[Avodah] so is she married?

[kennethgmiller at juno.com]

R' Saul Newman posted this link to a video:
http://achaslmaala.blogspot.com/2009/10/nefesh-keshura-bnefesh-proposal-did-her.html

The video shows a young Jewish man and woman, who obviously know each other. He says some romantic things to her in the presence of many others, takes a ring out and presents it to her with the question, "Will you marry me?" She gratefully accepts.

To this, RSN asks (in the title to this thread), "So, is she married?"

My guess is that RSN is worried about the ideas reported on that linked page:

> are they merely engaged? I am not so sure. He asked her to
> marry her in front of a lot of witnesses, some of whom are
> Mitzva observant adult men. She accepted in front of all
> those witnesses and he put a valuable ring on her finger
> in front of all those witnesses (and captured on video).
> Could it be that this constitutes a Halachic betrothal
> (erussin) and she is actually already mekudeshet and an
> eishet ish?

I don't know a lot about Hilchos Kiddushin, but I am somewhat familiar with the American practice of getting engaged.

I know that the poskim have teshuvos about when foolish teenagers pretend to get married. But this was not a pretend marriage. It was a genuine engagement. I am incredulous that anyone could confuse the two. It is my respectful opinion that anyone who thinks that the woman in that video might be mekudeshes does not adequately understand the circumstances.

I do recall some gemaras which point out that the formula "Haray at mekudeshes lee" is not required; all we need is for the situation to be one in which it is clear that she understands that she is marrying the guy who is giving her this gift. But that is NOT WHAT HAPPENED here! She agreed to become ENGAGED to him, that's all!

The Wikipedia article titled "Proposal of marriage" states: The proposal of marriage is an event where one person in a relationship asks for the other's hand in marriage. If accepted, it marks the initiation of engagement. It often has a ritual quality, sometimes involving the presentation of an engagement ring and a formalized asking of a question such as "Will you marry me?".

Those are the exact words he used in that video when proposing to her.

There may be some people who will cite concepts such as "dvarim shebalev ainam dvarim", to say that we can judge the situation only by what actually happened and was actually said, and that we cannot presume what the people had in mind.

To those people, I respond that "what actually happened" was the standard procedure for a "proposal of marriage", and was not similar in any way to any sort of actual marriage in this time and place. And "what was actually said" was "WILL you marry me", not "DO you marry me" or "PLEASE marry me" or "You HEREBY marry me."

Anyone who thinks this was an actual marriage is confusing this time and place with some other time and place.

UNLESS... Is it possible that local practices are irrelevant to these halachos? Like I said, I have not learned these halachos in depth. If I'm wrong, I'd love to be corrected.

Akiva Miller

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