Study Bava Kamma folio 89A with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
Text Excerpt
והרי היא תחתיו ומשמשתו; ונמצאו זוממין; אין אומרים ישלמו כל כתובתה, אלא טובת הנאת כתובתה. איזהו טובת הנאת כתובתה? אומדין כמה אדם רוצה ליתן בכתובה של זו – שאם נתארמלה או נתגרשה, ואם מתה – יירשנה בעלה.
and she is under him and serves him, i.e., she was in fact still married to him, and then these witnesses were found to be conspiring witnesses who were attempting to deny this woman the ability to ever collect payment of her marriage contract, then the court does not say that the witnesses should pay the entire value of her marriage contract. Rather, the court says that they should pay the financial advantage of her marriage contract. The Talmud explains: What is the financial advantage of her marriage contract? The court evaluates how much a person would want to give to purchase the rights of this woman’s marriage contract, taking into account the halakha that if she becomes widowed or divorced the purchaser will receive its full value, but if she dies during her husband’s lifetime, her husband will inherit her property and the purchaser will receive nothing.
Rav Idi bar Avin continues: And if it enters your mind that there is no ordinance of Usha, why would her husband inherit from her? Let the woman sell her marriage contract entirely.
אמר אביי: אם אמרו בנכסי מלוג, יאמרו בנכסי צאן ברזל?!
Abaye said: This is not a proof for the existence of the ordinance of Usha, because even if there is no ordinance, and the rabbis said that the woman retains the right to sell with regard to the usufruct property, would they also say that the woman retains the right to sell with regard to guaranteed property, which is listed among the possessions she brought into the marriage but is entirely under her husband’s authority? In any event, there is property that she does not have the right to sell and that the husband would inherit if she dies, regardless of whether or not there is an ordinance of Usha, so the marriage contract could not be sold for its full value.