The Mouth That Forbade Her

About This Talk

Issurei Biah 18 defines the status that bars a woman from marrying a priest and then demonstrates, from the law's own cases, that it is a question of eligibility rather than of conduct: it reaches a woman who is not native-born, a woman who had relations with a man she was forbidden to marry under a universally applicable prohibition, and a woman who had relations with a challal, while a woman liable for lashes or worse with a man she was permitted to marry falls outside it and a woman who marries a challal, which is entirely permitted, falls inside. The Rambam states the principle outright, that the matter depends on the blemish alone, includes converts and freed maidservants even if freed under the age of three, excludes an aylonit, and notes that the disqualification attaches at the first stage of relations whether willing or forced, knowing or inadvertent, from the age of three for her and nine for him, while Rabbinic prohibitions such as the shniot and relations after chalitzah do not create it; the Ra'avad disputes several of these inclusions and the Shulchan Aruch follows the Rambam. The chapter then turns to proof and withdraws almost every instrument of accusation: a wife's own statement that she was raped or erred is inadmissible, since a person's word is not used against herself and she may have set her eyes on another, one witness to adultery binds nothing, and a husband who believes either of them is left with a moral obligation to divorce and nothing to enforce; the raped wife of an Israelite stays with him but is still barred from the priesthood, while the raped wife of a priest is forbidden to him; a priest's claim that his bride was not a virgin forbids her on one doubt where an Israelite's raises two and rules leniently; a sotah who never drank the waters, for any reason, is barred on the unresolved question; and probability is tightened to two majorities for lineage, with the fixed-place rule treating even one disqualifying resident of a city as an even balance, though a woman already married is not divorced. The last half is the captive woman, where every rule of evidence is relaxed toward her: one witness clears her, and a servant, maidservant, relative, fellow captive or a minor speaking in the course of conversation all qualify; her own word that she was held but is pure is accepted because the mouth that forbade her granted her license; a license once given survives later witnesses to her captivity, the arrival of her captor and any rumor of witnesses to her defilement, and only two witnesses who actually testify to defilement undo it; a priest who testifies for her may not marry her unless he redeemed her first; a father is believed about her marriage but not about her captivity; one unused hiding place in a conquered city clears every woman in it; and a woman jailed over money is permitted, over a capital charge forbidden, and barred in either case where her captors hold the power.