Bava Batra 109: Proof that Men Inherit Before Women

Usually my commentary on the daf, if included at all, follows a somewhat detailed review of the day's daf.  Today's post is a departure from that pattern.  Much of what is interesting to me of what I read was not the detail but the general tone and topic of the conversation.

The rabbis wish to discuss inheritance guidelines as they were set out in yesterday's daf.  Who is thought to be the first to inherit and why?  What is meant by the word "family" in some of our texts?  Why are wives not the first inheritors?  When do women inherit and why?  The rabbis provide proofs both through their texts and through their lines of questioning for the logic of the guidelines in our Mishna.  

Such arguments are circular, though genius.  Circular because each question is based on the limited scope of the questioners at that time.  We only know as much as we can know given our place in time, geography, relationships, status, gender, etc.  The arguments are genius because our rabbis are able to call upon the specific texts which will answer their questions in a manner that matches their logical origins.  

And so, of course, the rabbis determine that fathers and sons are the primary inheritors.  They explain how levirate marriage might influence their understandings of who inherits and in which cases one inherits.  But they cannot find texts to prove that women should inherit in these particular cases.  This makes sense, as women were in fact property of their husbands.  In fact, women only achieved "peoplehood" over the past hundred years in North America, so our world view is not so terribly different from those of the rabbis of the Talmud.