Kiddushin 4 – When a man takes a wife

Earlier, we saw one way to derive that marriage can be effected by giving the bride-to-be a ring or another object of value. However, it was based on taking the extra word "money" from a different place in the Torah and applying it to our context.

A more direct way is to take the phrase, "When a man takes a woman and has relations with her... if later he does not like her, he can divorce."" This clearly describes the situation of marriage and uses the word "take." The same word "take" is found when Abraham buys a field from Efron and says, "I gave you the money for the field, take it from me." We thus see that "take" has a meaning of acquiring with money.

Now this calls for some logical acrobatics. Look at a Jewish female slave, who cannot be acquired by having relations with her and is acquired only with money; a wife, who is acquired by relations, is undoubtedly acquired with money! Therefore, we don't need the derivation above at all!!

No, because a Yebamah case disproves this. Look at Yebamah (one's dead brother's wife), whom the remaining brother has to marry. She is acquired by cohabitation – and nevertheless, she is not acquired with money. So the above logic breaks: someone acquired with relations is nevertheless not acquired with money.

However, we can deflect this attack: Yebamah has an inherent weakness in that she is not acquired with a document, whereas a wife is acquired with a document of intent to marry.

Thus, we saw an attack, a deflection of this attack, and then a deflection of this deflection. We see at least why the proof based on the word "take" helps.

Art: The Innkeepers Daughter by Charles Cope West