Resources for Kesubos 65
1. The גמרא says that when a husband is sending support for his wife we don’t require him to give her any wine unless she is a רגילה בכך. The reason for this is that it can lead to promiscuity. There is a fascinating פּני יהושע here who asks a simple question: what about קידוש? A woman is חייבת מדאורייתא in קידוש and at least מדרבנן in יין so why doesn’t he have to supply her with wine for that purpose? Furthermore, many שיטות hold you need to bentch על הכוס, so she will need wine for bentching as well! He first suggests that perhaps we can tell her to simply be יוצא על ידי אחרים. His second suggestion is quite astounding. He says the actual חיוב of doing any specific מצוה with wine is דרבנן and the רבנן specifically exempted a non רגילה woman from this חיוב. That means some women are חייב בקידוש על היין and some have no חיוב whatsoever to use wine—all depending on whether they are רגילה to drink wine or not. He also brings up the fact that the גמרא says that you are supposed to give some of the כוס של ברכה to the woman of the house. He explains that is either talking about a רגילה or since it is only a טעימה בעלמא it will not be an issue. He explains further that even though a רגילה would need wine, the משנה doesn’t list wine as something to give your wife since the משנה is talking about an עני שבישראל and most עניים are not רגילה ביין. The בן יהוידע brings up another interesting question: חז"ל say explicitly that a woman is חייבת בארבע כוסות on פּסח. How could חז"ל been מתקן something for all ladies which should be a real issue for even a רגילה, certainly an אינה רגילה! He answers that since the four cups are broken up and not drank together it is all like one cup.
2. The גמרא says that a person must provide food to his children when they are below the age of six. The גמרא doesn’t explain explicitly why. What is the nature of this חיוב? The מגיד משנה in הלכות אישות פּרק י"ב הל׳ י"ד brings this as a מחלוקת ראשונים. The ר"ן says that it sounds from the גמרא that the חיוב of the husband is based on the חיובים to the mother. In other words, the fact that the חיוב to support the child is all based on the time that a child clings to the mother indicates that the reason the husband is חייב to pay for his sons מזונות is because it’s part of supporting the mother and since the child is inseparable from the mother at that age the mother will need to feed him. However, the בית יוסף at the end of סימן ע"א brings a רא"ש that says that if a man admits that he is the father of a certain child then he must support that child even though the mother is a פּנויה. Clearly, the רא"ש holds the חיוב מזונות to the child is not based off the husband's obligation to his wife. Interestingly, the מגיה to that מגיד משנה suggests that the רמב"ם holds like the ר"ן that the חיוב to support the child is based on the חיוב to the mother since the רמב"ם says כשם שחייב במזונות אשתו כך חייב במזונות בנו. However, the אבני מילואים in סימן ע"א says that can possibly be true since the רמב"ם writes that a בת שניה gets מזונות while her father is alive yet the שניה herself doesn’t get מזונות. You see clearly that he holds like the רא"ש that the חיובי האב לבנו are not connected to the חיוב מזונות לאשתו. Rather, the רמב"ם just said "כשם" to tell you that it isn’t מדיני צדקה such that if the kid has his own money the father doesn’t need to support him.
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