Yerushalmi Ketubot 1:6 ירושלמי כתובות א׳:ו׳

MISHNAH: Somebody married a woman and found that she was no virgin²¹²The fact is not in dispute.. She says, I was raped after you had married me preliminarily, so your field was flooded²¹³Cf. Note 58.. He says not so, but it happened before I married you preliminarily; therefore, my acquisition was made in error. Rabban Gamliel and Rebbi Eliezer say, she is believed²¹⁴If neither of them has any corroborating evidence, her claim that she certainly was raped later is stronger than his assertion that maybe she was raped or had consensual sex earlier. If the husband wants to deny her claim, he has to provide evidence.. Rebbi Joshua said, we do not live off her mouth but there is a presumption that she had sexual relations before she was preliminarily married unless she provides proof of her statement²¹⁵Since she claims a ketubah and he does not want to pay at all, she claims money and a claimant in a civil suit carries the burden of proof..

HALAKHAH: “Somebody married a woman and found that she was no virgin”, etc. Rebbi Jeremiah asked: Does this mean that a claim of missing virginity is impossible following Rabban Gamliel and Rebbi Eliezer²¹⁶If the court automatically has to side with the woman, how could the husband hope to be heard?, only following Rebbi Joshua? He turned around and said, a claim of missing virginity is possible following Rabban Gamliel and Rebbi Eliezer, if she remains silent. And even if you say that she talks, if she said that he found her a virgin and destroyed the evidence. Why should she not be believed²¹⁷If she claims to have been a virgin at the time of the final marriage ceremony.? One cannot tolerate it, since Rebbi Hila said in the name of Rebbi Eleazar, if he found the door open, he is forbidden to keep her because she might have been unfaithful¹⁹Here סוֹטָה means “unfaithful, deviant” in a general sense, not in the technical sense discussed in Tractate Soṭah. R. Eleazar holds that the Mishnah does not only give the husband the right to complain about lack of virginity but obligates him to go to court to annul his marriage since nobody can stay married to an adulterous wife (Mishnah Soṭah 5:1) and he presumes his bride was deflowered after she was preliminarily married to him, up to a year earlier. In the Babli, 8b/9a, the same argument is quoted in his name.. Here you say, she is believed. There, you say that she is not believed. In this case, both agree that the door was open²¹⁸In the case of the Mishnah here, the facts are not in dispute, only their explanation is. It is possible to prefer an explanation presented as certain over a presumed argument. But if she denies not being a virgin, he has to assume that she is forbidden to him and, because he thinks her to be guilty, has to divorce her irrespective of the real facts behind the case..

There, we have stated²¹⁹Mishnah 7:8. The groom says that he never would have agreed to the marriage had he known that the bride had a bodily defect; his preliminary marriage was arranged under false pretenses; he wants to withdraw without paying. The father asserts that at the time of the preliminary marriage the bride was without defects, and that “the groom’s field was flooded”. If the disagreement surfaces before the final marriage, the burden of proof is on the father; after that, the burden of proof is on the husband.: “If she had bodily defects while still in her father’s house, the father has to bring proof.” Rebbi Eleazar asked Rebbi Joḥanan: Is this Mishnah from Rabban Gamliel and Rebbi Eliezer? Not from Rebbi Joshua²²⁰Since R. Joshua puts the burden of proof on the wife in the Mishnah here; why is there no disagreement recorded there?? He said to him, those are everybody’s words. There is a difference because bodily defects have a way to appear²²¹For problems that have to be expected, the person in control of the place where they happened is responsible. In Halakhah 7:8, it is stated that in the matter of very frequent defects, the husband can complain if at the start he had stipulated that the bride be free from even the most minute impairment.. Rebbi Yose said, formerly we saw rabbis who compared bodily defects to [defects of] virginity. These can be inferred from those and those can be inferred from these²²²Claims for annulment of the marriage because of bodily defects of the bride and because of missing virginity follow identical rules.. Bodily defects from claims of missing virginity: For if he slept with her in her father’s house, the father has to provide proof²²³It really is the other way around; in this case the rule about a complaint about virginity is derived from that about defects. If the final marriage ceremony is held at the father’s house, then in case of a blemish the burden of proof would have to be on the father; therefore, for the claim of missing virginity the father has to bring proof that his daughter either was a virgin at the moment of final marriage or lost her virginity in a manner which did not impair the validity of the marriage.. Claims of missing virginity from bodily defects²²⁴Again, this should be inverted: Rules for claims about blemishes derived from rules of complaints about virginity.: For if she developed bodily defects and there is a doubt whether it happened after she entered his domain or before she entered his domain, the husband has to provide proof, from claims of missing virginity. But if she lost her virginity, was it not in her father’s house? Nevertheless, you say, the husband has to provide proof²²⁵This follows only Rabban Gamliel and R. Eliezer; it is the only indication that practice should follow Rabban Gamliel (and not R. Joshua against R. Eliezer); this is stated explicitly in the Babli (12b). In the Mishnah here it is agreed that the loss of virginity occured in her father’s house. But since the argument developed after the final marriage in the husband’s house, the burden of proof is on the husband.; so here also, the husband has to provide proof.