Resources for Kesubos daf 56
1. The גמרא brings the מחלוקת רבי מאיר ורבי יהודה that when someone is מקדש a woman on condition that he doesn’t have to give her שאר כסות ועונה that רבי מאיר holds the תנאי is בטל and they are fully married with the husband needing to give his wife שאר כסות ועונה whereas רבי יהודה holds that they are married but the תנאי is valid and he doesn’t need to give her שאר כסות ועונה. It is unclear exactly what this husband was really trying to say. תוספות in ד"ה הרי says that our גמרא must be talking about a case where the husband made a תנאי כפול. תוספות understood that the husband was trying to have a typical marriage with a side condition that he would not be obligated to pay her. If so, all משפּטי התנאים apply. However, רבי עקיבא איגרsuggests that the husband wasn’t trying to have a typical marriage at all. Rather, he was trying to create his own brand of marriage where he would simply have no financial obligations. The usage of the word ”תנאי” is לאו דוקא and doesn’t mean דיני תנאים. If so, all classic rules of תנאים would not be relevant and תוספות would have much less of a question. (According to this when the גמרא employs the concept of מתנה על מה שכתוב בתורה it would also be לאו דוקא).
תוספות, based on his understanding that a תנאי כפול was made, is bothered by the fact that it is obvious that the husband doesn’t want to marry her if he has to pay anything so why don’t we just say there is an אומדנא that the husband doesn’t want to marry her and the marriage is void? He answers in his first answer that דיני תנאים are learned from בני גד ובני ראובן and if not for that we would never let a תנאי be מבטל an action. The ברכת שמואל in ב"מ סימן ל"ז has a fundamental explanation of תוספות in the name of רב חיים מבריסק ז"ל as follows: the לימוד of תנאי is not that the Torah says we make an אומדנא as to what the person meant when did the action. If that were true it would not have all the restrictions of תנאי כפול, etc. Rather, the action one took is taken fully with no strings attached. The way תנאי works is that it is an independent mechanism that has the potential to invalidate an action, and that is a special לימוד from בני גד ובני ראובן. He learned this from a תשובות הרא"ש that says if one gives a גט on condition that the lady pays $200 and then the man is later מבטל the condition, the גט is valid even if the money is not paid. You see from there that the action is not based on what he was thinking at the time but rather the action was a full מעשה and if one removes the תנאי then the גט is fully there. The קובץ שיעורים in אות ק"ע makes the exact same point and explains it as follows: if a person said to a woman I am מקדש you to be חל in 30 days, and then he later says “I am מבטל my תנאי of 30 days”, would anyone say she is married now? Certainly not since there was no מעשה קידושין! Here, there is a מעשה and the תנאי is simply a side issue that you can remove, and that is the חידוש מבני גד ובני ראובן and we therefore cannot learn it to a case of מתנה על מה שכתוב בתורה.
2. תוספות mentioned above brings from the ר"י and רבינו אלחנן that מתנה על מה שכתוב בתורה is only an issue if you say you don’t want the דין of needing to pay שאר כסות ועונה. However, if you accept the דיןbut you simply want the other person to be מוחל anyway then the תנאי is קיים. תוספות is saying that in שיטת רבי מאיר. According to ר"י and רבינו אלחנן, what does רבי יהודה who says there is no issue of מתנה על מה שכתוב בתורה in our case anyway hold? The פּשטות I believe is that he holds that one can be מבטל even the דין of שאר כסות ועונה by an issue of ממון. The רמב"ן in ב"ב דף קכ"ו ד"ה הרי says that explicitly in שיטת ר"ת. The רשב"א here has a different שיטה. He assumes that everyone agrees that you can’t be מבטל the דין of שאר כסות ועונה. רבי יהודה just assumes that the person must have meant that he wants the woman to be מוחל and he was not trying to be מבטל דין שאר וכסות, whereas רבי מאיר holds he was trying to be מבטל the actual דין of שאר כסות ועונה. The קובץ שיעורים in אות קס"ה points out that there is a גמרא that says explicitly in שיטת רבי יהודה that if you say you want to sell something without דין אונאה then it doesn’t work, even though it is a דבר שבממון! He therefore explains that even the רמב"ן must agree that it depends on what you mean: if you mean you want the person to remove himself from דין אונאה then it works, but if you mean the Torah should remove itself from דין אונאהthen it doesn’t work.
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