Gittin 20 - June 5, 16 Sivan

Today's daf is sponsored by Meryll Levine Page in loving memory of her father, Yosef Michael haLevi, on his 14th yahrzeit. "Our dad set us on the derekh by modeling and encouraging both study and tzedakah." A man gave a sefer Torah to his wife and said it was her get. Rav Yosef indicated that there were three reasons why this could not possibly be effective. Rav Chisda attempted to connect a debate between Rabbi Yehuda and the rabbis about a sefer Torah where God's name was not written without the proper intent - can one go over it with ink or not - to the question of fixing a get that was not written li'shma. However, this connection is rejected as the Torah requires beautification, which is not required for a get. Rav Chisda said that he could theoretically disqualify all gittin. Rava attempted to understand what he was referring to. One suggestion was that since the rabbis instituted that the women pay the scribe (to prevent agunot situations - that the husband may not want to pay the money for the divorce), and therefore the get was not written by the husband as prescribed by the Torah. The second suggestion is that the husband does not actually give the woman anything of value and perhaps when the Torahg stated "he gives her," it meant an item of value. Both these suggestions are rejected and it is unclear what Rav Chisda was referring to. Is chiseling considered writing? It depends on whether it was done by chiseling the area surrounding the letters (considered writing) or chiseling the areas where the letters are, causing the writing to protrude. (not considered writing). How then was the tzitz considered 'written' if it was chiseled "like a coin"? A husband needs to give the get to his wife and cannot say that the paper/parchment it is written on still belongs to him, as in that case the letters are just considered 'hanging in the air' and not written. If one gives a get to his wife on a piece of gold and tells her to keep the gold as her ketuba money - is this effective - is it considered that the letters are hanging in the air or not? Rami bar Hama asked: if they find a slave in the woman's possession with a get written on his arm, but no one witnessed the husband giving the get to his wife, can we assume she is divorced or is it possible the slave went to her on his own? He also asked another question: if she owned a slate and the get was written on that, can we assume that she transferred ownership of the slate to the husband before he gave it to her and divorce would be effective, or do we assume that women do not know how to do that properly?