daf bit: Kiddushin 56

[cellio]

When a man betrothes a woman he must pay a bride-price, which need not be in cash but can be in goods. However, the mishna teaches that several possible payments are off limits: he cannot pay with fruit that is forbidden to eat (orlah), nor with an animal destined for sacrifice, nor with the ox condemned to be killed for goring, nor with meat seethed in milk, among others. If he pays with these, he is not betrothed. However, if he sells any of those items and betrothes her with the money gained from the sale, then he is betrothed. (56b)

Some of these (like the ox) are things I would have expected to be in the category of "you may derive no benefit from these". (The g'mara argues about this with respect to the meat/milk mixture on 57, today's daf.) I guess benefit ok but you have to have one level of indirection in the case of marriage contracts?

(I'm not sure where he would get buyers for some of these, but that is not the mishna's concern here.)

Comments

[kayre]

What fruit is forbidden to eat?

[cellio]

Fruit grown in the first three years of the tree's life.

(Also anything grown in the land of Israel during the sabbatical year (one in seven) would be forbidden, though it's not cited here.)

[zevabe.livejournal.com]

"anything grown in the land of Israel during the sabbatical year (one in seven)" would in fact be permitted to be eaten. However, it does not belong to the person in possession, inso far as he may not transact buisness (including paying for a bride) with it. However, it is his in the sense that he may use it on the first day of Sukkot (4 species need to be yours on day 1).

[cellio]

Thanks for the clarification! I hadn't realized that the concerns about buying orlah were more about ownership (can I buy this?) than eating.

[zevabe.livejournal.com]

Oh, orlah is prohibited for benefit, including eating. But Shemitta has to do with ownership. Eating shemitta is in fact encouraged.

[talvinamarich.livejournal.com]

Where would he find a buyer? Hm.

I assume that it would be permitted to sell an animal destined for sacrifice to someone else so that they might sacrifice?

As for the others, what of things sold to those who are not Jews? Some of those sales would strike me as wrong regardless ("The ox gored somebody. Quick, sell it to a gentile!").

Best suggestion I can offer is that while doing some of these things might be a sin, the intent here is that the sin should remain his and not be passed off to his betrothed. If an ox is to be killed for goring, and you don't kill it, that is disobedience to God's Law. If you make a gift of it to your betrothed (or, I would assume, ANY other Jew?) then you have made that one complicit in your disobedience, knowingly or unknowingly.

I know the mishna isn't concerned with this, but the implications are interesting.

[ticklethepear.livejournal.com]

My dowry was the equivalent of a round-trip bus ticket between my town and his (about $20). I don't know who got the better deal.

[zevabe.livejournal.com]

This is discussing not the dowry but the "bride-price" or what the man gives the woman in order to acquire exclusive rights to her. In modern times, a ring is traditionaly used for this purpose, but any item of determinate value works, assuming said value is above that of a peruta (which is very little).

He can't use these things because they are ALL prohibited to benefit from. As such they don't really belong to him, and he needs to use his own stuff to acquire rights to his bride. It has nothing to do with the prohibition involved, but rather that they are in a sense ownerless and unacquireable. Something prohibited for its normal use but permitted to benefitted from, such as a non-kosher fish, may be used b/c the woman could find another use for it besides eating. She might for example use it to slap her new husband.

He is prohibited to sell these things, but if he did, the money does not become prohibited from benefit (which is a concept called temura, that the status of A, when exchanged for B, becomes transfered to B.)