Kiddushin 5: Modes of Acquisition and Release

The rabbis continue to discuss which actions can be affected by which means.  Documents release women from marriage, for example, but they do not necessarily effect betrothal.  The rabbis consider money, which does not allow the divorce of a husband and wife.  Money can be used to redeem consecrated property and the second tithe.  If acquisitions is effected by money, why isn't the release of property - including a wife - affected by money?  One of the more interesting points is that both documents and coins are discrete items.  Ultimately, the rabbis look to the requirement that not just a document but a document of severance is required to break the bond between husband and wife.  Money might represent a document, but it cannot specifically represent a document of severance.

To prove that some modes of betrothal cannot be derived from other modes of betrothal, the rabbis look at the issue of consent.  In some cases, a woman can be acquired against her will.  For example, women can be betrothed in most cases without her consent.  However, she cannot be acquired through money against her will.  Thus no modes of acquisition are derived from any of the others.

The rabbis rule against Rav Chuna, who says that chupa, the wedding canopy, effects full acquisition of the woman.  Instead they argue that women are able to partake of teruma once under the chupa, for husbands are taking women under their cloaks at that time.  Our notes remind us that this is the case even if the wife is only three years and one day old.  Masechet Ketubah discusses these details, very disturbing to our modern ears, greater detail.  In our daf, the rabbis go on to better understand how entering under a chupa may or may not effect acquisition as betrothal.

Though a document, money and/or sexual intercourse can effect the acquisition of a wife, only a document - a get - can effect divorce.  

We learn that if a man gives an object worth money to a woman and says "you are betrothed to me" or "You are my wife", she is betrothed.  However, if she gives him an object worth money and says, "I am betrothed to you" or "I am your wife", she is not betrothed.  Rav Pappa disagrees. Why shouldn't her words carry the same power?  She gave the money/object and repeated the formulaic words.  

The Gemara reasons that the second half of our Mishna was not worded carefully enough to agree with Rav Pappa's interpretation.  Instead, it argues that the intention of the baraita was to demonstrate the actions that must be done by the man in the act of betrothal.  In the case of divorce, a man must state that the woman is free from her bond to her husband.  Thus if he says, "You are hereby sent away", the get is valid.  If he says, "I am not your husband", the get is questionable.  The rabbis want the husband to state that his wife is free to marry another man.  There should be no confusion about this.

At the end of our daf, the rabbis wonder why this is different from one who takes a vow of Nazirut  when a nazirite walks past and the person says, "I am, too".  Rav Pappa suggests that if a nazirite had not passed by, the statement would be too ambiguous to be taken as a vow.  Is this statement of intention to be interpreted loosely, or should we be more stringent in statements regarding divorce?  Ambiguous intimations are different from unambiguous intimations, the rabbis argue.  I would add that the consequences of effecting a divorce might be much more serious than the consequences of effecting a vow of nazirut.