Explore every episode of the podcast Lomdus On The Amud: Following The Oraysa Schedule

Kiddushin 3a: דעת אשה בנישואין בקידושין Part 2

Kiddushin 2b: דעת האשה בקידושין ונשיאון

Kiddushin 2a: Rav Nachum's Yesod in Kesef Kiddushin

Yevamos 122b: A "Talmid Chacham" that Causes Fights

Yevamos 122a: דרישה וחקירה באשת איש שזינתה

In 1943, a Jewish man was chased into a forest by Nazi collaborators and never seen again. A non-Jew later reported that he had been killed and buried.

Eight years later, his wife was still an agunah.

Could Beis Din rely on his statement? A fascinating real-life case exploring the halachos of גוי מסיח לפי תומו and a remarkable 1951 psak.

When the Titanic sank in 1912, a Jewish woman was left an agunah after her husband disappeared at sea. His body was never recovered. Could Beis Din permit her to remarry?

A fascinating real-life case exploring the sugya of מים שאין להם סוף, the reliability of testimony, גוי מסיח לפי תומו, and the halachic reasoning that ultimately allowed this woman to remarry.

Yevamos 120a: Chezkas Kol Mah

Yevamos 120a: The Ketzos on the 2 Dinim in Simanim Derabnan

Yevamos 119b: Rav Chaim Shmulevitz Yesod רבי מאיר חוששין למיעוטא

Yevamos 119a: חילוק בין רובא דאיתא קמו וליתא קמן

Yevamos 118b: קשה למדא ברי ושמא ברי עדיף

Yevamos 118a: בעניין צרות המכחישות ודיני ממנות

Yevamos 117b: Rav Chaim Brisker on כ"מ דע"א נאמן הוי כשנים

Yevamos 117a: Rav Reuven Grozovsky's Chakira in מדרש כתובה

Yevamos 116b: Rav Aharon Yaffen - Ritva is Lishitaso! - מסרו הכתוב לחכמים

Yevamos 116a: The Bais HaLevi Fascinating Chiddush When בדדמי Applies

Yevamos 115a: Rosh vs Rambam - Do we say Safek Lchumra in Our Sugya

Yevamos 115b: Rav Asher Arieli - In every בדדמי there is a חשש משקר - why מיגו would help

We all know that parents have a mitzvah to educate their children. But then comes a shocking Gemara: A child is eating treif, and the adults aren't obligated to stop him!

What happened to the mitzvah of Chinuch?!

Does Chinuch only require teaching children to perform mitzvos, or must parents also prevent them from committing aveiros? Is a father different from everyone else? And does the obligation change as a child gets older?

The Rishonim offer dramatically different approaches, uncovering a fascinating debate about what the mitzvah of Chinuch actually requires.

A powerful exploration of Tosafos, the Rambam, the Rashba, and the Beis Yosef that challenges everything we thought we knew about Chinuch!

A young child sees a fire on Shabbos and puts it out to help his father. Nobody asked him. Must his father stop him?

The Gemara opens a fascinating debate about a parent's responsibility for a child's actions.

But the real surprise comes from Rav Chaim Brisker's powerful yesod, brought by the Achiezer: Shabbos isn't simply another Torah prohibition. Its unique severity creates an entirely different dimension to a child's violation.

Why might allowing a child to break Shabbos be fundamentally different from allowing him to eat treif?

A person is born completely deaf and cannot speak. Years later, a cochlear implant allows him to hear, speak, communicate and function completely normally. Is he still the חרש described by Chazal — or has he become a פיקח?

Starting from the Gemara’s discussion of דעת in a חרש, we follow a fascinating debate from the Divrei Chaim and Maharam Shik to Rav Moshe Feinstein’s remarkable case of a deaf person who learned to hear and speak through technology — and then to the modern-day debate over cochlear implants.

And there may be a major difference between two questions: Does this person now have full halachic דעת? And does hearing through a cochlear implant count as actual שמיעה for Shofar, Megillah and other mitzvos?

Modern technology meets one of the most fascinating questions in Yevamos: What really defines a חרש?

Why is the kiddushin of a cheresh fundamentally different from the kiddushin of a katan?

Rav Elchonon Wasserman, in the Kovetz Shiurim, develops a powerful yesod in understanding the sugya. At first glance, both a cheresh and a katan lack the daas necessary for a regular kiddushin d’Oraisa. But Rav Elchonon shows that the two are not the same chesaron at all.

By a cheresh, there is a certain level of daas and an actual maaseh kiddushin, but the daas is not strong enough for the Torah to give the kiddushin its regular chalus. By a katan, however, the problem goes deeper: a katan simply does not have the halachic koach to create the chalus of kiddushin.

That chiluk gives us a new way to understand the Gemara’s treatment of these two marriages and opens up a much bigger lomdishe question: when kiddushin does not work, is the chesaron in the person’s daas, in the maaseh kiddushin, or in his basic koach to create a chalus?

A classic Rav Elchonon yesod that turns what looks like a small distinction in the Gemara into a fundamental understanding of daas, maaseh and chalus in Kiddushin.

Tosafos on Yevamos 111b makes a fascinating observation: performing chalitzah can be embarrassing for the yavam, particularly because the ceremony requires the woman to spit in front of him.

That small comment opens an unexpected question in Hilchos Lashon Hara.

If something is completely true — and may even be public knowledge — can merely repeating it still be Lashon Hara because the information itself is embarrassing?

Rashi elsewhere describes divorce as something that can be a גנאי for the husband. Shu”t LeChafetz BaChaim, discussing the principles of the Chafetz Chaim, therefore asks whether telling someone that a particular person was divorced can itself constitute Lashon Hara.

And that brings us directly back to our Tosafos: if chalitzah is also considered embarrassing, would the same problem apply to telling people that someone once performed chalitzah?

We explore the surprising line between revealing a secret and simply repeating a true fact everyone may once have known — and whether an uncomfortable chapter from someone’s past can become Lashon Hara simply because there is no reason to bring it back up.

Yevamos 112a discusses one of the most private claims a woman can make:

לא נבעלתי.

“We never had relations.”

But what happens when that claim comes up years after the marriage is already over?

A fascinating case came before the Be’er Sheva Beis Din in 2018.

A woman had been widowed from her first husband. She then remarried, eventually divorced her second husband with a get, and later wanted to marry a Kohen.

There was one obvious problem:

A Kohen cannot marry a גרושה.

So she made an extraordinary argument.

She claimed that her second husband had no גבורת אנשים and that they had never had relations.

Had she known about his condition before the wedding, she said, she never would have married him.

Maybe the marriage was therefore a מקח טעות.

And if the kiddushin were never valid, perhaps she wasn't really a גרושה and could marry the Kohen.

There was a major precedent she could point to.

Rav Moshe Feinstein, in Igros Moshe Even HaEzer 1:79, dealt with a woman who discovered immediately after her wedding that her husband was completely incapable of consummating the marriage.

The condition existed before the kiddushin, she hadn't known about it, doctors considered it incurable, and eventually the husband disappeared and she could not obtain a get.

Rav Moshe ruled that she should not remain an agunah and permitted her based on קידושי טעות.

So could the Be’er Sheva woman make the same argument?

Beis Din investigated.

They even obtained her former husband's medical records.

The records showed that there had been a problem, but they did not prove the kind of complete, incurable condition that existed in Rav Moshe's case.

And then Beis Din discovered something even more damaging.

They looked back at her original divorce case.

At the time, she had complained about other serious problems in the marriage.

But she had never claimed that her husband had no גבורת אנשים.

In fact, she remained with him for several months and even opened a שלום בית case.

That makes it very difficult to come back years later and say:

“Had I known about this, I never would have agreed to the marriage.”

So Beis Din rejected the מקח טעות argument.

But there was one final problem.

She had already received a get.

Even if the original kiddushin could somehow be invalidated, there is a concept called ריח הגט:

Even a get that wasn't truly necessary can sometimes disqualify a woman from marrying a Kohen.

So this woman wasn't trying to get out of a marriage.

She was trying to go backward and prove:

“I never needed my get because I was never really married.”

And Beis Din said she couldn't.

It is an incredible modern extension of לא נבעלתי:

Can the claim “We never had relations” merely end a marriage —

or can it sometimes prove that the marriage never existed at all?

What does Rav really mean when he says that a חרשת is “קנויה ומשויירת” — acquired, but with something left over?

The Beis Shmuel gives those words a remarkable practical consequence: even after one man marries a חרשת, the Kiddushin of a second man can still take hold. The Aruch HaShulchan explains that there is a שיור in the very קנין itself — something the first husband never acquired, leaving room for a second Kiddushin.

But the Rogatchover seems to understand the שיור very differently. He points instead to the missing דיני אישות, such as כתובה and תנאי כתובה.

That leaves us with a fundamental question in Rav’s “קנויה ומשויירת”: Where exactly is the שיור? Is something missing in the קנין itself — or is the קנין complete, with something missing only in the consequences and dinim of the marriage?

Rav drops two remarkably precise descriptions of Rabbinic marriage:

חרשת — קנויה ומשויירת.

קטנה — קנויה ואינה קנויה.

They sound almost identical. They’re not.

The Aruch HaShulchan explains that the קטנה may represent an all-or-nothing marriage: if she performs מיאון, the kinyan can disappear entirely; if she does not, it can emerge as a complete Rabbinic kinyan.

The Rogatchover then sharpens the other side. A חרשת isn't “maybe married.” Her marriage is real — but משויירת. Something is actually missing from what Chazal created.

So what exactly are Rav’s two categories? A definite but incomplete marriage versus a marriage whose very status remains open.

Two words in Rav — משויירת and אינה קנויה — reveal two fundamentally different ways that a דרבנן marriage can be imperfect.

The Gemara gives us Rav and Shmuel — but Rav’s position raises a fascinating question: how can this Kiddushin possibly work?

The answer is not one step, but two.

We follow Rav carefully and uncover the two separate stages that have to happen for the Kiddushin to take effect. Then, through the Rashba and Chazon Ish, we see why neither stage alone is enough — and how putting the two together suddenly makes Rav’s entire position click.

A classic example of a short line in the Gemara hiding a much deeper mechanism underneath.

Yevamos 110a takes us into one of the most powerful concepts in Shas: אפקעינהו רבנן לקידושין מיניה — Chazal uprooted the Kiddushin.

But how can Chazal undo a marriage that was valid מן התורה?

This shiur develops the central chakirah: Is every Kiddushin inherently created אדעתא דרבנן, giving Chazal control from within the marriage itself? Or did a complete חלות קידושין already take effect, with Chazal possessing an independent power to uproot it afterward?

Through Kiddushei Kesef vs. Kiddushei Bi’ah, הפקר בית דין הפקר, and שויוה רבנן לבעילתו בעילת זנות, we sharpen the issue into classic lomdus: חסרון בחלות or עקירת החלות?

From there, the sugya opens into major nafka minas involving למפרע, ממזרות, דעת המקדש, and the limits of using אפקעינהו in cases such as Agunah.

At its core, the question is simple but enormous: Is אפקעינהו a דין in קידושין — or a דין in כח חכמים?

The Gemara asks: מיתה מפלת או נישואין הראשונים מפילין.

Rav Soloveitchik points out that נישואין הראשונים מפילין is extremely difficult to understand.

How can the marriage itself be the cause of yibum?

Those very נישואין are what create the issur of אשת אח. Before she married his brother, she was permitted to the future yavam. The marriage is what makes her assur.

So how can the same marriage that creates the issur also be what creates the future נפילה to yibum?

Rav Soloveitchik explains that yibum must somehow already be built into the original אישות. The marriage does not only create איסור אשת אח; it also creates the framework that can later produce היתר יבום if the husband dies childless.

He sees this in the Rambam’s language regarding a woman who was divorced and then remarried:

הרי חזרה להיתרה

How can remarriage be called a “return to heter” when remarriage actually makes her אשת אח again?

The answer is that she has returned to an אישות that carries within it the potential for yibum.

That is the depth of the sugya: the very same נישואין that create the prohibition may also contain the future היתר.

Yevamos 108b: Get After Miun - Can she marry a Kohen?

Yevamos 108a: Why Kiddushin is considered a Miun - The Fascinating Chiddush of the Ohr Samayach

If mi’un uproots a marriage retroactively — תעקרינהו לנישואין קמאי — an obvious and powerful question emerges: if she is now treated as though she was never married, what was the status of all the relations she had with her husband? Shouldn’t every bi’ah retroactively become a ביאת זנות?

The answer brings us to a famous yesod of Rav Chaim Brisker: מיאון works מכאן ולהבא למפרע — “from now on, retroactively.”

Mi’un does not reveal that the marriage was fake or invalid from the beginning. Until the moment of mi’un, the marriage was completely real and halachically operative. She was his wife, he was her husband, and their relationship took place במסגרת נישואין. Only when she performs mi’un does Halachah uproot that marriage retroactively for the consequences that exist from this point forward.

That means the past has an extraordinary dual character. Looking at the moment when the bi’ah actually occurred, it was a completely legitimate ביאה של נישואין. But after mi’un, when determining her present and future halachic status, we can treat the original marriage as though it had been uprooted from its beginning.

This is the depth of מכאן ולהבא למפרע: the mi’un happening today can change how Halachah treats yesterday without saying that yesterday’s halachic reality never existed.

A classic piece of Brisker lomdus that answers a striking question on Yevamos 107b — and opens up a much bigger discussion about what “retroactive” really means in Halachah.

Yevamos 107a: החידוש של האבני נזר בעניין גדר ביאת זנות

Yevamos 106b: האם בחליצה צריך אמירת רוצה אני מצד האשה

What exactly must the yavam and yevamah have in mind when performing chalitzah?

The sugya on Yevamos 106a says that chalitzah requires the kavanah of both parties—but the Acharonim debate what kind of kavanah this actually is.

The Chacham Tzvi and Minchas Chinuch explore whether chalitzah requires the type of da’as needed to create a kinyan and a halachic chalos. The Beis Meir, Sho’el U’Meishiv, and Ketzos challenge that approach and raise the possibility that the requirement is one of kavanat hamitzvah and lishmah.

Rav Chaim Brisker and the Shaarei Yosher develop a fundamentally different understanding: the yavam and yevamah do not themselves create the heter. Rather, their kavanah gives the physical act its halachic identity as a ma’aseh chalitzah, and once that act exists, the Torah itself creates the resulting heter.

Along the way, we examine the Rambam, Ramban, Rashba, Tosafos, the cases of a katan and cheresh, the role of גדול עומד על גביו, and why removing a shoe can be either an ordinary physical act—or a halachic act powerful enough to release a yevamah to the shuk.

In Yevamos 105b, the dramatic encounter between Avdan and רבי ישמעאל ברבי יוסי becomes the basis for a powerful yesod in tochachah, lashon hara, and judging others. Why was Avdan punished only after he himself stepped through the talmidim—the very behavior for which he had just criticized רבי ישמעאל? The Chafetz Chaim connects this to the remarkable case of Yehu, who was commanded by Hashem to destroy the house of Achav, yet was later held accountable after he himself became connected to the same aveirah for which he had punished them. Together with the words of Rabbeinu Yonah, we explore a fundamental question: even when another person truly deserves criticism, can you be the one to expose or condemn him when you share the same failing? And even when speaking negatively is technically permitted for a genuine to’eles, how do we know that our motivation is really לשם שמים and not personal animosity or שמחה לאיד? A fascinating sugya about הפוסל במומו פוסל, the responsibility created when we judge another person, and the much higher standard the Torah demands from the one giving the תוכחה.

Yevamos 105a | Two Types of Teshuva

What makes the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur so unique? The Rambam discusses Aseres Yemei Teshuva in two separate places — first describing a time when teshuva is accepted immediately, and later describing the shofar’s call to “wake up” and examine our lives.

Why does the Rambam separate these two ideas?

Based on an insight of Rav Soloveitchik, we explore two fundamentally different forms of teshuva: teshuva for a specific sin that we already recognize, and teshuva that begins before we even know what is wrong. Sometimes the challenge isn’t fixing an aveirah — it’s waking up, taking an honest look at the direction of our lives, and discovering what needs to change.

A powerful perspective on the avodah of Aseres Yemei Teshuva and the journey from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur.

The Gemara teaches that even when the verbal recitation of Chalitzah is not essential, the Yavam and Yevamah still have to be capable of saying it. But what happens when someone can speak perfectly well — and simply cannot hear?

A fascinating discussion in the Rashash and Ramban may reveal two very different reasons why this is a problem. Is the issue that the person is not considered capable of performing the Kriah, or is there a separate requirement for Beis Din to teach them what to say?

An interesting case — where Beis Din teaches the person first and only afterward they lose their hearing — brings the distinction into sharp focus.

A real case from the Noda BiYehuda: after chalitzah was performed on his right foot, a yavam suddenly claimed he was actually left-footed — and that he had hidden it on purpose. Could that invalidate the chalitzah and trap the widow again? A fascinating real-life application of the sugya of איטר רגל.

Can the Mossad use a “honey trap” according to halacha? We take the principles of Yael and Esther into the modern world of Israeli intelligence: undercover relationships, forbidden relations, false identities, and the extraordinary question of how far an operative may go when the security of Klal Yisrael is at stake.

Can one of the Torah’s most serious prohibitions ever be permitted to save Klal Yisrael? We explore the remarkable cases of Yael and Esther, aveirah lishmah, yehareg v’al yaavor, and the debate among the Rishonim and Acharonim over whether saving the many—or all of Klal Yisrael—changes the rules.

The proposed heter triggered fierce opposition from leading poskim. In this episode, we examine a second side of the lomdus: perhaps Chalitzah is not simply a collection of actions that can be delegated at all. Unlike an ordinary mitzvah or transaction, Chalitzah may require a personal encounter between the Yavam and Yevamah before Beis Din. We explore how the definition of Chalitzah itself determines whether the entire concept of shlichus can ever apply.

A Chalitzah crisis in the 20th century ignited a major controversy across the Torah world: could a Yevamah who could not appear personally appoint a shaliach to perform her role in Chalitzah? We explore the lomdus behind the remarkable heter — perhaps the Yavam and Yevamah are fundamentally different. The Yevamah performs a maaseh Chalitzah, an action that may be transferable through shlichus, while the Yavam’s physical presence is itself an indispensable part of the Chalitzah. What exactly does the Torah require from each side, and can shlichus accomplish an act when the person herself cannot be there?

If an onen is exempt from mitzvos, can he perform the mitzvah of chalitzah? The Chacham Tzvi asks a stunning question: at the very moment every yibum begins, the brother and widow are both onenim—so why doesn’t that invalidate every case of yibum from the start? We explore the Chacham Tzvi’s question, the Yaavetz’s answer from Tosafos, and the Noda BiYehuda’s fascinating principle about a temporary exemption causing a permanent loss.

Is chalitzah simply the procedure that releases a yevamah to remarry, or is performing chalitzah itself a mitzvah? And if it is a mitzvah, what happens when the woman refuses? Can Beis Din force her to participate in chalitzah even if she has no interest in remarrying? We explore the nature of the mitzvah of chalitzah and the fascinating question of whether a person can be compelled to perform it.

Yevamos 100b: The Kovetz Haaros Chakira - ירושת הבת במקום בן

Yevamos 100a: The Famous Yesod of the Ohr Samayach Minchas Kohen vs Chatas HaOf

Can a DNA test determine whether someone is Jewish? This episode explores the fascinating intersection of genetics and Halacha: how Jewish identity is established, whether DNA can qualify as a siman muvhak or rov, why mitochondrial DNA is especially relevant to maternal Jewish lineage, and when genetic evidence can — and cannot — be relied upon in determining Jewish status.

In this episode, we continue our exploration of one of the most fascinating modern questions in halacha: when one woman provides the egg and another carries and gives birth to the child, who is considered the halachic mother?

We begin with the Gemara in Bechoros 21b and the famous concept that before forty days the developing fetus is considered “מיא בעלמא” — “mere water.” Could that suggest that motherhood has not yet been halachically established at conception?

From there, we turn to the central source in our discussion: Yevamos 97b. The Gemara discusses twins whose conception occurred before their mother converted but whose birth occurred afterward — “הורתן שלא בקדושה ולידתן בקדושה.” Despite their conception taking place while their mother was still non-Jewish, their birth after conversion creates a halachically significant maternal relationship.

Could this be evidence that maternal yichus is established specifically through birth?

We then examine the remarkable Gemara in Megillah 13a concerning Esther, together with Rashi and the Beis HaOtzar, which appears to draw a striking distinction: fatherhood may begin at conception, while motherhood may only become fully established at birth.

These sources build a powerful argument that the woman who gives birth is the halachic mother. But just as that conclusion begins to look convincing, Rabbi Akiva Eiger introduces a source that may turn the entire discussion upside down.