[Avodah] RYBS's Talk on Hafkaas Kiddushin, Talmud Torah and Kabala s Ol Malchus Shamayim

[Zev Sero via Avodah]

On 04/13/2015 11:45 PM, Kenneth Miller via Avodah wrote:
>   From what I understand, the objection to hafkaas kiddushin comes from a
> presumption that a woman would prefer to stay with her husband, even if
> he seems to be a terrible person, and even if she tells us that in*her*
> opinion he is a terrible person -- and we have this presumption because
> of the chazaka of tan du.

What she prefers is irrelevant.  Obviously she wants to leave her husband;
she is openly telling us so, and it's ridiculous to suppose she is not
telling the truth.  And even if she weren't, if the marriage is invalid
then it's invalid, no matter what she wants.

You're looking at the whole thing from the wrong direction.  No objection
is needed to annulling a marriage; what's needed is grounds *for* annulling
it.  The alleged grounds are that it has now become clear that this man
was always such a bad person that had the woman known this when he proposed
marriage she would have refused, and throughout the subsequent marriage
there was never a point at which she was so happy that had she found out
the truth she would have consented to stay with him.

Now if the husband is bad enough (and it can be proved that he always was so),
*and* the woman is such a catch that there was never a point at which she
could not have found another husband, then this makes sense.  Obviously she
has always preferred a good husband to a bad one, and only married this man
because she thought he was a good one.   But what if refusing to marry him,
or leaving him at some point during the marriage, were to expose her to the
risk of remaining single forever?  Would she still have turned him down or
left him?   The proponents of annulment say yes, of course she would, just
as she has left him now.  But, RYBS says, Chazal tell us that it's female
nature to prefer a bad husband to none at all, so perhaps even if she had
known the truth about this man she would have consented to marry him rather
than risk remaining single; or perhaps there was a point after the event at
which, had she learned the truth, she would have stayed with him rather than
face a single future.



> But I do not see Rav Soloveitchik making that case here. All he is saying
> is that "an old spinster's life is much more miserable and tragic than
> the life of an old bachelor."

Yes, and therefore while a man might prefer to be single rather than live with
a bad wife, a similarly situated woman will not.   That this woman *now* tells
us she would, doesn't prove that she always would have.


> He does say that this relative perspective on singlehood is a "permanent
> ontological principle[s] rooted in the very depth of the human
> personality," and that it will never change, and that this information
> is Revealed in the words of Bereishis. But this refers ONLY to the misery
> and tragedy of a single woman as opposed to a single man.
>
> And that's NOT that argument against hafkaas kiddushin, at least not
> how I've heard it. The argument that I've heard -- that is to say, the
> supposed translation of "tav l'meisiv tan du" -- is that a woman would
> prefer living with ANY man rather than to be alone.

Yes.  How is that not the same thing?  Spinsterhood is terrible for women,
so terrible that they'd prefer living with a bad man to it.


> When they invoke "tan du" against Hafkaas Kidushin, they're saying that despite
> the wife's protestations, the wife would actually prefer to stay married,
> and that's why they're unable to annul the marriage. Or am I mistaken?

Not that she'd prefer it now, but that she did prefer it earlier, when she
was faced with the risk of never finding anyone else.


-- 
Zev Sero               I have a right to stand on my own defence, if you
zev at sero.name          intend to commit felony...if a robber meets me in
                        the street and commands me to surrender my purse,
                        I have a right to kill him without asking questions
                                               -- John Adams