[Avodah] O attend R wedding = kosher eidim?

[Zev Sero]

Micha Berger wrote:
> On Mon, March 17, 2008 8:54 pm, R Elazar M. Teitz wrote:
> :      I don't think R weddings have designated witnesses, certainly not
> : "to the exclusion of all others."


> To bring the story to its relevancy for this conversation, I would
> presume that if the American norm is to appoint witnesses, R would as
> well. [...] Reform and
>> Reconstructionist and some Conservative rabbis accept women as
>> witnesses, though most still prefer that the witness be Jewish.
> 
> So, they appoint witnesses, often nothing resembling eidus. They are
> pretty formally appointed, actually, I got the impression that there
> is usually one set of witnesses for the "kesuvah" and the ceremony.

I think this is a different meaning of "witnesses".  Despite the name,
what they're there for is not to actually see the marriage but to sign
the register.  The proper analogy here is not to eidei kiddushin, who
are eidei kiyum, but to the eidim on the tena'im and the ketuba, who
are eidei ra'ayah.  Signing the register is a kibbud, just as is signing
the tena'im or ketuba, but I don't think they have the concept of eidei
kiyum for the ceremony itself.


-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev at sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                       	                          - Clarence Thomas