[Avodah] Geirut for marriage

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Feb 17, 2010 at 01:10:58PM -0000, Chana wrote:
: RMB writes:
: > Except that I still don't find it clear. He writes, "chutz miqabalas
: > hamitzvos sheme'aqeves..." which although is the language of the Tosafos
: > and the Rosh WRT requiring a beis din (3 kesheirim meeting during the
: > day) does not prove he holds like them WRT sefeiqos in the qabalah due
: > to the person having ulteriar motives. And the Rambam is more machmir,
: > requiring the other steps to also require BD, not that qabbalas ol
: > mitzvos before a BD is less mandatory.

: I struggle to see how you can see this in the Rambam ...

I was looking at the SA when I wrote that. Not what the Rambam says,
just translating what the SA says he says.

But since we are revisiting this discussion, we can return to the
Rambam...

: I struggle to see how you can see this in the Rambam - let us look at the
: whole section in Issurei Biah Perek 13...

I'm just going to skip to the ones that deal with QOM (qabbalas ol
mitzvos).

...
: Halacha 1: Three things caused Israel to enter into the convenant, mila,
: tevila and korban. [No mention of Na'aseh v'Nishma, which would be the
: equivalent of kabbalat mitzvot - noting of course that if he had done so,
: questions of har hagigis would not doubt have come up]

Because in 12:17 we see the Rambam calling QOM a separate part of becoming
Jewish from the mitzvah maasis of geirus. (BTW, note also in hilkhos
teshuvah, he opens by telling you the mitzvah is saying vidui when you
do teshuvah. The mindset is a precondition; the act is the mitzvah. I
think there is a leshitaso here -- the Rambam doesn't count pure thought
and emotion among the mitzvos.)

The language of 12:17 is "kol hagoyim kulam sheyisgayru viyqablu aleihen
kol hamitzvos shel Torah .. harei hein keYisrael lekhol davar..." He
says you need QOM in addition to geirus. Two things.

Last time around I wondered why the Rambam wrote QOM second, since with
the exception of geir qatan, we make it a prerequisite to geirus. Then
we got into what "al daas BD" meant, and what the QOM at the time of
becoming an adult did -- provide the QOM piece or validate that the other
3 were actually a zekhus for us to say zakhin le'adam shelo befanav on
the milah, tevilah and qorban.

The Bach you refer to (YD 268, "vekhol inyanav") also doesn't deny the
Rambam requiring QOM. Rather, he says the Rambam and Semag only require
BD for tevilah. The question he addresses is whether QOM requires BD,
not whether becoming a Jew requires QOM altogether -- even bedi'eved.

I would think the Bach's understanding of the Rambam is mistabeir from
the notion that it's geirus that requires BD, and this other part of
becoming Jewish does not.

This notion that there are two stages: mitzvas geirus and QOM, fits the
layout of pereq 13. When he defines geirus, the Rambam defines only
the steps of geirus -- "sheyisgayru", not those of "viybalu aleihen
kol hamizvos".

Halakhah 9 is arguably not about QOM, but about using observance as a way
to set up a chazaqah that there must have been a BD. Similarly halakhah
10 is about neemanus. 11-14 speak about an eved at the time of shichrur.
(There there is no requirement of QOM, although there is a QOM of the
mitzvos that are shayachim to avadim at the time he is enslaved if he is
to be a true eved kenaani rather than a nakhri. Required back in 12:11.)

So, we don't get to defining QOM for certain until 13:15. Although again,
we know from 12:17 that the Rambam required it.

We also see the requirement in pereq 13, halakhah 17, where the Rambam
contrasts someone we are unsure did QOM with one we established his
tzidqus but afterward "chazar ve'avad AZ". In the first case, Jewishness
is a matter of cheshash until QOM is resolved. In latter case, the
Jewishness was already chal, so the person is a meshumad, but Jewish
with all the dinim -- the Rambam lists qidushin and hashavas aveidah.

And a weak proof from the SA and the Bach arguing about whether it
requires BD bedi'eved, which kind of distances one from the question of
whether it is required altogether.

BTW, the Tur that Bach is commenting on says that QOM bifnei BD is
me'aqeves, and he also has the Rif saying that tevilah and milah require
a BD even bedi'eved. Nothing about the Rif saying that *instead* of QOM
requiring BD.

What I can't find is the Rif himself, to see the original words.

...
: So where can you see in the Rambam that kabal ohl mitzvos before a beis din
: is mandatory? ...

As I said above, I don't. I was saying the SA did. And in fact, since the
Rambam separates QOM from the mitzvah of geirus, alhtough requiring to
create a geir tzedeq, I don't think it's compelling to assume that he did.

But we were originally discussing the need for QOM, not that QOM meant
before a BD. And then you moved us to the SA, saying I shouldn't have
invoked the Rambam as the SA doesn't hold like him. But in the SA's
version of the Rambam, the Rambam and the Rif *add* requiring a BD for
tevilah and milah to the previous requirement (which he gives as the
baseline pesaq) of requiring it for QOM.


All of which is really tangential, as you now made the discussion about
the definition of QOM -- does it require BD or not? The notion that
someone isn't Jewish unless they did QOM altogether is IMHO clearly
required even bedi'eved, lekhol hadei'os. And it was QOM, not whether
QOM requires a beis din, that really addresses RJR's original question.

On Wed, Feb 10, 2010 at 8:47am EST, Rich, R Joel wrote:
: IIUC the rule is we don't lchatchila accept a ger who wishes to convert
: to marry, but bdieved "kulam geirim heim"

: 1. I assume this prohibition is on a rabbinic level-is it?

To which I replied:
: I understood it on very different terms.
...
: A convert who isn't meqabel ol mitzvos isn't a ger. But we're not
: psychic, so we have to rely on watching behavior, listening to what the
: person says, and relying on chazaqos that the qabbalah is real.

The Rambam would say he performed geirus, but he didn't do enough to be
"keYisrael lekhol davar", nor is he mutar "lehikaneis bekehilal Hashem
miyad" (to quote 12:17).

Which means that whether you call it part of the mitzvah of geirus or
not, what I wrote about him not being a Jew stands. And thus someone's
Jewishness could end up depending upon something that only a mindreader
could know. Thus, if the convert's chazaqah is blown (eg by an ulterior
motive), we then have someone whose Jewishness becomes a non-trivial
question where error in either direction is very dangerous. Therefore
we have someone who is "yatza mikelal hagohim vechosheshin lo ad
sheyisba'eir tzidquso" (13:17).

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             When memories exceed dreams,
micha at aishdas.org        The end is near.
http://www.aishdas.org                   - Rav Moshe Sherer
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