Initially the sages would say that three women are automatically divorced and receive their ketubah: (1) the wife who says to her husband, “I am defiled to you,” (2) the wife who says “Heaven is between me and you,” and (3) the wife who vows “I am removed from the Jews.”

The first woman is a survivor of sexual assault, which renders her, though blameless, no longer permissible to her husband (if he is a priest, as the Gemara will explain). The second, the Gemara clarifies, is a woman whose husband “does not shoot like an arrow” — that is, he’s impotent. And the third — the one who has vowed to be removed from all Jews, including her mate — is the reason this mishnah is tacked on to this tractate on vows.

Because this law unintentionally gave clever women the power to initiate divorce and still keep their ketubahs, the mishnah continues, it was changed: The assaulted wife was required to bring proof that the sex was not consensual; the woman whose husband was impotent could request but not compel a divorce; and the husband of the woman who vowed to separate herself from the Jews was encouraged to annul the portion of the vow that applied to him so that not only was divorce no longer required, in the event of divorce she would be unable to remarry within the Jewish community.

Since we are in Tractate Nedarim, we might expect the Gemara’s discussion to center on the last case that pertains to vows. (Also, in my view, it is the most interesting legal adjustment because it weaponizes her attempt to leave the marriage with her ketubah.) But in fact, the Gemara is focused on the first two cases, eventually wending its way into a series of scenarios in which a woman has had sex outside her marriage but we are not certain whether it was consensual — or, indeed, if it even happened at all. The last and most cinematic of the hypothetical scenarios is this:

An adulterer entered the house of a married woman. When her husband came home, the adulterer went and sat behind the door. There was some cress lying there in the house, and the adulterer saw a snake taste it. The master of the house wanted to eat from the cress and the adulterer said to him, “Do not eat from the cress! A snake has tasted it.”

It’s a made-to-order movie scene with the following legal question attached: Can the husband infer that the (naked?) man behind the door is in fact an adulterer? The omniscient narrator has told us he is. And why else would he be skulking behind the door? But according to Rava, his presence is not adequate proof:

Rava said: His wife is permitted to him (i.e. she didn’t commit adultery), for had he (the man behind the door) committed a transgression, it would have been preferable for him that the husband should eat the cress and die, as it is written: For they have committed adultery and blood is on their hands. (Ezekiel 23:45)

An adulterer, says Rava, would welcome the death of his lover’s husband. Therefore, we can conclude that this man is innocent.

The Gemara suggests that this conclusion is obvious and wonders why Rava even needed to tell us. Why might we suppose the man who just jumped out to save the husband’s life is also cuckolding him? The last lines of our tractate explain:

Rava’s ruling is necessary, lest you say that he did commit a transgression with her, and he spoke to the husband because it is preferable for him that the husband should not die. This is in order that the man’s wife should be to him as it says in the verse: Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. (Proverbs 9:17)

We might have supposed that the man’s decision to save the husband’s life proveshis guilt, because it is only while the husband continues to live that the adulterous relationship stays illicit and hot. That is why we need Rava’s teaching that by saving the husband, the man proves his innocence. 

Before we turn the page, let’s once more consider that verse from Proverbs: Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. In this tractate we have mostly been dealing with vows that are the inverse: People vowing to deny themselves things that they would normally want. But this verse reminds us that forbidden things are also thrilling, perhaps yet another reason the rabbis were concerned that vows not get out of hand. 

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A certain man vowed that all benefit from the world would be forbidden to him if he married a woman before learning halakhah. He would run up a ladder and rope but was not able to learn. 

Once, says the Gemara, there was a man so dedicated to learning Jewish law, he vowed to deny himself all benefit from the world if he married before mastering it. Alas, he did not have a head for halakhah. He studied hard — so hard that it was as if he climbed up and down a rope ladder all day — but was not able to successfully learn the material. 

This sounds tragic on all counts, but there is no automatic violation of the vow. The man keeps studying, keeps failing to master the material, and remains unmarried. That is, until a rabbi intervenes:

Rav Aha bar Rav Huna came and misled him so he married a woman.

Rav Aha bar Rav Huna tricks this poor man into believing that his vow will not go into effect if he marries and so he gets hitched. 

Why would Rav Aha intentionally deceive the man into activating a vow that will deny him all benefit from the world? Isn’t it better for the man to live an unmarried life than to marry and be unable to benefit from the world? While the former deviates from the rabbinic norm to marry and have a family, the latter is a path to death by starvation!

As soon as the man marries, his vow is activated and he is, in fact, unable to benefit from the world, which includes wearing clothes, so …

Rav Aha bar Rav Huna then smeared him with clay. 

Holding the man to his vow (the one he previously convinced him would not be activated by marriage), Rav Aha now provides clay to take the place of clothing. “Wearing” clay, which comes from the world, is not considered to be a benefit. Whether this is a small kindness to provide protection for a person who can no longer wear clothes or a public humiliation for a person who was deceived into taking on the consequences of a vow, Rav Aha’s actions appear difficult to defend. But at least the man’s suffering is about to end, because:

Rav Aha then brought him before Rav Hisda to dissolve his vow. 

Once the man has married, been stripped of his clothes and covered with mud, Rav Aha immediately brings him to have his vow dissolved. And now we finally get an explanation for this strange sequence of events.

Rava said: Who is wise enough to act in this manner, if not Rav Aha bar Rav Huna, who is a great man? As he holds that just as the rabbis and Rabbi Natan disagree with regard to nullification, whether it is possible to nullify a vow that has yet to take effect, so too, they disagree with regard to a request made to a halakhic authority to dissolve a vow, whether it is possible to request dissolution of such a vow. 

As Rava explains, the rabbis do not agree about whether a vow can be dissolved, or even if one can request that a vow be dissolved, until its conditions are activated. And this provides us with the motivation behind Rav Aha’s actions: The man has made a vow which prevents him from getting married because he is unable to master halakhah. Rav Aha wants to relieve him of the enormous burden of this vow, but in order to do so, the vow must be activated. So he tricks the man into marrying and then, once the vow has been activated, immediately brings him to have it canceled.

What appeared to be an act of cruelty turned out to be an act of kindness — one that shows us just how far the rabbis will go to unencumber a person from a vow that they shouldn’t have taken in the first place.

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The term na’arah (plural na’arot) usually refers to single young women who have not yet reached the age of legal majority. Today’s mishnah lists nine na’arot whose vows cannot be nullified. But as we will see, the term clearly refers to women of different ages in this mishnah. Here are the first seven:

There are nine young women whose vows are upheld: (1) a grown woman who is an orphan; (2) a young woman (who took a vow) and then reached her majority and she is an orphan; (3) a young woman who had not yet reached her majority and was an orphan; (4) a grown woman whose father died; (5) a young woman who came of age (who vowed and then) her father died; (6) a young woman who had not reached her majority (when she made her vow) and her father died (before she reached the age of majority and so she is still a minor); (7) a young woman (who made a vow) and her father died, and after her father died she reached her majority. 

These seven types of women have all lost their fathers; without a father or a husband to annul their vows, their vows stand — regardless of their age when they made their vow, or the age at which they lost their fathers. And if you’re having trouble tracking the differences, don’t worry — the Gemara is going to simplify it soon. But before that, let’s finish our list of the nine na’arot. And, thank God, the last two categories in this mishnah also offer us examples of women who got to keep their vows and their fathers!

(8) a grown woman and her father is alive; (9) a young woman who took a vow and reached the age of majority and her father is alive. 

So actually, regardless of whether her father is alive, an unmarried adult woman’s vows cannot be annulled. 

Young girls with fathers can have their vows annulled by their fathers, young orphan girls cannot, and adult women – regardless of whether their fathers are alive — cannot either. Then why list all these different extremely specific scenarios? It turns out that the rabbis of the Gemara don’t actually think we need to get this specific. They offer a much simpler way of saying the same thing:

But the rabbis say three young women whose vows are upheld: A grown woman, and an orphan, and an orphan in her father’s lifetime.

For the rabbis, an orphan is a girl whose father has died (but whose mother — who can’t annul her vows — could still be alive). So then what is an orphan in her father’s lifetime? It’s a technical rabbinic expression which refers to a girl who is a minor who was married and then widowed or divorced all before she reaches the age of majority. In this case, even though she no longer has a husband and she is still a minor, she does not revert back to her father’s authority. While statistically, many girls would have been orphans, the case of the “orphan in her father’s lifetime” was less likely.

What about the grown woman? This term is used by the rabbis to describe a grown woman who has never been married. But how common would it have actually been for a Jewish woman to even be unmarried after she reached the age of majority? Many of us imagine women in the ancient world moving from their father’s household straight to their husband’s household sometime around puberty. 

As my students are always surprised to learn, the historical evidence does not support this image. Historians now think that across the Roman Empire women got married in their late teens and early twenties. To be clear, this data point is an average; it’s certainly possible that different groups tended to get married at different ages. But assuming that the Jews who wrote the Mishnah and lived in the Roman Empire were themselves in conversation with wider practices, it is likely that many Jewish women did in fact get married in their late teens, years after they became a legal adult within a Jewish context — with all the rights and responsibilities that that status entailed.

We’ve spent a lot of time thinking about all the ways that fathers and husbands can annul the vows of their daughters and wives. But as the Talmud has reminded us yesterday and today, a huge number of women would have been halakhically able to make vows without the risk of nullification. From those who never married, to those who married and divorced or married and were widowed, to those who married, divorced and remarried all in the same day — many women could (and perhaps did!) vow freely.

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To explore this question, the mishnah lays out three possible scenarios:

She said: I am hereby a nazirite after thirty days, even if she was married within thirty days, he cannot nullify her vow. 

If a single woman makes a vow that would only take effect at a future date, and in the interim gets married, then even though she has a husband when the vow takes effect, her husband cannot annul the vow. So apparently when dating, we all need to be asking each other if any difficult vows might come into effect during our marriage. 

Here’s the second scenario:

If she said: I am hereby a nazirite for after thirty days (and her husband nullified the vow), then even if she was widowed or divorced within thirty days, it is nullified.

This scenario is the flip side of the first — a married woman makes a vow that will take effect at a future date and her husband annuls it. But by the time that date rolls around, she is no longer married. Does the vow kick in anyways? Nope. But it’s worth noting that since at this point she has no husband, she could just make the vow again if she wants to.

The third scenario is the most complicated. We’ve already learned that a husband has one day, and only one day, to nullify his wife’s vow. So here the mishnah asks us to imagine a very busy day: A married woman makes a vow that her husband does not nullify, he then divorces her, presumably realizes his mistake, convinces her to marry him again, and then they remarry— all in the same day. What happens with the woman’s initial vow?

If she took a vow on that day and was divorced on that day, and he took her back on that day, he cannot nullify. This is the principle: Once she has left into her own jurisdiction for even a single hour, he cannot nullify.

If the day a married woman makes a vow is interrupted by even a brief period in which she is not married, then her husband cannot nullify the vow. When he divorced her, he created a break between them. They can marry again, but it’s a different marriage, which means that he cannot nullify any of her vows from their first marriage, even if it’s still within the one-day window.

All of these scenarios, even if they are just elaborate thought experiments, recognize that people’s statuses change over time — a woman might be married, and then divorced or widowed, and then remarried — or not. Heck, she might be married, divorced and remarried all in the same day! And in a world where people grow and change, rabbinic law stretches to address all the possibilities.

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According to Numbers 35:23, this avenue of protection only exists if the killing was inadvertent — or as the biblical Hebrew puts it, be-lo roeh — literally “without seeing.” On today’s daf, the Talmud asks: Just how literally should we take this phrase?

“Without seeing,” to exclude a blind person. This is the statement of Rabbi Yehuda. 

Rabbi Yehuda reads the verse as suggesting that a city of refuge is only for those who can see but did not, for whatever reason. But Rabbi Yehuda does not get the last word. 

Rabbi Meir says to include a blind person.  

Rabbi Meir seems to suggest that all those who cannot see, physically or metaphorically, can be found guilty of manslaughter, and so they all have recourse to the city of refuge. 

At this point, this appears to be a relatively simple rabbinic dispute. Reading it, we might just conclude that Rabbi Yehuda differentiates people with visual impairments within the rabbinic legal system while Rabbi Meir treats people with visual impairments the same as people who are seeing. 

But the later rabbi, Rava, flips this conclusion on its head. Rava explains that each rabbi’s position emerges not only from their reading of Numbers 35, but from reading Numbers 35 together with Deuteronomy 19, which lays out the rules for a city of refuge a second time. In Deuteronomy 19, the Torah describes a paradigmatic example of a case where a city of refuge is needed — a case where two men go out to the forest to chop wood and the axe head accidentally flies off the handle and kills one of them. 

Rabbi Yehuda maintains that with regard to the (accidental) killer it is written: “And a man who goes into the forest with his neighbor to hew wood” (Deuteronomy 19:5) — anyone who is capable of entering a forest, and a blind person is also is capable of entering a forest. And if you say “without seeing” serves to include a blind person, this is derived from the word “forest.” Rather, learn from it “without seeing” serves to exclude a blind person.

According to Rava, Rabbi Yehuda reads Deuteronomy 19:5 as broadly inclusive — anyone capable of going into a forest is included. Since blind people are already covered by that verse, the verse in Numbers 35 must be doing something else — excluding them from the sentence of exile to a city of refuge. 

Rabbi Meir, however, reads the two verses together and comes to the opposite conclusion:

Rabbi Meir maintains: It is written: “One who strikes his neighbor without knowledge” (Deuteronomy 19:4) — anyone who is capable of knowing (exactly where his neighbor is standing at a given moment), but a blind person is not capable of knowing. And if you say “without seeing” to exclude a blind person, this is already derived from the “without knowledge.” Rather, learn from it “without seeing” to include a blind person.

Rabbi Meir argues that Deuteronomy 19 insists that someone who is visually impaired cannot be found guilty of manslaughter. So the verse in Numbers 35 must come to teach that even if a blind person has not been found legally guilty, they still have recourse to the cities of refuge. 

According to Rava’s reading, then, it is actually Rabbi Yehuda who thinks that, at least when it comes to manslaughter, there should be no differentiating between people with visual impairments and everyone else while Rabbi Meir thinks people with visual impairments should be treated differently. And yet, Rabbi Yehuda reads the Bible as stating that even though someone with a visual impairment may be found guilty of manslaughter, they do not need to flee to a city of refuge. And Rabbi Meir insists that even though they cannot be found guilty, they must still flee!

And just to complicate these positions even further, while we might imagine that the person who has been found guilty of manslaughter and allowed to stay home would be relieved, in not requiring exile, Rabbi Yehuda leaves the accidental killer vulnerable to attack. 

Neither position is simple, and neither position maps neatly onto a particular modern attitude. But at its core, Rava reminds us, even things which appear simple at first glance may end up actually being very complicated.

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While the banking industry has more tools than it did during the rabbinic period, the Talmud provides many examples in which people put up property as collateral for a loan. But some kinds of collateral are more complicated than others. On today’s daf, we read:

Rava said: Consecration of an item to the Temple, becoming subject to the prohibition of leavened bread on Passover, and the emancipation of a slave abrogate any lien that exists upon them. 

According to Rava, if a person consecrates property to the Temple that had previously been designated as collateral for a loan, the act of consecration overrides the lien and the property can no longer be claimed if the terms of the loan are violated. Similarly, if the lien was placed upon hametz (leaven) and Passover arrives, the prohibition against benefitting from hametz on Passover cancels the lien. And, in a case when a slave was designated as collateral for a loan, if the slave is freed by their owner, they can no longer be held as collateral.

Having rules for loans, especially those that protect the lender against a loss when the borrower defaults, allows those who have resources to lend and those who need to borrow. What Rava is suggesting, however, is that there are other rules that are more important than those that govern loans.

Why these three things in particular? Rava does not provide any rationale for his choices, but we might intuit what he was thinking on our own. We know that when property is given to the Temple, it takes on a sacred status, as if it is owned by God, and so it makes sense that such a gift is stronger than any promise made to another human being. We’ve also learned that the commandment to remove hametz from one’s home on Passover is among the most serious of religious obligations in the mind of the rabbis, so including it on this list makes sense as well.

Biblical and rabbinic law allow for the practice of servitude, but given the centrality of the Exodus from Egypt and the liberation from servitude that came with it in the Jewish narrative, there are a number of ways that Jewish law limits the practice. Rava suggests that one of those is to prevent a person who once was a slave to be treated like property after their emancipation, including when they were named as collateral for a loan while still in servitude.

While Rava’s principle is adopted by the rabbinic legal system, a caveat was put in to provide protection for the lender. Although the lien upon which the loan was established is canceled, the debt is not. If in any of these cases that Rava mentions the borrower defaults, the lender’s claim can be applied to other property, allowing them to recover the funds.

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If a woman said (to her husband): “I vow not to produce anything for my father,” or, “for your father,” or, “for my brother,” or, “for your brother,” — her husband cannot nullify such vows.

Why can’t he nullify these vows? Because, as we learned at the beginning of this chapter, they are not matters of self-affliction and they don’t affect her immediate relationship with her husband. But what if she vows not to work for husband?

If she said: “I vow not to produce anything for you (my husband),” — her husband need not nullify.

As we learned in Tractate Ketubot, a married woman is obligated to hand over a certain amount of what she produces to her husband. Therefore, since what she produces does not actually belong to her, but her husband, she cannot take a vow to render it forbidden to him. There is no need to nullify the vow because the vow never took effect.

But Rabbi Akiva notes that in some cases the vow might actually take effect:

Rabbi Akiva says: He should nevertheless nullify the vow, as perhaps she will exceed the required amount of work and do more for him than is fitting for him to receive.

Rabbi Akiva reminds us that a woman’s obligation to her husband is not bottomless. Therefore, her vow applies to any work that exceeds the minimum. According to Rabbi Akiva, then, it is best for her husband to nullify the vow, so that she will not accidentally transgress it by doing too much work. 

Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri agrees that the husband should nullify this vow, but for a different reason:

Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri says: He should nullify the vow because perhaps he will one day divorce her, at which point the vow will take effect and she will then be forbidden to him forever. 

Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri thinks that the vow would not take effect so long as she is married. But should he divorce her in the future, her vow would then take effect because she no longer has spousal obligations toward him. Further, if he ever wanted to remarry her, she would be prohibited from him because her vow not to work for him would prevent her from fulfilling her obligations as his wife.

It is Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri whose opinion ends up being codified as halakhah. A husband should annul his wife’s vow that attempts to prevent him from benefiting from her labor, on the off chance that he will divorce her and then one day wish to remarry her. 

The premise of the mishnah takes a depressing view of this couple’s relationship. She is presumably so angry with her spouse that she rashly vows he can never benefit from her work ever again — even though she (presumably) knows that the vow is, for the most part, ineffective. And yet, Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri’s interpretation of the halakhah gives us a glimmer of hope for this couple. Perhaps they are so at loggerheads divorce is on the horizon, but there may come a time that they will nonetheless choose to come back together and remarry. And when they do, says Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri, no ancient vow of anger should stand in their way.

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If one steals another’s untithed produce and eats it, one must pay them the value of their untithed produce. This is the statement of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi. 

Rabbi Yosei, son of Rabbi Yehuda, says: One pays them only the value of the non-sacred produce it contained.

Untithed produce is produce that has not yet had a portion separated out for consumption by a priest. The question here seems to be whether the portion of the produce that will eventually belong to the priest still belongs to the original owner or not. If it does, then as Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi says, the owner ought to be compensated for it if it is stolen. If not, and that produce already belongs to the priest even though it has not yet been set aside, then as Rabbi Yosei says, the owner should be compensated only for what he would have retained after tithing is complete.

The Gemara has cited this teaching to help resolve an apparent inconsistency in the mishnah on yesterday’s daf. There we encountered two teachings, one that implied the ability to direct tithes to a particular priest has value and one that implied that it doesn’t. Perhaps, the Gemara suggests, the former teaching is in accordance with Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi’s opinion and the latter is in accordance with Rabbi Yosei. How so? 

The Gemara explains that if the ability to designate tithes for a particular priest has value, then crops that would have been tithed are still worth something to the owner. Therefore, if they are stolen, the owner has suffered a loss, even if those crops would have been given away eventually. But if directing tithes to a particular priest has no value, then a thief does not have to make restitution for the portion of the crops that would have been tithed because it does not represent a financial loss. 

Great, except the Gemara quickly points out:

Everyone (agrees) the benefit of discretion does not have monetary value.

So much for that theory. The debate between Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi and Rabbi Yosei must therefore be about something else, since both agree that the right to direct tithes to a particular priest does not have value. So the Gemara tries again:

This is the reasoning of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi: The sages penalized the thief so that they would not steal. And Rabbi Yosei, son of Rabbi Yehuda, holds that the sages penalized the owner of the produce so that they would not delay with untithed produce.

Rabbi Yehuda is interested in disincentivizing theft, and so he includes the value of the part of the crops that would be tithed in the penalty. Rabbi Yosei wants to incentivize tithing produce as soon as possible, so he penalizes the owner by awarding them only the value of the crops that would remain after tithing.

While this discussion does not reach a conclusion about who owns the tithes before they are separated or how much a thief has to pay for restitution, it does clarify what Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Yosei were arguing about and it leaves us with some important advice — tithe early and don’t steal.

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(If a married woman vowed: The property) of people is konam that I will not benefit from it, (her husband) cannot nullify it and she may benefit from gleanings, forgotten sheaves, and produce of the corners.

The mishnah teaches that if a woman vows that she will not benefit from the property of other people, her husband cannot nullify the vow. The woman can still benefit from the agricultural support system that the Torah commands farmers to set up. 

The rabbis of the Gemara interrogate one specific part of this law: Who exactly is included in the woman’s vow not to benefit from “people”? Now, the Hebrew word that the mishnah uses for people is briyot, which literally means “creations” and usually refers to humankind. So we might expect that this vow includes literally all humans.

But not so fast, because the Gemara just isn’t sure whether or not people includes her husband. Indeed, it offers two opposing answers. 

Apparently, (she) can be sustained from him, so by inference a husband is not included in “people.” 

Perhaps the husband cannot annul his wife’s vow because it doesn’t actually affect her health and their relationship. The woman can continue to eat from his property because husbands don’t count as “people.” Or alternatively: 

(She) may benefit from gleanings, forgotten (sheaves), and corners, but she may not eat from her husband. Apparently, a husband is included in “people.”

Perhaps the husband cannot annul his wife’s vow because even though he is included in the vow, it doesn’t actually affect her health and their relationship because the woman can continue to sustain herself from the agricultural charity of others. 

Next, named rabbis take specific sides in this debate. Ulla and Rav Nahman insist that husbands are not considered “people” for the purpose of their wife’s vow, while Rava argues that, in fact, husbands are “people.” 

Part of what underlies this dispute is a debate over how the mishnah’s two clauses relate to each other. Is the husband’s inability to annul the vow and the wife’s capacity to be sustained from the agricultural food bank separate clauses? Is he barred from annulling the vow (because she can continue to benefit from him), and she can also choose to use the agricultural food bank? Or perhaps they are causally related — he cannot annul the vow because she can continue to benefit from the agricultural food bank.  

But there is also a broader question at stake: Are spouses considered fully “other people,” or does marriage in some way blur the boundaries between individuals in ways that complicate women’s vows? Is a married couple one legal and ritual unit, or are they two individuals legally and ritually bound together? This simple turn of phrase in a vow opens up enormous questions about how the rabbis understand the very nature of marriage.

The debate continues on to tomorrow’s daf, where it never quite gets resolved. The Gemara leaves us still asking the question of whether husbands are considered people for the purpose of a woman’s vow. Only in the medieval period does Maimonides give us a firm answer — no, they aren’t.

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On today’s daf, Rav Nahman states that an anonymous mishnah we will encounter in a few days (on Nedarim 90b) expresses the opinion of the Sages. Not so, counters the Gemara: The mishnah expresses the opinion of Rabbi Yosei. In fact:

Rav Huna said: Our entire chapter (of the Mishnah) is the opinion of Rabbi Yosei. From where do we know this? Since the (first) mishnah (on Nedarim 79) teaches: “Rabbi Yosei says” … and also “this is the statement of Rabbi Yosei.” Learn therefore that from this point forward the rest of the mishnah (ie: all the mishnahs of this chapter after the first) is in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Yosei.

Rav Huna points out that the first mishnah of this chapter clearly attributes an opinion to Rabbi Yosei, then concludes with the seemingly superfluous statement “these are the words of Rabbi Yosei.” A Talmud scholar might see this as a scribal error: Perhaps the person who wrote down this mishnah accidentally attributed a statement to Rabbi Yosei both before recording it and afterward, creating an awkward repetition of his name. But the rabbis of the Talmud are not inclined to this explanation and, instead, attribute significant meaning to the second mention of Rabbi Yosei. The words “this is the statement of Rabbi Yosei,” Rav Huna says, refer not to the teaching that precedes it but, rather, to all the anonymous rulings from here until the end of the chapter.

This is not the only place where the Talmud attributes a block of anonymous statements to a specific sage; in Tractate Sanhedrin 86a, Rabbi Yohanan teaches that all unattributed mishnahs are in accordance with Rabbi Meir. It seems that there is something troubling about the anonymity of mishnaic statements that pushes the Gemara to bend over backwards in order to try to attribute them. 

But it is also true that often anonymity lends rabbinic statements greater authority. This is because, according to some, whenever there is a dispute between an attributed position and an anonymous position, the halakhah follows the anonymous position (see, for example, Shabbat 46a and Yerushalmi Yevamot 4:11). One reason given for this is that the anonymous position expresses the opinion of the majority of rabbis. Based on the rabbinic principle that we follow the majority, the anonymity tells us that the position is widely accepted, so much so that it becomes law.

So what might we learn from this love/hate relationship with anonymity? It’s not so hard to understand why the Gemara would want to identify the author of a given statement. Sometimes, as in the case on our daf, attributing a position to a particular rabbi resolves a dispute, or a methodological or textual problem. And on a spiritual level, the sages believe that there is great power in giving credit to a person for their teaching. Pirkei Avot 6:6 tells us that:

One who says something in the name of its speaker brings redemption to the world.

But keeping some statements anonymous can give them greater power, as I was reminded once when listening to a public radio segment on economic policy. I had tuned in midway and didn’t know who the speaker was. He sounded thoughtful and compassionate, with an interesting analysis on policies that could lift more people out of poverty. Then the host announced his name and I was surprised to realize it was someone with political views diametrically opposed to my own. Reflecting on this intellectual shock, it occurred to me that had I known from the outset who was speaking, my political perspective would likely have prevented me from being open to his ideas.

Sometimes, then, it is better not to know where an idea or legal position comes from — so that we are free to evaluate it not on the basis of how we feel about its author, but rather on its own merits. Omitting the attribution removes presuppositions and politics from the process, giving us the space for more independent thinking. The anonymity of a statement provides the opportunity for us to engage in the rabbinic project of entering into a humble and honest encounter with ideas. But it is also the case that naming authors can give statements another kind of authority, as well as credit to the one who made them. And who knows — maybe it will even bring about redemption.

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After a discussion about the importance of cleanliness and avoiding grime, the Talmud offers this admonition:

Be careful with (the education of) the sons of paupers, as it is from them that the Torah will issue forth. As it is stated: “Water shall flow from his branches” (Numbers 24:7), as it from them the Torah will issue forth.

It’s a clever pun and a beautiful metaphor: The rabbis connect the word for branches, dalav, to the word for poor people, dalim. As Torah is often compared to water, the verse can be read to mean that from the poor, Torah will issue forth. 

This teaching is well more than a millennium old, but it speaks to a broader issue that remains relevant today. Wealth inequality continues to play a significant role in educational inequality. This passage reminds us to pay attention to those who are economically marginalized and to honor what they might teach us all.

But for the rabbis, it’s apparently not enough to highlight the value and anticipated contributions of people in poverty. The text goes on to denigrate the potential of Torah scholars’ children:

And for what reason is it not common for Torah scholars to give rise to Torah scholars from among their sons? 

Rav Yosef said: So that they should not say the Torah is their inheritance. 

Rav Sheshet, son of Rav Idi, said: So that they should not be presumptuous toward the community. 

Mar Zutra said: Because they lord over the community. 

Rav Ashi said: Because they call people donkeys. 

Ravina says: Because they do not first recite a blessing over the Torah (before commencing their studies). 

Ouch! These explanations paint an entire group of people with far too broad a brush, not to mention portraying the children of the very Torah scholars the Talmud normally venerates in awful terms. 

But the rabbis were probably responding to a real sense of entitlement on the part of the children of scholars. The first two statements appear to be a reaction to specific comments the rabbis have overheard, and the next three are implicit condemnations of actual behaviors. Later commentators seem to endorse this read. Tosafot, for example, interprets the concern about the children of Torah scholars claiming the Torah as their (presumably) exclusive inheritance to be rooted in a concern that those children might then conclude they don’t need to study Torah to grasp it. 

So while these statements may come off as grossly generalizing and surprisingly harsh, the rabbis may well be alerting us to the unfortunate consequences that can follow from having a class of entitled children who don’t believe they need to work as hard as others and aren’t bound by norms of respect and equality. Conversely, closing off educational possibilities to people whose parents might be less educated or have fewer financial resources shuts Torah out of the world and ultimately makes us all poorer.

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These instructions raise questions about the relationship between helping yourself and helping others that are echoed in a beraita (an earlier tradition) on today’s daf: 

A spring belonging to the residents of a city, (if the water was needed) for their lives and the lives of others, their lives take precedence over the lives of others; their animals and the animals of others, their animals take precedence over the animals of others; their laundry and the laundry of others, their laundry takes precedence over the laundry of others. 

If a city’s water is a limited resource, how should it be apportioned? The beraita states that the lives of the residents of the city take priority over the lives of others, and so too the lives of their animals and their laundry needs take priority over others’ animals and laundry needs. But this prioritization is not absolute: 

The lives of others and their laundry, the lives of others take precedence over their laundry. 

Local prioritization only takes effect if the needs are equal. If we are portioning out the water to feed animals or do laundry, local needs take priority. But if the locals need water to do laundry, and outsiders need water to live, then in fact the outsiders take priority. The Gemara is silent on whether outsiders’ animals take priority over local laundry,  but it does record a surprising dissent to the rule about weighing the prioritization of human life and laundry.

Rabbi Yosei says: Their laundry takes precedence over the lives of others.

I hate wearing dirty clothes as much as the next person, but is it really a case of life or death? The Gemara explains that Rabbi Yosei thought that wearing dirty clothing could indeed cause serious health problems. But the halakhah doesn’t follow Rabbi Yosei. Instead, the Gemara insists that even if you own a limited and life-giving resource, other people’s right to live overrides your desire for comfort. Outsiders have a greater claim to your water than you do, if your needs are already met.  

And yet, all things being equal, if everyone needs the water to drink, or everyone needs it to feed their animals, or everyone needs it to do their laundry, then yes, the local owners take priority. But here’s where juxtaposing the Gemara with in-flight safety videos may offer us a helpful perspective. 

In a world where we value helping others, especially those who cannot help themselves, these instructions can feel a little weird. But in fact, this practice makes sense — after all, if you pass out from a lack of oxygen, you will be unable to help those around you. Having the ultimate right to your own water doesn’t erase the mitzvot of pikuach nefesh (saving a life) and tzedakah (sustaining the poor). Use the resources you need to live — and then help others. 

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Every vow and every sworn obligation of self-affliction may be upheld by her husband or annulled by her husband.

The Torah suggests that the man’s role in nullifying a woman’s vow is to protect her from herself. Today’s mishnah asks: What exactly are vows of self-affliction?

And these are the vows that he can nullify: Matters that involve affliction, for example: “If I bathe, or if I do not bathe,” or “If I adorn myself, or if I do not adorn myself.”

Rabbi Yosei said: Those are not vows of affliction. Rather, these are vows of affliction: For example, if she said, “The produce of the world is forbidden for me,” he can nullify the vow. If, however, she said, “The produce of this country is forbidden for me,” he may still bring her produce from another country. If she said, “The produce of this storekeeper is forbidden for me,” he cannot nullify her vow. But if he can obtain his sustenance only from him, he can nullify the vow. – this is the opinion of Rabbi Yosei.

The Tanna Kama, the first anonymous opinion of our mishnah, defines self-affliction as refraining from hygiene practices: bathing and cosmetics. Rabbi Yosei, on the other hand, does not seem to view refraining from bubble baths as true affliction. Rather, he views self-affliction as eschewing enough food so as to make it difficult or even impossible for her husband to procure sustenance for her. 

In the context of Rabbi Yosei’s critique, it’s difficult to understand why refraining from bathing and cosmetics might be considered self-affliction. Maimonides, writing hundreds of years later, elucidates the issue: “These are matters that affect the marital relationship” (Mishneh Torah, Vows, 12:1)

The Shulchan Aruch, the standard medieval law code, further explains, “Such conduct could arouse a husband’s displeasure, for he will not be happy that his wife does not appear attractive.” (234:59) The same source considers the makeup issue to also be one of “personal aggravation” to the woman’s husband, and therefore one that could affect their relationship. Now it’s not an aesthetic issue, and not even necessarily a self-harm issue, but a relationship issue — so he’s given carte blanche to revoke any vow that she makes regarding cosmetics.

When it comes to her vow to give up food, Maimonides again explains the effect this has on her husband: “When a woman takes a vow not to eat figs from her native country, her husband may nullify her vow because this is a matter that affects the marriage relationship. For it is a major problem for him to undertake the difficulty of bringing her figs from another place.” (Mishneh Torah, Vows, 12:7) 

A plain reading of the Torah might suggest the husband’s role in revoking the vow is to protect the woman from herself. But reading through the mishnah’s description of what constitutes self-affliction, Maimonides understands the vows as actually afflicting the husband — and therefore the relationship. Maimonides seems to understand that she made these vows in order to frustrate her husband — that she chose to stop bathing (I don’t think this really is about eye shadow) to push him away. But it doesn’t seem to me that we need to understand her as doing this intentionally. Either way, by revoking this type of vow, a husband may be indicating his desire for closeness, and attempting to force the issue.

It’s possible to read this law that a husband can revoke his wife’s self-afflicting vow as a simple case of a husband taking control over his wife’s decisions. But a closer look suggests that the rabbis may be saying something deeper about how a couple should communicate in order to achieve intimacy. Allowing a husband to dissolve his wife’s harmful vow might erode marital closeness, or it could be a step in the right direction. I’m rooting for this proverbial couple, whoever they were. I hope she got her figs. 

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Today’s daf cites a teaching about the final verse of this chapter in Leviticus:

It is written: “And Moses declared the festivals of the Lord to the children of Israel” (Leviticus 23:44). And it is taught in a beraita that Rabbi Yosei HaGelili says: The festivals are declared, but Shabbat, which commemorates Creation, is not included with them. 

Rav Asi bar Natan came to Neharde’a to come before Rav Sheshet, but he did not find him. He pursued him to Mehoza and said to him: How can the beraita say that the festivals of the Lord were declared, but Shabbat, which commemorates Creation, was not included with them? But Shabbat is written with them!

So is Shabbat mentioned with the festivals in Leviticus 23 or not? It depends how you read the full chapter. The bulk of chapter 23 records the instructions that God related to Moses, while the final verse (44) states that Moses then related everything to Israel. The ambiguity comes in the opening four verses, which frame what follows:

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the Israelite people and say to them: These are My festivals, the festivals of the Lord, which you shall proclaim as sacred occasions. On six days work may be done, but on the seventh day there shall be a sabbath of complete rest, a sacred occasion. You shall do no work; it shall be a sabbath of the Lord throughout your settlements. These are the festivals of the Lord, the sacred occasions, which you shall celebrate each at its appointed time…’

The question is: When Moses proclaims the holidays to the people of Israel, does he include the verses about Shabbat (2-3) in this opening, or are they merely God’s preamble that he leaves out, starting his disquisition from verse 4: “These are the festivals…”? Rav Asi bar Natan suggests the former; Rabbi Yosei HaGelili the latter.

Rav Sheshet, responding to Rav Asi, clarifies Rabbi Yosei’s teaching: 

The festivals of the Lord require sanctification by the court, and Shabbat, which commemorates Creation, does not require sanctification by the court.

Of course, says Rav Sheshet, both Shabbat and the festivals are sacred days established by God and observed by the people. When Leviticus 23:44 states that Moses declared the holidays, leaving out Shabbat, it is teaching us that Moses, acting as an officer of the court, declared when the holidays would occur, but did not do so for Shabbat. Festivals are determined by the observation of the new moon. Shabbat is not connected to any astronomical phenomena and therefore does not need to be declared.

We’ve seen this issue before. This is precedent for the power given to the high court to declare the new moon which, as we learned in Rosh Hashanah 25, determines the exact day on which the holidays will fall. The court does not serve this function for Shabbat which falls, like clockwork, every seven days.

The notion that people have agency in setting the Jewish calendar and fixing the times of the holidays is a powerful one — we make the holidays happen. In our day, this is not because we declared the new moon, as the calendar has long been fixed, but if you’ve hosted a seder or built a sukkah you can testify to the effort that goes into making a holiday.

While there is certainly effort that goes into preparing for Shabbat as well, the Talmud is telling us that it is God, not us, who makes Shabbat happen. An echo of creation, Shabbat is woven into the fabric of the world and takes place whether we declare it or not. Our role is to stop what we are doing and take notice of it, each and every week. That’s a powerful idea as well.

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One who says to his wife: “Any vows which you will vow, I do not want you to vow,” or who says, “This is not a vow,” — has not said anything.

If he says, “You have done well,” or, “There is no one like you,” or, “If you had not taken a vow, I, myself, would have taken a vow to obligate you,” — his words stand. 

First, the beraita gives examples of statements that do not constitute proper revocation. These include a general statement to the effect of, “I don’t want you to make any vows,” or a dismissive one: “What you’ve said isn’t a vow.”  The husband may not want his wife to make a vow, or he may not take her words seriously, but statements indicating as much don’t make her vow any less effective. In these instances, he has said nothing of legal substance. 

By contrast, general statements of affirmation and support can be used to uphold a woman’s vow. These statements include both general approval (“You’ve done well” and “There’s no one like you”) and specific validation (“If you hadn’t made that vow, I would have done so on your behalf”). In these cases, the husband’s words do, in fact, ratify his wife’s vow. 

Why are these kinds of general statements unable to cancel a vow but are capable of ratifying it?

According to Rabbi Nissim of Gerona (the Ran, who is the main commentator on our tractate), in the first set of statements, the husband’s desire to revoke the vow isn’t enough; he must nullify his wife’s vow with explicit language of cancellation because, as the Ran puts it, revocation made in one’s heart is not effective. But though an implied revocation is not effective, an implied confirmation is, since all the husband is doing is affirming what already exists. 

Writing centuries later, Maimonides agrees (Mishneh Torah, Vows 13:3): “How does one express his acceptance of a vow? He says to her: ‘I uphold your vow,’ ‘It was good that you vowed,’ ‘There is no one like you,’ ‘Had you not taken the vow, I would have administered it to you,’ or any analogous statement that implies that he is happy with this vow.”

I think there is something else going on here as well. We’ve already learned in this chapter that the seriousness of a vow lends itself to confirmation rather than cancelation. Here, the Talmud understands something more about what it takes to maintain a respectful marital relationship. Statements of general dismissal of vows can come off as dismissive of the wife herself. But statements of general approval give the opposite impression. In what I think is both a subversive and poignant message, the Gemara gives efficacy to the spouse who praises his wife and not to the one who dismisses her.

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But if her husband does annul them on the day he finds out, then nothing that has crossed her lips shall stand … (Numbers 30:13)

If her husband offers no objection from that day to the next, he has upheld all the vows or obligations she has assumed … (Numbers 30:15)

Given their proximity to one another in the Torah, we might suppose that the biblical text thinks of these two statements as synonymous. The husband has only a day to act. But the rabbis detect a difference in the language of the two verses, between the time frame of verse 13, “on the day he finds out” and verse 15, “from that day to the next.” So just how much time does he have to annul?

The mishnah on today’s daf teaches: 

The nullification of vows is all day.

The rabbinic day starts at sundown and ends at sundown, so the mishnah’s calculations take this into account:

If a woman took a vow on Shabbat evening, (her father or husband) can nullify it on Shabbat evening, and on Shabbat day until dark. If she took a vow with nightfall approaching, he can nullify it until nightfall …

In other words, he has until the end of the day at sundown. If she vowed toward the beginning of the rabbinic day, he has close to 24 hours. If she vowed later in the day, then his window of opportunity narrows. 

The Gemara then quotes a beraita, a rabbinic tradition not in the Mishnah but of the same period, which offers a relevant rabbinic dispute.

The nullification of vows is all day.

Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Elazar son of Rabbi Shimon said a period. 

The first opinion in this beraita agrees with our mishnah. But the tradition then cites two rabbis who disagree with it. Rabbis Yosei and Elazar understand the “day” in which a woman’s vow can be annulled not as the standard sundown to sundown day (as we might infer from Numbers 30:13), but as a 24-hour period after the vow is made, regardless of the time at which it is made (as might be inferred from Numbers 30:15).

The Gemara now tries to figure out how each source in the beraita understands the other verse in Numbers. According to the Gemara, the anonymous first opinion reads the first verse as insisting that vows have to be annulled on the same day that they are made — before the sun sets. As for the second verse:

It is necessary, as if it had said only “on the day that he hears them,” I would say during the day, yes, at night, no. Therefore, it is written, “from day to day.” 

In other words, the second verse teaches the first source that a man can annul his wife’s vow during the night and doesn’t have to wait until sunrise. 

Rabbi Yosei and Rabbi Elazar, on the other hand, read the second verse (Numbers 30:15) as insisting that a man can annul his wife’s vows for 24 full hours, regardless of whether this spans more than one day. And as for Numbers 30:13, here’s what they do with it, according to the Gemara:

It was necessary, as if it had written only “from day to day,” I would say that he can nullify a vow for her from one Sunday to the next Sunday. Therefore, it is written, “on the day that he hears them.”

In other words, they think Numbers 30:13, which says “on the day he found out,” comes to prevent us from reading “from day to day” in verse 15 as permission to extend the entire annulment period to a full week.

Though both positions are biblically supported, the Gemara tells us that the halakhah follows the mishnah (which is also the anonymous position in the beraita) — not surprising because it is presented as the majority opinion in both sources — and not the position of Rabbis Yosei and Elazar. But it does take the time to explore and respect the thinking of those two rabbis.

So, ladies: Want to make vows that last? You have two options: (1) Stay single and move out of your father’s household, or (2) If you want to marry, make sure to vow just before the sun sets. Not only is sunset the “golden hour” when the light is perfect for portraits (and who doesn’t want to look fabulous when vowing?), but it also limits the amount of time your husband has to annul it.

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One who says to his wife: “All vows that you will vow from now until I arrive from such and such a place … are hereby nullified,” Rabbi Eliezer says they are nullified.

According to Rabbi Eliezer, a husband can nullify his wife’s vows before she even makes them. At least when he knows that he is traveling. 

The rabbis interrogate exactly how Rabbi Eliezer’s “advance nullification” would work. If a vow is nullified in advance, does that mean it never took effect? Or does it take effect for a split second only to be officially nullified thereafter? 

Before we answer this question though, the Gemara takes a step back to ask why it would even matter which way the advance nullification works. 

Where another person associated with this vow: If you say (such vows) take effect, then the association takes effect. If you say they do not take effect, it has no substance. 

If someone sees this woman making her vow and is inspired — “I’m making the same vow!” — if the vow takes effect, even for a brief moment, then this person’s vow also takes effect (and since presumably no one has preemptively annulled it, stands). But if the wife’s vow never takes effect, then this other person’s vow doesn’t take effect either; the same vow is no vow at all. So in this one particular case, it really matters — according to Rabbi Eliezer — whether vows annulled in advance take effect, even for a split second, before being annulled.

Why does he think this? To answer this question, the Gemara explores different early rabbinic sources in which Rabbi Eliezer has a relevant opinion, to see whether they can extrapolate to this discussion. Let’s look at just one example: 

Rabbi Eliezer said to them: And since it is the case that he cannot nullify his own vows once he has vowed, but he can nullify his own vows before he vows, in the situation where he can nullify his wife’s vows after she vows, is it not logical that he should be able to nullify his wife’s vows before she vows?

Here Rabbi Eliezer offers a kal va-chomer argument, a logical inference from one case to another, a kind of inference that English-language legal sources call by the Latin name a fortiori. Since a man in general has more power over his wife’s vows than his own, seeing as he can annul hers after they are made and he cannot do the same for himself, reasons the Gemara, it would follow that since he can preemptively annul is own vows, he should have at least the same amount of power to preemptively annul hers.

The Gemara then asks whether this tradition can offer insight into whether Rabbi Eliezer thinks these preemptively nullified vows ever take effect. Since when a man annuls his own vows in advance, they never take effect at all, can we assume that likewise the wife’s preemptively annulled vows do not take effect?

No, this as it is, and that as it is.

The Gemara ultimately rejects this extrapolation — the cases are too different from each other for us to infer whether Rabbi Eliezer thought a man’s advance nullification of his wife’s vows would mean the vows never took effect at all.  

The Gemara cites several older traditions and explores them using the same pattern — first demonstrating relevance and then attempting to extrapolate in order to determine how Rabbi Eliezer thought advanced nullification actually worked. The Gemara’s discussion on this topic will continue tomorrow, where the rabbis conclude that Rabbi Eliezer thought that a wife’s preemptively annulled vows never take effect. 

But before we get ahead of ourselves, it’s worth noting that the mishnah with which we opened our discussion concludes with the rabbis rejecting Rabbi Eliezer’s position from the get go, insisting that a wife’s vows actually can’t be nullified in advance at all. So all of this discussion of Rabbi Eliezer’s opinion is theoretical rather than practical. In the end, a husband can only nullify his wife’s vows once she’s made them. So that’s one more risk he takes when he decides to travel.

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Rabbi Eliezer says: A yavam can nullify her vows. 

Rabbi Yehoshua says: If she is waiting for one yavam, he can nullify her vows, but not if she is waiting for two. 

Rabbi Akiva says: A yavam cannot nullify her vows, regardless of whether she is waiting for one yavam or for two or more.

Normally, having stated all opinions, the mishnah would stop. But today it contains a few more lines in which we get to see these three great sages hash out the argument. First Rabbi Eliezer, a disciple of the school of Shammai who held that the levirate bond was legally like marriage, defends his position that a yavam can always nullify his yevama’s vows:

Rabbi Eliezer said: Just as he nullifies the vows of a woman he acquired for himself (through betrothal), so too he nullifies vows for a woman acquired from Heaven (i.e. the yevama).

Rabbi Akiva said to him: No, if you say that a husband can nullify the vows of a woman he acquired for himself, over whom others have no authority, shall you also say that this is the case with regard to a woman acquired for him from Heaven, over whom others have authority? 

Rabbi Akiva points out that in the case of two or more potential yavams, however strong your view of levirate betrothal, we cannot say that she is truly married to both, since a woman cannot have two husbands. Therefore, no single one has enough authority to nullify her vows.

You might have noticed that while Rabbi Akiva’s statement hasn’t really addressed the case of a single yavam. Rabbi Yehoshua notices this too and points it out to him:

Rabbi Yehoshua said to him: Akiva, your statement applies in a situation with two yavams, but how do you reply to Rabbi Eliezer in the case of one yavam?

Rabbi Akiva said to him: A yevama is not the full-fledged wife of the yavam in the way that a betrothed woman is her husband’s full-fledged wife.

Rabbi Akiva answers by rejecting Rabbi Eliezer’s premise that a yevama is a full-fledged wife. Because she is not, in his view, a yavam may never nullify a yevama’s vows, no matter whether he is the only yavam or one of many. He may have held this view back earlier out of respect for his teachers, but when pressed by Rabbi Yehoshua he shares it and, in that moment, the student has outmaneuvered two of his teachers.

There are three versions of this story in talmudic literature, including a beraita brought by the Gemara on our page. Once again, we see that Rabbi Eliezer supports his own position, Rabbi Akiva rejects his logic, Rabbi Yehoshua points out that Rabbi Akiva’s argument has not decisively defended his own position, and Rabbi Akiva presents a new argument that carries the day. But this beraita appends one more statement with no parallel in our mishnah:

Ben Azzai responded with this language: Woe to you, ben Azzai, that you did not serve Rabbi Akiva. 

We can imagine that Ben Azzai, a contemporary of Akiva, was sitting on the side observing the interaction between Rabbi Yehoshua and his student, Akiva. Ben Azzai’s exclamation applauds the genius of his peer by lamenting that he hadn’t taken full advantage of opportunities to learn from him. A nice end to the story that praises Rabbi Akiva for his rabbinic prowess.

The third version of the debate appears in the Tosefta (Nedarim 6:5). Again, the structure of the story is the same, but now, Rabbis Yehoshua and Akiva are joined by Rabbi Eleazar ben Arach, a sage known for his brilliance and for having lost his gift of Torah, instead of Rabbi Eliezer (whose name is substantially similar in spelling). In this version, it’s Rabbi Yehoshua who chimes in at the end, saying:

Oh my, if only you (Akiva) had been around in the days of Rabbi Elazar ben Arach and responded in this manner!

In this version, the final exclamation comes from a teacher and not a peer and suggests that the interaction between Rabbi Yehoshua and Rabbi Akiva took place at a different time from the initial exchange with Rabbi Elazar. In addition to acknowledging Rabbi Akiva’s gifts, it adds a touch of the sorrow that Rabbi Yehoshua feels for his colleague’s absence in the Beit Midrash. I would have loved to have seen Rabbi Elazar’s face had you been able to share this explanation directly with him, says Rabbi Yehoshua lamentingly to Rabbi Akiba. The exchange has added poignancy if one remembers that Rabbi Elazar ben Arach was a sage who tragically lost his Torah when he lived in isolation from other sages (Ecclesiastes Rabbah 7.7.2). 

Twentieth century talmudist Rabbi Saul Liberman argues that the Tosefta’s version of the story, this last one, is the earliest and suggests that Rabbi Yehoshua is saying that Rabbi Akiva might have been able to change Rabbi Elazar’s mind. If it had come to pass that way, we might have inherited a different version of the mishnah, with only one opinion about the yavam’s ability to nullify vows — that of Rabbi Akiva.

Read all of Nedarim 74 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on January 7th, 2023. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

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Rami bar Hama asks: A man who cannot hear, what is the halakhah with regard to nullifying vows for his wife? 

Perhaps, if a man does not need to hear his wife’s vow to nullify it, then a man who is incapable of hearing also can nullify his wife’s vow? The Gemara tries to answer this question. 

If you say that a (hearing) husband can nullify without hearing, (perhaps) it is because he is capable of hearing. But a man who is not capable of hearing, this is (an application of the principle derived from the statement) of Rabbi Zeira. As Rabbi Zeira said: For any amount of flour suitable for mingling (with oil), mingling is not indispensable for it. But for any not suitable for mingling, mingling is indispensable for it. 

The Gemara draws an analogy from Rabbi Zeira’s ruling on the question of flour offerings in the Temple, which consisted of flour mixed with oil. We’re going to spend a whole tractate discussing flour offerings (stay tuned for Menachot), so for today it’s enough to know that Rabbi Zeira ruled that as long as one has the right amount of all the ingredients, whether or not one uses them all (at least after the fact) doesn’t really matter. But if one doesn’t have the right amount of ingredients, then the flour offering is not fit. 

The Gemara uses Rabbi Zeira’s teaching to suggest that if a man can hear, then he may be able to annul his wife’s vow without actually hearing it. But a if a man can’t hear at all, he is unable to annul his wife’s vows. 

But of course, people and flour offerings are not the same thing. So the Gemara raises another possibility:

Or perhaps “and her husband hears it” (Numbers 30:8) does not mean that hearing is indispensable.

Perhaps hearing just means communication, writ broadly? In his fascinating Show of Hands: A Natural History of Sign Language, anthropologist David F. Armstrong writes that, as early as the fifth century BCE, the Greek philosopher Plato describes people with hearing loss as making “signs with the hands and head and the rest of the body” in order to communicate. Indeed, “public speaking in ancient Rome was almost always accompanied by conventionalized visible gesture” — after all, in the days before microphones, you had to do something to reach the people at the back of the amphitheater. (20-1) Sign language wasn’t just for the hard of hearing.

If we know that people were using sign language to speak in public forums, then it stands to reason that people — whether or not they could hear— understood it. But is this kind of communication included under the biblical umbrella of “hearing”?

Rava said: Come and hear: And her husband hears it (shom’o) — this excludes the wife of a man who cannot hear. 

Rava’s teaching, which is accepted by the Gemara as a whole, hones in on the literal meaning of “hear” and insists that only those men who can hear can annul their wives’ vows. The rabbis insist that the word “hears” in Numbers refers specifically to a process where sound enters the ear canal, activating all kinds of internal processes.

We have seen many instances where the rabbis read a biblical phrase literally, but we have also seen numerous places where they read such a phrase metaphorically, expansively, imaginatively. Here the Gemara chooses to read “hear” literally; but I am left wondering what the Talmud’s discussion here might look like if the rabbis made a different choice. What might the halakhot of vowing (among other areas of rabbinic law that assume hearing) look like if the rabbis chose to read the word “hear” as including the many ways that people communicate with each?

Read all of Nedarim 723on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on January 6th, 2023. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

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The practice of Torah scholars is that a father, before his daughter would leave him (through marriage) would say to her: “All vows that you vowed in my house are hereby nullified.” And similarly, the husband, before she would enter his jurisdiction, would say to her: “All vows that you vowed before you entered my jurisdiction are hereby nullified” — because once she enters his jurisdiction, he cannot nullify (vows made previously).

As we have seen, a betrothed woman, who experiences all the obligations but none of the privileges of marriage (see Ketubot 57b), must have her vows annulled by both her father and her husband. But we also learned that, according to the Torah, they are supposed to do that on the same day the vows are made. This mishnah, which states that the father and future husband can issue a blanket annulment of her vows right before marriage, seems to violate what the Torah says:

If her father restrains her on the day he learns of it, none of her vows or self-imposed obligations shall stand … If her husband restrains her on the day that he learns of it, he thereby annuls her vow … (Numbers 30:6, 9)

The Hebrew for the words, “he learns of it,” shom’o, literally means “he hears of it.” This makes clear that not only are the father and husband supposed to annul vows on the same day, they must have literallyheard her utter the vow before either of them can annul it. So how can they annul a bride’s vows after the fact, and possibly without hearing them?

The first part of that question is easier to answer. Our mishnah limits this procedure to rabbinic authorities in their own households presumably because they possess the requisite knowledge about annulment and release from vows. (As we saw previously, fathers and husbands who are not rabbis and have even ratified a woman’s vow can go to a rabbi to have the vow annulled.) 

Still, there is the problem that they must have heard the vow. Motivated by this concern, the Gemara restrictively interprets the mishnah’s annulment procedure for Torah scholars as follows: 

When he will hear a particular vow is when he nullifies it. If so, when he has not actually heard, why is it necessary for him to state preemptively that the vows will be nullified? This teaches us that it is the practice of a Torah scholar to pursue such matters.

In other words, he has to first talk to her and hear her relate her vows. The mishnahisn’t giving a Torah scholar a new power of annulment that contradicts the Torah’s laws, it’s simply creating an opportunity for discussion.  

Perhaps this is an apologetic reading of the mishnah. But it is not the only possible reading. The mishnah is clearly trying to expand the powers of the father and husband to annul her vows, in line with the rabbinic preference to keep vowing and its consequences to a minimum. Oral Torah, as we see it at work in this case, is designed to promote justice and peace through a creative betrayal (or, if you prefer, reworking) of the Torah’s dictates. 

Read all of Nedarim 72 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on January 5th, 2023. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.

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