Resources for Kesubos 107
1. The גמרא brings the מחלוקת between רב and שמואל as to whether you give מזונות to a woman whose husband went on a long business trip. We know that a husband generally owes his wife מזונות and yet שמואל insists that we don’t give her מזונות because he may have given her צררי or he may have worked out with her beforehand that the money she earns would be instead of giving her מזונות. שמואל’s שיטה seems unusual--how do we have the right to say that the husband doesn’t have to pay for a חיוב he definitely has because of a ספק that he may have paid? Maybe he didn’t! After all, the גמרא earlier on דף צ"ו ע"ב had said that if a widow claims she never received מזונות and the יתומים said they paid her, the burden of proof is on the יתומים (until she remarries) and they would have to pay מספק. If so, why here don’t we say here as well that she is מוחזקת, the burden of proof is on his assets, and she should get the money מספק!? Interestingly, the ריטב"א here says that the only מחלוקת רב ושמואל is about giving her מזונות in the future. Everyone agrees that she doesn’t get מזונות for the past because if the husband was here he would be believed to say פּרעתי. Therefore, even though he is not here we will be טענינן for him that he paid. If so, it begs the question why שמואל says the husband doesn’t have to pay for the future? Even if the husband was here screaming he paid (or gave her צררי, etc) we would not believe him and would say he needs to pay, so why when he goes away do we suddenly say he paid? The answer must be that there is an underlying assumption or חזקה that a husband normally takes care of his wife. There are several proofs to this. First, even רב agrees that within three months of her husbands departure we don’t give her מזונות —we assume a husband would have left food for his wife for that amount. Moreover, the מרדכי here in אות רס"ז says that if we know the husband left because he was fighting with his wife and decided to leave her as an עגונה, she can collect מזונות immediately because we assume in those unusual circumstances that the husband would not have left his wife anything to eat. Lastly, the ריטב"א says that if the husband left in a rush and had no intention of being away for a long time that everyone would agree that she gets מזונות. We see from all this that all that there is a basic assumption that a husband would leave his wife food under normal circumstances, and if this wasn’t normal circumstances then all would agree that he doesn’t. The מחלוקת seems to be because he left for a long time and he may not have gone to that length to provide for her for years on end without being there.
2. The גמרא says that if a קטנה was married and her husband went away and she borrowed money to pay for her מזונות that if she does מיאון then the husband doesn’t need to pay for the מזונות. The רא"ש in סימן ז brings from רבינו מאיר הלוי that we see from here that a child who borrows money needs to pay back the loan when they get older since if that wasn’t the case then מיאון would not be relevant in our גמרא since a child who borrows never needs to pay back the loan anyway! He also brings רבינו יונה who disagrees and says that it’s not מסתברא that a child can be childish and borrow tons of money and have his life ruined by what he did when he was eleven. Rather, our גמרא is an exception since the husband has a חיוב מזונות. The רא"ש himself holds that a child generally doesn’t need to pay back what they borrowed as a child with the exception of things like מזונות since if we don’t make it that they must pay back then no one will lend money them to start with and they can die of starvation. All three opinions are brought in שולחן ערוך חו"מ סימן רל"ה סעיף ט"ו.
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