Talmud - Gittin 79b גיטין ע״ט ב׳

And the third matter relates to that which Rav Yehuda says that Shmuel says: On Shabbat a person should not stand on this roof and collect rainwater from the roof of another if there is no joining of courtyards. As just as the residences are separated below, so too, the residences are separated above. Each residence has a separate domain, and it is forbidden by rabbinic law to transfer an item from a private domain to another private domain if they are not joined. Similarly, despite the fact that the roofs are not totally separated from one another and nobody lives there, each roof is considered to be its own domain.

Rava explains: This matter applies only with regard to Shabbat. But with regard to a bill of divorce, if it fell onto another roof that is adjacent to the roof that he lent her for the purpose of acquiring the bill of divorce, she is divorced. The reason that a woman is usually not divorced when a bill of divorce falls into a different place, even though that place also belongs to her husband, is due to the fact that a husband is particular and does not want to lend her more than one place; but people are not particular to that extent, i.e., in this case the husband would not be particular about allowing her to temporarily use an adjacent rooftop that also belongs to him.

§ Abaye says: If there are two courtyards that are configured such that this courtyard is within that courtyard, and the inner courtyard is hers and the outer courtyard is his, and the partitions of the outer courtyard extend higher than the partitions of the inner courtyard, and he threw a bill of divorce to her into her courtyard, once it reaches the airspace of the partitions of the outer courtyard, i.e., it reaches the area above the inner courtyard at a height lower than the height of the partitions of the outer courtyard, she is divorced.

What is the reason for this? The inner courtyard itself is secured by the partitions of the outer courtyard. Therefore, the outer partitions service the inner courtyard as well. If the bill of divorce is secured by being encompassed by the outer partitions, it can be viewed as belonging to the inner courtyard once it reaches its airspace.

The Gemara comments: This is not so with regard to baskets. In a case where there were two baskets, this one within that one, resting in a domain that does not belong to either of them, and the inner basket is hers and the outer basket is his, and he threw a bill if divorce to her into her basket, even if the bill of divorce reached the airspace of the inner basket but was burned or taken before it landed therein, she is not divorced.

What is the reason for this? It is because the bill of divorce did not yet rest within the basket, and in this case, the walls of the outer basket do not service the inner basket.

The Gemara asks: And when it rests within the basket, what of it? They are like the vessels of a buyer in the domain of the seller, since her basket is within his basket, which is his domain. She cannot acquire the bill of divorce, despite the fact that it is in her basket, since it is within his domain.

The Gemara answers: With what are we dealing here? With a basket that has no bottom, and consequently the inner basket is resting on the ground and not inside the outer basket. Therefore, once the bill of divorce lands inside the inner basket, she is indeed divorced.

MISHNA: Beit Shammai say: A man may send, i.e., divorce, his wife with an outdated bill of divorce, and Beit Hillel prohibit him from doing so. And what is an outdated bill of divorce? Any case where he was secluded with her after he wrote it for her and before he gave it to her.

GEMARA: The Gemara explains: With regard to what do they disagree? Beit Shammai hold that we do not say that the bill of divorce is not valid due to a rabbinic decree, lest they say that receipt of her bill of divorce precedes conception of her son. If he gives her the bill of divorce long after it was written, she may give birth to children from him in the interim. There is a concern that people will say that she was actually divorced on the date written on the bill of divorce before the children were born, and the children were conceived through licentious sexual intercourse.

And Beit Hillel hold that we do say that this bill of divorce is not valid due to a rabbinic decree, lest they say that receipt of her bill of divorce precedes conception of her son. Consequently, if a woman was secluded with her husband following the writing of the bill of divorce, the bill of divorce is not valid.

Rabbi Abba says that Shmuel says: Even according to Beit Hillel, if the woman was married on the basis of an outdated bill of divorce given to her by her previous husband, who did not ask advice from the rabbis, she need not leave her second husband. In such a case, this decree is not severe enough to invalidate the bill of divorce.

And there are those who say that Rabbi Abba says that Shmuel says: If she was divorced with an outdated bill of divorce, this woman can marry even ab initio on the basis of this bill of divorce. There is no requirement for her to wait for her first husband to write her a new bill of divorce.

MISHNA: If he wrote the date on the bill of divorce using a calendrical system that counts years in the name of a kingdom that is not legitimate, or he wrote the date in the name of the kingdom of Media, or in the name of the Greek Empire, after it ceased to exist, or he wrote the date counting to the building of the Temple, or counting to the destruction of the Temple, in all these case, the bill of divorce is not valid. In the time of the mishna, the local government was particular that documents be dated with the official government date. Therefore, the Sages instituted that this must be done in bills of divorce as well. If one deviates from this practice, the rabbinic dictates of bills of divorce have been violated, and the bill of divorce is invalid.

If he was in the east and he wrote the location in the bill of divorce as in the west, or if he was in the west and he wrote the location in the bill of divorce as in the east, the bill of divorce is not valid. If he divorced her with this bill of divorce and she remarried, she must leave both this first husband and that second husband, and she needs a bill of divorce from this husband and that husband.

And she does not receive payment of her marriage contract, and not the profits from her properties that her husband consumed, and she does not have a claim to receive sustenance, and she does not have a claim to worn clothes that belonged to her, but which her husband used. She cannot demand these items, not of this husband and not of that husband.

If she took any of these items from this husband or from that husband, she must return what was taken. And the child that was born from this husband or from that husband that was conceived after she married the second husband is a son born from an adulterous relationship [mamzer]. And neither this husband nor that husband, if they are priests, is permitted to become ritually impure by her when she dies, which a husband may ordinarily do for his wife. And neither this husband nor that husband have the rights to objects she finds, or to her earnings, or to the annulment of her vows.

If she was an Israelite woman, then through these two marriages she becomes disqualified from marrying into the priesthood, due to the prohibition against a priest marrying a zona.

Traduction : The William Davidson digital edition of the Koren Noé Talmud, with commentary by Rabbi Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz.

Gittin 79b explores Shabbat restrictions on rooftop domains and examines how a divorce document's validity depends on adjoining courtyards and rooftops.