One-Page Learn · The Halachos at a glance
גֵּרוּשִׁין
Divorce 3
Sefer Nashim · Why a flawless get can be worth nothing, the four places a scribe must leave blank in a prepared document, and how a lost get is identified again
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Places a scribe must leave empty in a get prepared in advance: his name, her name, the date, and the words of release
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People unfit to write a get: a gentile, a servant, a deaf mute, a mentally incompetent person and a minor
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Letters that can be repaired by tracing over them, since a get written without intent stays void and writing over writing is not writing
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Documents handed to each woman when two identical bills of divorce are interchanged, so that each receives the one written for her
Part 1For her sake, or not at all
- A practice copy divorces nobody. A get written by a scribe to learn or to teach the craft is void even when the husband's name, the wife's name and the city all match exactly, because it was never written with the intent of effecting a divorce. (3:1)
- Written for a divorce, but not for these two. A get prepared by one man who changed his mind is void in the hands of a neighbor who shares his name and whose wife shares the wife's name, and a get written to divorce the older of two wives with the same name is void when used on the younger. (3:2, 3:3)
- Deferred choice, doubtful divorce. Where a husband instructs the scribe to write a get and says he will divorce whichever wife he chooses, the status of the divorce is doubtful, and a get written without the proper intent stays void even if the scribe traces the letters again with the right intent. (3:4)
- An old get, and a bond that does not yet exist. A get written and set aside should not be used after the couple were secluded together, lest people say her get preceded her son, though after the fact the divorce holds, while a get written for a woman before she is consecrated is void because she could not have been divorced by it when it was written. (3:5, 3:6)
RememberEvery visible thing about the document can be flawless. What makes it a get is invisible and cannot be added afterwards.
Part 2The four blanks, and who may fill them
- The body may be prepared; the essence may not. To assist scribes the Sages permitted writing the standard text of a get in advance while leaving blank the man's name, the woman's name, the date and the sentence, behold you are permitted to any man, so that these are written for the sake of husband and wife, after which the witnesses sign for their sake. (3:7)
- Witnesses who signed without intent. Where the scribe wrote properly but the witnesses signed without the required intent, the get is valid by Torah law and unacceptable only by Rabbinic decree, because signatures were instituted as a measure to aid society, and the Rambam explicitly rejects the view that such a get is void like a forgery. (3:8)
- Five who may not write it. All are fit to write a get except a gentile, a servant, a deaf mute, a mentally incompetent person and a minor, and a woman may write her own get, while an apostate or one who publicly desecrates the Sabbath is treated as a gentile in this regard. (3:15)
- Every disqualification is about intent. A gentile writes with his own intent, the deaf mute, the incompetent and the minor lack the capacity to form it, and the laws of marriage and divorce do not apply to a servant at all, so a get written by any of them is void even when properly signed and properly delivered. (3:16)
- Which is why supervision rescues some of them. If one of the five wrote only the standard body and a competent adult Jew wrote the four essential portions with proper intent, the get is acceptable, and at the outset a deaf mute, an incompetent person or a minor may write the body under supervision, though a gentile or servant may not even then. (3:17, 3:18)
RememberWhatever can be borrowed from a general form is borrowed. What cannot be borrowed is identity, time, and release.
Part 3Naming, losing, and the wrong day
- A lost get, and where it was lost. A get lost where caravans do not pass is presumed to be the one found, even long afterwards, while in a place caravans frequent it counts only if found before any passerby tarried, or found in its original container with the agent able to identify the rolled document's length and width. (3:9)
- Two men, one name. Where another man in that place bears the same name and a stranger passed by, the divorce is doubtful even if he did not linger, yet the presumption holds if nobody passed, and a distinctive sign named by the witnesses, such as a hole beside a particular letter, settles the matter in every case. (3:10, 3:11)
- Interchanged documents. When two men with the same names sent gittin that were then mixed up, both documents are given to each woman before witnesses so that each receives the one written for her, and if one of the two is lost the remaining get is void. (3:12)
- The name that is written. A person known by two names is written by the one most used with the phrase, or by whatever names he is called, and a nickname is acceptable, but the less used name with that phrase is unacceptable, and a name of the husband, the wife or the city written incorrectly renders the get void despite the phrase. (3:13, 3:14)
- Written on a forbidden day. A get written on the Sabbath or Yom Kippur without knowledge of the transgression and then given is effective, while one written and signed willfully on such a day is ineffective because the witnesses are disqualified by Torah law, and one written willfully on a festival and given before acceptable witnesses is unacceptable by Rabbinic decree. (3:19)
RememberIntent does not excuse a misspelled name and a correct name does not supply intent. The law requires both, so that she can know her own status.