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b-hebrew - Re: virgin: _BETHULAH_ and/or _(ALMAH_

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  • From: Shoshanna Walker <rosewalk AT concentric.net>
  • To: "Steve Oren" <soren AT enteract.com>
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu
  • Subject: Re: virgin: _BETHULAH_ and/or _(ALMAH_
  • Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2001 21:33:18 -0500


Mehullelet (a woman who has been profaned). Incidently Moshe Shulman is perfectly right that when the Ketuba was a real contract and not a ceremonial one,


I never disputed this, the Ketuba IS a legal document, and I never ever said or implied that it was a ceremonial one. Not at all. And the word Betula was used to denote a woman not previously married, because her LEGAL status and rights according to Ketuba and the rabbis who instituted it, are different than those of a woman who was already married and widowed or divorced.

The Ketuba was not a document whose purpose was to morally judge a woman's virtue - the rabbis were wise enough then, to leave that as a private matter.

The purpose had to do with material sustenance and protection of women, and the desire to discourage divorce and subsequent intermarriage.



the husband had the right to come into the Beit DIn the next morning and ask for a get (without the woman getting her Ketuba money) if the betulim were missing.


Was this true , do you think, in the fifth century BC, as the oldest preserved Ketuba is dated, and in the second century, BC, when the text was improved and finalized?

(Did you know - not every woman bleeds the first time she has sex, even if she did not ever go horseback riding? Do you think no one knew that then?)


Shoshanna




However, this was more or less nullified by the provisions that a) it did not work if the husband had ever previously been alone with the bride or b) she explained that the betulim were missing consequent to a "mukach Etz" (the local equivalent of too much horseback riding). I.B. Singer points out that as late as the 19th century, the custom was for the men at the wedding to dance with the bloody sheet so all would know the bride's status. No doubt the invention of Ketchup did much to undermine this custom


Steve Oren

Chicago, IL

----------
> >Sorry but this is not true. Betula in a Ketuba means a physical
> >virgin. Indeed, ancient ketubot used a different term to designate
> >unmarried but sexually experienced women.
>
>
> What exactly is the term?
>
> Shoshanna
>
>
>
> > Nowadays (perhaps unrealisticly), the Rabbis assume that every
> >previously unmarried woman from a Jewish home is a "betula" (just as
> >in the US, any previously unmarried bride gets to wear white) but
> >there are stories about the difficulties that ensue when some of the
> >potential (male) witnesses to the marriage have good reason to know
> >that this rabbinical assumption is untrue in the instant case.
> >
> >
> >Stephen Oren

> >
>
>
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