Yerushalmi Sotah 4:1 ירושלמי סוטה ד׳:א׳

MISHNAH: A preliminarily married woman¹Cf. Demai 4, Note 19. or one who waits for her brother-in-law²Her husband died childless; she waits to be married by her brother-in-law. In the meantime, the brother-in-law declared his jealousy and brought witnesses that she had an illicit rendezvous. While a woman waiting for her brother-in-law is unable to marry outside the family without ḥalîṣah, her infidelity in her widowhood is not criminal adultery (cf. Yebamot, Chapter 2, Note 6). Nevertheless, if a brother-in-law “bespoke” her, she is as if preliminarily married to him and if she violates his demand that she not be with a suspected paramour, he cannot marry her unless she is cleared by the Soṭah ritual. Since this is impossible and she has brought the situation on herself by her action, she has to receive ḥalîṣah, be divorced, and cannot claim her ketubah money. neither drinks nor collects her ketubah, since it is said³Num. 5:29. “Under her husband” is only a wife living with her husband. In Sifry Num. 20 (differently in Babli 24a, attributed to the same authors) there is a discussion on which woman is considered living with her husband.: “.. who will deviate from under her husband,” which excludes a preliminarily married woman and one who waits for her brother-in-law.
A widow [married to] a High Priest⁴Lev. 21:14., a divorcee⁵Lev. 21:7. or one who received ḥalîṣah⁶She is a divorcee by rabbinic standards; cf. Mishnah Yebamot 2:4. to a common priest, a female bastard⁷Cf. Yebamot Chapter 1, Note 176. or a Gibeoness⁸Cf. Yebamot Chapter 2, Note 72. to an Israel, or an Israel woman married to a bastard or a Gibeonite, neither drinks nor collects her ketubah⁹The Halakhah leaves open the possibility that this latter rule may be a rabbinic decree..

HALAKHAH: “A preliminarily married woman or one who waits for her brother-in-law,” etc. Why can he not make her drink? It is a decision of the verse: “The man shall bring his wife to the Cohen¹⁰Lev. 5:15. A man can bring his wife only if he is living with her..” Then he should not be able to declare his jealousy¹¹If “his wife” in this paragraph means only the definitively married one, the entire procedure should be impossible for the preliminarily married woman.! The Torah said, “and he declared his jealousy to his wife,” “and he declared his jealousy to his wife,¹²Lev. 5:14; if the meaning of “his wife” were constant in this verse, the second clause should have read “and he declared his jealousy to her.” The woman who is a wife but not a wife in the first sense is the preliminarily married one. Therefore, the second mention of “wife” adds the preliminarily married one as object of jealousy.” even if she is only partially his wife.

Does our Mishnah follow the House of Shammai, since the House of Shammai say, “she takes her ketubah but does not drink”¹³Mishnah 4:3. If the husband died after she was in a secluded place with her paramour but before she could drink.? Rebbi Yose said, there the reason of the House of Shammai is that she may say, bring me my husband, then I shall drink¹⁴Since the verse requires the husband to bring his wife to the Temple, she can claim that it is not her fault that she could not cleanse herself.. But here, she knew that the preliminarily married cannot drink¹⁵It is clear that the House of Shammai also hold that women have to study all the rules (and texts) of the oral law; cf. Berakhot Chapter 3, Note 181. If R. Eliezer in Halakhah 3:4 excludes women from the study of Torah, he can mean only the study of the Pentateuch, not that of the oral tradition.; why did she bring herself into that great doubt? In order to disqualify herself from receiving her ketubah¹⁶For the preliminarily married woman, this refers only to pre-talmudic times, when the ketubah was given at the time of qiddušin. But later practice was to deliver the document only at the time of the actual marriage (cf. Ketubot5:1)..

Rebbi Jehudah asked: As you say, “and he declared his jealousy to his wife,” “and he declared his jealousy to his wife,¹²Lev. 5:14; if the meaning of “his wife” were constant in this verse, the second clause should have read “and he declared his jealousy to her.” The woman who is a wife but not a wife in the first sense is the preliminarily married one. Therefore, the second mention of “wife” adds the preliminarily married one as object of jealousy.” even if she is only partially his wife, similarly, “under your husband,” even if he is only partially your husband¹⁷R. Jehudah notes that “under your husband” is repeated (vv. 19,20). Therefore, if the repetition of “his wife” (cf. Note 12) also includes a partial wife ( preliminarily married or one who waits for her brother-in-law), the repetition here should also give the partial husband the right to bring his partial wife to the Temple. There is no answer given; R. Jehudah’s argument is contradicted by the verse he himself quotes, cf. Chapter 1, Notes 154–156.. How is that? If he declared his jealousy to her while she was preliminarily married, then he wed her¹⁸“He took her in”, i. e., he brought her to his house in the final wedding ceremony to live with him., and she went to a secluded place, he makes her drink on the basis of his declaration of jealousy¹⁹The final wedding activates the prior declaration of jealousy. The Babli agrees, 25a.. If he²⁰The brother-in-law. declared his jealousy to her while she was waiting for her brother-in-law, then he²⁰The brother-in-law. wed her, and she went to a secluded place, he makes her drink on the basis of his declaration of jealousy¹⁹The final wedding activates the prior declaration of jealousy. The Babli agrees, 25a.. If he declared his jealousy to her while she was preliminarily married, then he took her in, she went to a secluded place, and after that he had sex with her, she has to leave with her ketubah²¹As stated in Mishnah 3:6, the ceremony is ineffective for a woman whose husband had slept with her while she was forbidden to him. Since it is his action that (a) keeps his wife permanently forbidden to him and, (b) prevents his wife from proving her innocence, he as the guilty party is forced to divorce her and to pay the full amount of the ketubah.; otherwise²²If the husband did not sleep with his wife after she became forbidden to him, he has the choice to divorce her because of her fault, without paying any of his own money. she has to leave without ketubah. [If he declared his jealousy to her while she was waiting for her brother-in-law, then he took her in, she went to a secluded place, and after that he had sex with her, she has to leave with her ketubah; otherwise without ketubah.]²³From the Rome ms., probably omitted by the scribe of the Leiden ms. because of the parallel text. If her husband declared his jealousy and died, she became destined for her brother-in-law who married her, then she went to a secluded place, he makes her drink on the basis of [the first husband’s] declaration of jealousy²⁴Since by biblical standards the brother-in-law’s marriage is an automatic consequence of the first husband’s death.. If her husband did not declare his jealousy and died, she became destined for her brother-in-law who declared his jealousy but did not manage to take her in before he died and she became destined for his brother, the latter cannot make her drink since she became destined for him only because of the first brother²⁵Since the second brother never became her husband, his declaration is irrelevant to the third brother.. But if her brother-in-law declared his jealousy, took her in, and died, then she became destined for a brother-in-law who took her in, when she went to a secluded place he makes her drink on the basis of his²⁰The brother-in-law. declaration of jealousy.

There²⁶Mishnah 4:4; a fuller text in Tosephta 5:4 and Babli 26a as the minority opinion of R. Simeon ben Eleazar; as an alternative explanation in Sifry Num. 19., we have stated: “A she-ram²⁷A woman lacking secondary female sex characteristics, cf. Yebamot, Chapter 1, Note 65., an old woman²⁸A post-menopausal woman., or a sterile one neither drinks nor collects her ketubah,” as it is said²⁹Num. 5:28.: “She will be declared innocent and bear seed,” [this refers to] one able to bear seed; it excludes one who is unable to bear seed. They objected, is there not the widow [married to] the High Priest, is she not able to bear seed³⁰Why is she excluded from drinking (Mishnah 2)?? There is a difference, since it is written³¹Lev. 21:15.: “He may not desecrate his seed among his people.³¹Lev. 21:15.” There³²Since any child of the widow will be desecrated, it is not counted as the High Priest’s child. Therefore, as far as he is concerned, his wife is unable to bear children., we have stated: “A bastard disables and enables to eat. How is this?” And here he says so? Rebbi Tanḥuma said, there, “she has no issue” of any kind, but here³³Mishnah Yebamot7:7. An Israel woman widowed from a Cohen may eat heave as long as any Jewish descendant of her husband’s is alive; a Cohen woman widowed from an Israel may not eat heave as long as any Jewish descendant of her husband’s is alive. one requires enabled seed, not disabled seed. Rebbi Yose ben Rebbi Abun said, the water only serves to permit her to her house; but about this one one tells him to divorce once she went to a secluded place³⁴He rejects the earlier attempt to find a biblical source to the rejection of the widow and explains Lev. 21:15 as: “He is forbidden to desecrate his seed.” The rule excluding the High Priest’s widow is rabbinical. If the Temple court refuses to administer the water, the widow remains permanently forbidden to her husband, who therefore is forced to divorce her..