ketubot as valued at the time of his death?  or should they equally split the funds?

Our daf ends with two cases meant to elucidate the decisions of our Sages.  Unfortunately for me, the Gemara proves to be continually confounding.  The first of the two cases concerns orphans who pay off their fathers' debt of fifty dinars.  However, they did not fully remove they lien of the property and so they have no right to claim it as their own - that is, unless they said to the creditor that they were specifically giving him that money as payment for the land and their father's debt.  Because paying off one's parents' debts is a mitzvah, the orphans might be simply fulfilling the mitzvah and not acquiring the land with their payment.

The second case tells of a son who agreed to sell the rights to his mother's ketuba if she should die after her husband dies - and if she does not object to the sale.  She did not object to the sale, and after she died, the son changed his mind.  He brought the buyer to court, arguing that he was standing as his mother's proxy.  The story begins in today's daf, but it does not end in today's daf.  We can look forward to its conclusion tomorrow.