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In last weeks haftara, with the 2 women and the one baby, I have a question.
How did Shlomo know that his trick was going to work? Maybe both women really think they are the mother, and will both yell to not chop it.
See, imagine if really nobody switched it. The one woke up with a live baby, and knows it is hers, because she didn’t switch it. The other woke up with a dead baby, and thinks the live one is hers, and that the first switched them (maybe she thinks she recognizes it, like the navi says).
(To be explicit, I am assuming that you could honestly mistake another baby for yours when they are a few days old.)
So what was Shlomo planning to do if both mothers said don’t chop?
Sorry that wasn’t last weeks haftora it was shabbos chanuka
its discussed in the Gemorrah, i think Yevamos.
the inyan is complicated and i dont recall it. one was the wife of the other ones brother or something like that. depending on whos baby it was one of them would be able to do Yibum, something like that, i forget.
Plan B. We’ll just never know what it was.
I thought that he realised the truth – that one was lying (you can see it in his wording in the pesukim). He was just trying to catch her out.
Welcome back Mod 80.
You were missed.
I knew that (even though I didn’t get to shul)
I was answering your question.
c’mon. YOu can do better than that!
Shlomo Hamelech was the smartest man that ever lived. I think we can assume that he wasn’t just taking a gamble, he knew what he was doing.
Pba,
Look who’s talking I called ur bluff right off the bat
Chicagoians, you can always know they’re bluffing
maybe they did in Chicago (either that or you weren’t paying attention)
Maybe he knew whose it was, because he figured out that the other was lying. There are professionals who can do this today, so if he was so smart he was probably able to read them. But he needed evidence, so he orchestrated this whole scheme in order to get the liar to confess.
The Midrash says that the husbands of the two women were father and son, making the two women, mother-in-law and daughter-in-law.
The two women had just lost their husbands, and needed a live child to exempt them from the status of a Yevamah. Both women gave birth to babies. However, these two babies were still less than 30 days old at the time that one of them died. The mother of the dead child would therefore be subject to the laws of Yibbum. This was the lying mother’s motivation for taking the other woman’s child.
If it were the mother-in-law’s child who had died, she would have no incentive to kidnap her daughter-in-law’s child. Even though her son (the deceased husband of her daughter-in-law) had passed away before her own husband had, and therefore he would not exempt her from Yibbum, nevertheless, she would be exempt from Yibbum for another reason. The living child was her son’s child, and a grandchild exempts one from Yibbum.
Only the daughter-in-law had the motive to lie and try to claim that the child was hers. If it was her baby who had died within 30 days of its birth, leaving her childless, she would have been bound to her husband’s brother as a Yevama- and that brother would have been -none other than the living baby (who was in fact her mother-in-law’s child – i.e., her deceased husband’s bother). Since her brother-in-law was a newborn, the daughter-in-law would have had to wait 13 years before this baby would be able to perform Chalitzah on her and free her to remarry.
King Solomon realized all of this and suspected that since the only one with a strong motive to lie was the daughter-in-law, the child must really belong to the mother-in-law.
moi aussi,
BH i’m learning yevamos now and there is something called achiv shelo hayah bolam (brother that isn’t around) if the brother was born after the marraige he can’t do yibum, sorry
i would like to know where this “midrash” is though
Koheles Rabah 10:16
Hey! Where did my post disappear to?
Popa, I thought of a 2 possible answers. I am completely guessing here.
*One of the babies had a bris while the other did not.
*One had a birthmark so the mother knew it was/wasn’t hers.
Sorry, I deleted it because it had outside links.
Thanks, ill look it up tomorrow iyH
So what was Shlomo planning to do if both mothers said don’t chop?
In that case he wouldn’t have chopped. The real question is what if both of the mothers would have listened to Shlomo, after all if he says that it’s a fair solution who were they to question him?
Huh? I don’t get it. Maybe in truth it was not switched, but the mother of the dead one is convinced that the live one is hers and that therefore it must have been switched.
Brilliant!
I must be tired.
popa: You are definately not a retard. This does’t mean you’re not crazy.
Oh now I get it. 🙂
moi aussi: thank you for your explanation.
nice try, but wrong, popa.
they could easily have been switched accidentally.
You need to know a little about sleeping arrangements, tiredness, and mothers of small babies.
They could have been switched accidentally whilst both babies were alive. Once the baby died, the switch could have only been intentional. If the babies were accidentally switched prior to death, there is indeed no way of knowing who the real mother is.
To add to choc,
Or switched on purpose by someone else
This is all theoretical.
As I mentioned above, it wasn’t an accidental switch and both the culprit and Shlomo knew that.
I heard an opinion that the entire case was theoretical – it was acted out by “ruchos” to demonstrate the depth of Shlomo Hamelech’s wisdom. Does anyone have a source?
Theoretically, the babies could have been switched accidentally whilst they were both alive, and once again intentionally after one baby died. Theoretically, the live baby could have ended up with the wrong mother.
miketz is not always chanuka. in a zayin chaser year,
chanuka will be friday, shabbos chanuka will be vayeshev
and miketz will be the day after chanuka.
Popa,
I don’t quite understand. If the switcher knows that it is in fact not her baby, why would she say don’t chop? In the navi the switcher agrees for the baby to be chopped precisely because it wasn’t her own.
But lets say the switcher yells don’t chop along with the real mother only because she is compassionate and doesn’t want another baby killed. Then according to your answer it seems she would get the baby on sheer virtue of waking up with it? Of course the switcher woke up with it if she switched it! So now the real mom wouldn’t get the baby?
Perhaps I misunderstood your answer. Please explain!
Ok, Ok, just reread the thread.
Popa, you mean that if both women yelled don’t chop it means that its not possible that a switch occurred, rather the one who lost her baby is just bitter and confused, and honestly thinks the live baby might be hers.
Now what if the babies were switched. And the switcher wants a live baby very badly (that is why she did such a deed). But standing in that courtroom before the king who decides the live baby must be chopped, she realizes the game has gone too far, and she doesn’t want a baby to die at her expense. After all her goal was to care for and raise a Jewish neshama, however misguided her method of acquiring a new one was; her goal initially was not to kill another women’s baby.
So I think it is very plausible to assume that even if she was so pained that she was driven to switch the babies, she might have been too compassionate to just allow a child to die. Even if she knew it wasn’t her own.
So now both the real mother and the switcher yell don’t chop! What happens now? She confesses? But she wants that live baby!
So Popa, it is possible that both women would yell don’t chop, even if the switch occurred. You have to consider all cases.
If the remaining child were to be killed, this too would free the daughter-in-law from her Yevamah status – since the living baby was her only brother-in-law. From the daughter-in-law’s perspective, in fact, killing the child would result in a better solution for her. By just kidnaping the child she might have convinced the earthly court that she was not a Yevamah. However, she herself would know that the child was not really hers and that she really was not permitted to remarry, until Chalitzah was performed. By having the baby killed, though, she would truthfully be released from the bonds of Yibbum.
This is the reason the daughter-in-law suddenly lost interest in keeping the child when she saw that King Solomon was ready to cut the child in half. This would serve her interests even more than if she took the child for herself. Therefore she insisted: “Cut!”
Moi aussi,
I saw the midrash and no where does it say anything about yibum (however it does talk about the story)
The Midrash (Koheles Rabah 10:16) tells us that the reason both of these women were so desperate to have the living child declared theirs was that they were both potential Yevamos (widows subject to Yibbum). Neither of the two had any other offspring. Whoever would be judged to be the childless woman would not only lose the infant, but would also be trapped in the unpleasant status of Yevamah, being dependent upon her brother-in-law’s good will.
The Midrash (Yalkut Shimoni 2:175) asserts that the husbands of the two women were father and son, making the two women, mother-in-law and daughter-in-law to each other.
According to the Meiri in his commentary to Yevamos 17a, the two Midrashim may be complementing each other.
I’m sorry but I don’t know what midrash you’re looking at but the one I am doesn’t say anything about yibum mehedura wagshal) page 156 (kuf nun vav) and just quoting a source while saying the same thing you’ve always been saying doesn’t prove anything.
You’re right about the meiri though
I found what you are talking about however its in a different company’s midrash
Ill look up the yalkut tomorrow (iyH)
The question still stands according to the meiri though that its achiv shelo hayah bolam (brother has to be around when gets married)
Are you saying that the brother who has to perform Yibum must be born prior to the marriage of his sister in law?
I recently heard of a case where a man died childless. He had no brothers, but his mother was pregnant when he died. When she gave birth to a boy, the wife was obliged to wait for 13 years to get Chalitza from her brother in law who was born AFTER her husband died. Does this make sense?
look at the Bartenura by Yevamos 1:1 about the case of eishes achiv shelo hayah b’olamo
I think the case was that the husbands died after the babies were born.
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