1,976. The Procedure of the Slanderous Claim

Naarah Besulah 3:6

Making a slanderous report means that a man goes to court and claims that he was intimate with this girl and discovered that she was not a virgin. He investigated and found that she committed adultery after betrothal, and he produces witnesses that she committed adultery. The court then examines the witnesses and, if the man’s claim is substantiated, the girl is executed by stoning for committing adultery. If the girl’s father produces other witnesses who contradict the first witnesses so that they are found to have testified falsely, then the false witnesses are executed by stoning. The husband is lashed and fined 100 silver sela. When Deuteronomy 22:17 refers to tokens of the girl’s virginity, it means the witnesses who contradict the husband’s witnesses. If the husband produces additional witnesses who contradict the father’s witnesses, then both the girl and the father’s witnesses are executed by stoning (for adultery and as false witnesses, respectively). This is what the Torah means when it say that the charge is found to be true (ibid. v. 20). According to our oral tradition, this section discusses a pair of witnesses who contradict the first witnesses, and a third pair who contradict the second witnesses.

Naarah Besulah 3:7

If a man makes a slanderous claim about his wife after she reaches maturity, he is not liable for lashes or the fine even if his witnesses testify that his wife committed adultery when she was a maiden. If the accusation is proven true, she is liable to stoning even though she has reached maturity because she was a maiden when she committed adultery.