What Was Once Possible

About This Talk

Chapter 6 sorts every brother and every widow into four categories and decides each one by what was once possible rather than by what is possible now. Among brothers, a saris chamah who never showed male development and an androgynos carry no obligation at all, since they were never fit to father children and the institution exists so that a name not be obliterated; a deaf-mute, a man who is not mentally competent and a minor may perform yibbum but not chalitzah, because chalitzah requires reading and understanding while yibbum requires no intent, with the result that a deaf-mute who performs yibbum can never divorce her and a yavam over nine years and one day acquires her but cannot divorce until majority; and those whose status is in doubt, men who have been castrated in any manner, an elderly man whose virility has weakened and a tumtum perform chalitzah but not yibbum, although a castrated yavam who does perform yibbum acquires her because he was once potent and must then divorce her with a get. The widows mirror this: a deaf-mute woman, one not competent and a minor may perform yibbum but not chalitzah, and the yavam may still divorce the deaf-mute with a get since neither her understanding nor her consent is required; women forbidden to him by a negative or positive commandment or as sh'niyot perform chalitzah and not yibbum, obligated because they are fit to be married and his kiddushin would bind, barred from yibbum by a decree lest he have relations a second time when no mitzvah remains, and if he transgresses he acquires her definitively and must divorce her; a doubt whether the deceased divorced her forces chalitzah lest he take a divorced brother's wife who is an ervah, while a doubt whether she was ever consecrated leaves her an ordinary yevamah free for either rite, and the wife of a deaf-mute, an elderly woman and a woman who has become barren are ordinary yevamot because they were once fit, whereas an aylonit who could never bear is outside the law entirely along with the wives of a saris chamah, an androgynos, an incompetent man and a minor, each exclusion drawn from its own phrase in the verses. The ervah who voids the obligation is specifically the sister, mother or daughter of the yavam's own wife, and only a woman whose consecration by him would bind is obligated. From there the chapter builds the household rule: where one of the deceased's wives is an ervah to the yavam, none of the wives is obligated, from the verse about one who did not build his brother's house, so that if he cannot build part of it he builds none of it; the exemption is permanent, it propagates through a freed woman's later marriages to all her new husband's wives, and a brother born after the deceased died is excluded forever since brothers must dwell together in time. The exceptions keep it honest: an ervah who was an aylonit, divorced, refused by mi'un or deceased in her husband's lifetime is treated as absent and the co-wife is fully obligated, because a co-wife is disqualified only where both were married at the moment of death, while a doubt about the ervah's kiddushin or divorce leaves the co-wife chalitzah only. A High Priest's yibbum with a widow does not release the other wives, a wife whose adultery was proven by witnesses exempts the household as an ervah would while an unproven sotah performs chalitzah, the relatives of a chalutzah and their co-wives are sh'niyot who perform chalitzah and not yibbum, and a widow carrying two yibbum claims, whether through a ma'amar or through relations with a minor yavam, performs chalitzah only, since the verse speaks of the wife of one deceased man and not of two.