Yevamot 94a (צד.) — the Talmud in English

For it is hateful to him

for she is hateful to him.

Perhaps she hates the man who is supposed to be her yavam, and therefore marries outside the levirate bond without adequate investigation.

Rav Sheshet said to them: You have learned it

in our Mishna, which establishes that one witness is deemed credible to permit a yevama to marry outside the levirate bond.

For we learned:

They said to her, ‘Your husband died and afterward your son died,’ and she married

outside the levirate bond,

and afterward they said to her: The events were the reverse—

She must leave him, and the first child and the last child are mamzerim.

But

what are the circumstances [who was the one who testified to permit the woman to marry, and who were those who contradicted him]?

If you say it was two

witnesses who testified that she was permitted to marry

and two

witnesses testified to contradict them,

What did you see that made you rely on these? Rely on those! [Why did you see fit to rely on the witnesses who contradicted them and prohibit her, rather than on the two who permitted her to marry outside the levirate bond]!?

And furthermore,

why does the Mishna state, “And the child is

a mamzer,”

which implies that he is certainly a mamzer, when

he is a mamzer of uncertain status?

According to the testimony of those who permitted her, he is not a mamzer, whereas according to the testimony of those who prohibited her, he is a mamzer; if so, he is a mamzer of uncertain status!?

And if you would say,

that the

tanna was not precise [was not exact] in the wording of our Mishna,

But from the fact that it teaches in the latter clause

of our Mishna:

“The first is a mamzer, but the last is not a mamzer,” it may be inferred that it teaches precisely.

Rather, is it not

necessarily the case that initially there came only

one

person to permit her to marry outside the levirate bond, and since two witnesses came to contradict him, they are deemed credible and the child is certainly a mamzer?

And

we learn from our Mishna that

the reason is that two witnesses came and contradicted him:

It is only because two witnesses came to contradict the one witness that we believe them rather than the one witness.

If not for this,

if two witnesses had not come to contradict the one witness, he would have been

deemed credible,

even if only one witness said, “Your husband died and afterward your son died,” to permit her to marry outside the levirate bond. Thus, one witness is deemed credible regarding a yevama to permit her to marry outside the levirate bond.

And we reject this proof:

Actually,

our Mishna is discussing

two

witnesses who testified that she was permitted to marry,

and two

witnesses who testified to contradict them.

As for your difficulty, “What did you see that made you rely on these? Rely on those!”—this is not difficult,

as Rav Aḥa bar Minyomi said, with regard to conspiring witnesses—

Here too, it is with regard to conspiring witnesses,

who established that the witnesses who contradicted the witnesses who permitted her were conspiring witnesses, for example, by saying to them, “You were with us at that time.” The Torah has deemed them credible to nullify the testimony of the first witnesses, and afterward the conspiring witnesses themselves said that the events had been reversed.

Rav Mordekhai said to Rav Ashi—and some say

Rav Aḥa said to Rav Ashi:

Come and hear

to resolve our uncertainty, whether one witness is deemed credible to permit a yevama to marry outside the levirate bond:

For we learned:

A woman is not deemed credible to say: ‘My yavam has died’—

‘so that I may marry,’ nor: ‘My sister has died’—

‘so that I may enter

in her place

into her house,’

that is, so that I may marry her husband, to whom she had been forbidden until her sister died.

And it is evident:

She herself,

the woman herself alone, is

not deemed credible.

But one witness—

is deemed credible

to say that your yavam died, and you are permitted to marry outside the levirate bond.

The Gemara raises an objection to this proof:

But according to your reasoning,

that you infer this—

say the latter clause:

A man is not deemed credible to say: ‘My brother has died’—

‘so that I may perform levirate marriage with his wife,’ nor: ‘My wife has died’—

‘so that I may marry her sister.’

According to your reasoning and your inference, we should likewise infer from the latter clause:

He himself,

the husband himself, is

not deemed credible.

But one witness is deemed credible

to say: “Your wife died,” and you are permitted to marry her sister.

But this is impossible.

For

granted, with regard to a woman,

to say to her: “Your husband died, and you are permitted to marry anyone,” the Sages were lenient and deemed a witness credible, because

the Sages were lenient with regard to her because of her being an aguna.

But with regard to a man,

to say to him: “Your wife died, so that you may marry her sister”—

what is there to say!?

Rather,

necessarily, one cannot infer from what we learned—that a woman is not deemed credible to say, “My yavam has died”—that she alone is not deemed credible, whereas one witness is deemed credible, as is demonstrated by the latter clause—

Actually, even one witness is not deemed credible to say that your yavam died, because she does not investigate carefully when she hates her yavam. And if you will say: If so, why did the tanna teach this law with regard to a woman? It would have been preferable to teach us this law with regard to a stranger, who likewise is not deemed credible. This is not difficult:

On the contrary, it is a greater novelty that the woman herself is not deemed credible than that a stranger is not deemed credible.

And

when it was necessary—

for our Mishna to teach us this novelty with regard to a woman—

it was necessary according to Rabbi Akiva

that

it was necessary,

for according to his view it is a novelty that she too is not deemed credible to say, “My yavam has died,” because:

It might have entered your mind to say: Since Rabbi Akiva said, ‘There is a mamzer from those liable for prohibitions,’

and according to his view, when a yevama marries outside the levirate bond and her yavam comes, she must leave both men, and all the stringencies stated in the first Mishna apply to her [as explained above, on 91b and in Rashi there].

And if so,

say

that one might have thought: Surely this woman would not both lie and cause herself to suffer, because

she is concerned about the resulting harm and

she investigates carefully [she is concerned about the resulting harm and investigates carefully].

This teaches us

that she too is not deemed credible, because there is reason to fear that she hates her yavam.

Rava said: One witness is deemed credible regarding a yevama

to say that her yavam died, permitting her to marry outside the levirate bond,

by means of a kal va-chomer:

If

you permitted a prohibition carrying karet,

for you permit a woman to marry on the basis of one witness who says, “Your husband died,”

a prohibition carrying lashes

—the yevama who marries outside the levirate bond, thereby violating the prohibition “The wife of the dead man shall not be married outside to a stranger”—

should it not

be

all the more so!?

A certain

sage

said to Rava:

But

she

the woman

herself—

who comes to permit herself—

can prove that you permitted a prohibition carrying karet,

for if she says, “My husband died,” she is deemed credible and is permitted from the prohibition of a married woman.

Whereas

a prohibition carrying lashes—

when she says, “My yavam died,” thereby permitting herself to marry outside the levirate bond—

you did not permit—

But rather,

certainly

she herself, [she herself],

why is she not deemed credible [why is she not deemed credible]—

Because

since sometimes she hates him [sometimes she hates him],

she does not investigate carefully and marries [she does not investigate carefully before marrying].

If so,

one witness as well, since sometimes she hates him—

does not investigate carefully and marries.

We learned in the Mishna:

“This is the exposition expounded by Rabbi Elazar ben Matya”:

“And a woman divorced from her husband,” and not from a man who is not her husband:

Rav Yehuda said in the name of Rav:

Rabbi Elazar should have expounded a pearl from it, but instead expounded mere earthenware [Rabbi Elazar should have expounded this verse and found a pearl in it, but he expounded it and came away with nothing but a potsherd]!

And we explain:

What is the pearl—

what is the pearl that Rabbi Elazar ben Matya should have found in this verse?

For it was taught:

It is written:

“And a woman divorced from her husband,”

to teach you:

Even if she was divorced only from her husband [from her husband] and was not permitted to marry anyone, as, for example, when he wrote her a bill of divorce and said to her, “Behold, you are divorced from me, but you are not permitted to marry anyone,” so that she was not fully divorced, but merely separated from her husband—

she is

disqualified from marrying a koen

when her husband dies—

And this is the “scent of a bill of divorce” that disqualifies her from marrying a koen.

Mishna:

A man’s wife’s sister is forbidden to him by a prohibition carrying karet as long as his wife is alive, even if he divorced her. But if his wife dies, he is permitted to marry her sister, for this is what the Torah said: “And you shall not take a woman in addition to her sister, to make her a rival, to uncover her nakedness alongside her, during her lifetime.” Thus, the Torah prohibited his wife’s sister only during his wife’s lifetime.

With regard to one whose wife went to a country overseas,

and

people came and said

to him: ‘Your wife has died,’

and her sister, who had been forbidden to him by a prohibition carrying karet, was thereby permitted to him.

And

the husband went and

married her sister,

on the basis of what they had told him—that she was permitted to marry him.

And afterward his first wife came

back—