More Discussions for this daf
1. Misla Talu 2. Mi'un and Nedarim 3. Avoidance of Mi'un is not always applicable
DAF DISCUSSIONS - YEVAMOS 109

Joshua Danziger asks:

Hello kollel! A general question on miun, which would also apply to the retroactive gittin of king David's army (I think).

Miun annuls a marriage, making it as if it never existed right? What happens if the husband annuls his wife's vow then she does miun (or if she's retroactively divorced)? Is it chozer veneor? Should she do hataras nedarim, or do we assume that any vow is anyway with his permission when made so maybe nothing needs to be done?

Thank you!

The Kollel replies:

1) We first have to try and figure out, bs'd, how this question could ever apply. The Mishnah Nidah 52a states that if the young girl already has 2 pubic hairs she can no longer do miun. Rava states in Nidah 46a that she can only do miun in her 12th year, not afterwards.

2) But the Mishnah Nidah 45b states that it is only from 12 years on that her nedarim apply. However the Mishnah does also say there that from 11 years and a day, her nedarim are checked. Rashi explains that if she is sufficiently mature to know that she made a neder for Hash-m then the neder applies.

3) So from 11 years and a day, if she is mature enough, she can make a neder and also be married miderabanan before doing miun.

4) The Gemara Nazir 21b asks a question if the husband is "Me'akar Akar" or "Meigaz Gayaz". Tosfos DH explains that if we say Me'akar Akar this means the neder never applied in the first place. If we say Meigaz Gayaz it means the neder did start but when the husband annuled it, it is annuled from then on. It seems that everyone agrees that it is not chozer veneor so she would need no hatoras nedarim.

KOL TUV

Dovid Bloom

This is the question of Rabbi Akiva Eiger!:

Josh, I think your question is asked by R. Akiva Eiger!

1) This is in Derush veChidush, by RAE, on Kesubos 101a. There, Rabbi Yehoshua said in the Gemara that if a man is married to a minor he can annul her vows. Tosfos DH uBeHafarat writes that this only applies if she has reached the "season" of Nedarim; meaning that she has reached the age where she can make nedarim [this is 11 years as we saw in the first reply, assuming she is mature enough to understand what the neder represents - DB].

2) Tosfos then writes that this is true even according to the opinion (Nidah 46b) that in her 12th year she has the power mideoraisa to make nedarim. Even though she is only married miderabanan to her husband; since she was a minor girl without a father, who was married off by her mother or brothers (it is only in the latter scenario that miun apllies); nevertheless her derabanan husband can annul her deoraisa vows, because the rule is that any vows that a wife takes are always subject to the agreement of her husband.

3) Rabbi Akiva Eiger writes in Derush veChidush that he is in doubt what is the din if after he annuled her vows, she then did miun. Do her nedarim come back and make a prohibition for her? Since the miun uproots the marriage, do we say that his hafarah is cancelled out retroactively? If so, the rule that all vows of a wife are subject to the agreement of her husband will not work here because she uproots the marriage, so retroactively the nedarim do stand, since at the end of the day there is no husband.

4) RAE concludes that if we would say that she can do miun and make the nedarim come back, this would mean that if she does make nedarim in her 12th year, she will have to be careful not to transgress them, because even though the husband annuled them, it may be that later on she will uproot the marriage and this will mean that the nedarim applied all along.

I am going to have look more carefully now to see where I went wrong with my first answer!

Yasher Koach Gadol

Dovid Bloom

Follow-up reply:

1) The mistake I made in my first answer is in part 4) where I did not take account of the fact that if she does miun this may mean that she was never married, and if so the husband cannot annul her vows.

2) Back to the original question. We should learn the Gemara Nidah 46b where Rav Yirmiah cites a braisa which states that if an orphan girl made a neder her husband can annul this. Rashi DH Yetomah writes that this girl was married off by her mother and therefore can do miun since she is only married miderabanan. In DH Ba'alah Rashi writes that she is only called an orphan when she is still a minor, when it is still possible for her to do miun.

3) So far the simple reading would seem to be that the husband can annul the vow despite the possibility that she has of doing miun. A few lines later the Gemara states that the braisa follows Rav Pinchas in the name of Rava that "Kol HaNoderet Al Daat Ba'alah Hi Noderet"; any vow is with his permission.

4) However the Chidushei Ramban DH veHa writes that if the husband did not do biah after she became adult, he cannot annul her vows because he has not obtained a complete kinyan. Ramban writes that to start off with "Mitla Tali Nidrah"; her neder is hanging in suspense. If the marriage will be completed then he can annul her vow since she only wanted to make the neder with his permission but if the marriage is not completed this means that the husband cannot do hafarah. This is because she did not take into account her husband's wishes when she made the vow because she might have been intending later on to leave this temporary husband.

5) I am stopping in the middle of the Ramban. The Ramban later retracts from what he wrote, but at this present stage in the Ramban, he says that the neder is in suspense, and if she does miun the neder comes back and is valid.

KOL TUV

Dovid Bloom

Conclusion of Ramban and answer of Aruch LeNer:

1) The Ramban cites a text in Nidah 46b which reads "Ella keDeRav Pinchas..." so according to the word "Ella" the Gemara is retracting from what it said earlier; that her nedarim are annuled only if there is biah after she becomes adult. According to this, the conclusion of the sugya is that the neder she made as a minor does not apply since she only does what her husband wants, as he is supporting her financially. The Ramban writes that this final pshat is the main one.

2) Aruch LeNer Yevamos 108a cites both the question of Rabbi Akiva Eiger and the beginning of the Ramban and his conclusion. AruLeN writes that the question of R. Akiva Eiger may depend on the reason that we say "Kol Hanoderet Al Da'at Ba'alah Noderet". The Ramban writes that this is because he is supporting her. However the Ran Nedarim end 73b writes that the financial support is not the only factor. He writes that there is a difference between the wife and husband relationship and any other relationship. Therefore if somebody made a neder on the understanding that it will only apply if a particular friend agrees, the friend will still need a Chacham to permit the neder and this is not the same as the husband who annuls the neder without the help of the Chacham. The difference is that the husband annuls the neder with specific phrases, as explained in Nedarim 77b. Thisc is a Gezerat Hakatuv that he must use this language of Hafarah. AruLeN writes that since the Hafarah of the husband is something that is unique to marriage, it is logical to say that if the girl later uproots the marriage through miun, this means there was never any marriage, so one cannot now use the rule of Kol Hanoderet Al Daat Baalah Noderet.

5) In summary, according to the Ramban, that the reason one needs the husband's agreement is because he is supporting her, it follows that it does not make a difference if afterwards she uproots the marriage because at the time of the vow the husband did not want it. However according to the Ran the neder will still remain valid because it later transpires that it was not a vow made duirng marriage at all, so the husband cannot prevent it taking effect because there was no Lashon of Hafarah used retroactively.

Dovid Bloom

Opinion of Rav Chaim Soloveitchik:

1) Chidushei Rabeinu Chaim Halevi, on the Rambam Hilchot Ishut 2:9 DH veHineh HaRambam, makes a distinction between what miun does and does not uproot. He cites the Rambam Hilchot Gerushin 11:16 who writes:

" A girl who does miun is not considered as a woman who has been divorced from her husband. Her din with the husband who she did miun from is as if she was never married to him at all. She may marry his close relatives and he may marry her close relatives and she is not disqualified from marrying a Cohen".

2) Rav Chaim Soloveitchik writes that we learn from the Rambam that miun uproots the marriage retroactively. However he cites the Gemara Yevamos 108a that according to Rabbi Yehoshua if a minor girl gets married, her husband acquires anything she finds in the street, or any earnings that she accrues, and can annul her vows. Rav Chaim writes that even after she does miun the lost item she found, or her earnings or the vows, do not return retroactively (unlike R. Akiva Eiger who is in doubt about the nedarim). Rav Chaim explains why miun does not uproot the metziah, the earnings and the vows.

3) He writes that miun does indeed uproot the kidushin from the very beginning, but miun cannot go so far as to say that even at the time they were married they were not in fact married. Rather, what it means is that from the time of miun onwards we consider it as if the were never married, but what happened before miun we consider as a marriage. In the langauge of Rav Chaim, miun upoots the marriage "LeMafraiya" but when we ask the question "were they ever married?" the answer is that it is only "Mikan UleHaba" that we consider that they were never married.

4) The idea of "Mikan UleHaba LeMafraiya" is sometimes coined in Yeshivot. However I think that in the case of miun it may be possible to understand it in simple terms. What it means is that once miun is performed, we say that as far as the future goes, the marriage is totally erased and has no ramifications whatsoever on what happens from now on. She may marry into his family; he may marry into her family and she may marry a Cohen. This is because as far as the future is concerned ("Mikan UleHaba" in Rav Chaim's language) the marriage has been uprooted LeMafraiya and is as if nothing ever took place. However at the time that they were still married, this was a full derabanan marriage. Therefore he receives her findings, earnings, and annuls her vows. These latter items do not change when she does miun because it is only the uprooting of the marriage Mikan UleHaba which applies LaMafraiya but what happened in the past is still valid. Therefore since he annuled her vows when they were married miderabanan, this still applies after miun because it is only matters of Mikan UleHaba that miun uproots LaMafraiay, but miun cannot uproot LaMafraiya matters; things that happened in the past; LaMafraiya.

5) Therefore Rav Chaim, unlike R. Akiva Eiger, has no doubt about the matter. The husband uprooted her vows when they were married miderabanan and the vows can never come back.

Dovid Bloom