פירוש על ערכין 6:1

שום היתומים –([the proclamation of the sale of goods of] orphans evaluated [by the court to meet the father’s debt]) – a Jewish court that goes down into the property of orphans to sell them to cause to be collected to the creditor, we estimate the property/land and announce it thirty consecutive days one after another: “all who wish to take it should come and take.” But if they wanted, they announce for sixty days every Monday and Thursday, and this is more preferable. For even though that they considered every Monday and Thursday that are part of the sixty days from the beginning of the second day of the first public announcement, they did not find other than eighteen days; nevertheless, this is preferable since the matter drags on/stretches a lot more than they know and hear about.

Introduction Chapter six deals with the consequences of dedicating one’s property to the Temple. How is the money collected? How does his dedication effect his other obligations? These and other questions are addressed in this mishnah and in the subsequent ones.

ושום הקדש – a person who dedicates an acquired field [to the Temple] which is redeemed with money according to what it is worth.

[The property] of orphans which has been evaluated [must be proclaimed for] thirty days. Occasionally the court needs to sell orphans’ property in order to pay back their father’s debts. When they do so, they proclaim that the property is for sale for thirty days in order to get the best offer.

בבוקר ובערב – at the time when the workers go out [to work] and at the time when they go home. For if there those who desire to sell it, he tells the workers at the time they go out [to work]: “See for me a particular field if it is nice,” and at the time when they go home, when he hears the public announcement, he recalls and goes and asks them. But when they make the announcement, they say: “This particular field – that such-and-such are its signs/marks [of identification], such and such are its pathways, such is how it makes grain and such the Jewish court has provided an estimate of it. And if they sell it for the [payment of] the Ketubah of his wife, they state: “The purchaser will buy it on the condition that he (i.e., the seller) will give the monies for the Ketubah of his wife.” But if they sell it for the creditor, they state: “On the condition that he gives the monies to the creditor.” Because there is a purchaser that it is pleasant for him to purchase it in order to pay the woman that he married bit by bit, and there is a case where it is more pleasant for him to pay the creditor who takes defective and broken Zuzim (i.e., coins), for it is not the manner of merchants to be so exacting in this. But even though we hold that the Jewish court does not require the property of orphans to sell them, and here (i.e., in this Mishnah) it is taught that “[the proclamation of the sale of goods of] orphans evaluated [by the court to meet the father’s debt] is thirty days,” that implies that the Jewish court does sell the property of orphans. But we state that only for three things does the Jewish court need to sell the property of orphans: a heathen creditor that their father owed him, and that interest [payments] eat up [their settlement], and on the Ketubah of a wife because there is ample provision for the orphans when she collects her Ketubah/marital settlement, for all the while that she didn’t collect her Ketubah settlement she has provisions/alimentation from the orphans; once she collects her Ketubah settlement, she no longer has alimentation. And on a debt that their father admitted to/acknowledged at the time of his death that someone has [a claim] of a Maneh, or that the Jewish court excommunicated him on this debt and he died in his being excommunicated, or that the time had not yet arrived at the time of his death for repayment of the debt, for a person does not act in the midst of its time, and when the Jewish court needs the property of the orphans for these things, they appoint for them an administrator (or guardian) and they sell it through public announcement, as is taught in our Mishnah. But these words apply with regard to land, but regarding movables, now that we hold that movables of orphans can be mortgaged to a creditor, the creditor needs to take an oath and collect his lien from the movables and there is no need for public announcement, for we don’t make public announcements on either slaves nor on documents nor on movable properties.

And [the property of] the Sanctuary which has been evaluated, [for] sixty days. When a person dedicates a piece of land to the Temple, the Temple treasury proclaims that the land is for sale for sixty days. This gives them twice as long to get the best offer.

ידירנה הנאה – with the knowledge of the many a vow that has no releasing/loosening [from the vow], so that he will never return her [as his wife] ever, for perhaps through a subtlety, he divorces her in order that she can collect her Ketubah settlement from that which was dedicated to the Temple.

They must make the proclamation in the morning and in the evening. The proclamation is made twice a day morning and night.

קנוניא (a conspiracy to defraud and divide the profits) – a subtlety.

If a man dedicates his property to the Sanctuary and he is still liable for his wife’s ketubah: Rabbi Eliezer says: when he divorces her he must vow that he will not derive any further benefit from her. Rabbi Joshua says: he need not do so. The man’s prior commitment to pay his wife’s ketubah means that if he divorces her, she can collect her ketubah money from the property that he has already dedicated to the Temple. This is not under discussion and indeed is obvious. The problem is that we fear that the man might divorce his wife, allow her to collect her ketubah and then remarry her. This would end up cheating the Temple out of the property that he dedicated to it. To avoid this problem, Rabbi Eliezer says that when he divorces her, he must take a vow never to receive benefit from her again. In this way, he cannot remarry her. Rabbi Joshua seems not to be concerned that a man will go through this ruse in order to cheat the Temple out of its due and therefore he does not obligate the man to take such a vow.

ר' יהושע אומר אינו צריך – Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua do not disagree here if a person performs a conspiracy on something dedicated to the Temple to defraud and divide the profits or not, both of them admit regarding a person that is on his deathbed, that always, he would not perform a conspiracy on something dedicated to the Temple, for a person does not sin regarding something that is not his. But regarding someone healthy, they both admit that he does make a conspiracy on something dedicated to the Temple. What they do disagree on is on a question [to a Sage] of dedication of something to the Temple for Rabbi Eliezer holds that they do not appear before a Sage regarding a question of dedicating something to the Temple, and even if he states to the Sage that it was not for this purpose that he vowed and the dedication to the Temple is in error, even so, the Sage cannot release his vow, for Rabbi Eliezer holds that a dedication done to the Temple in error is a valid dedication, and because this person making a dedication cannot find a Sage who will release him, he performs this conspiracy. But Rabbi Yehoshua holds that they do appear before a Sage regarding someone who dedicates something to the Temple [who wants to be released] for he states that it was not for that purpose that I made the vow and I errored, they release him, for something dedicated to the Temple in error is not a dedication to the Temple. Therefore, he does not have to take a vow [against] deriving any benefit, for if it was for making a conspiracy that he did it, he would come [before a Sage] to be absolved of his vow and he would not have to divorce her. And he Halakha is according to Rabbi Yehoshua.

Similarly, Rabban Shimon ben Gamaliel said: Also if one guarantees a woman's ketubah and her husband divorces her, the husband must vow to derive no benefit from her, lest he make a conspiracy against the property of that man [the guarantor] and take his wife back again. Rabban Shimon ben Gamaliel brings up another similar situation where we make a husband divorcing his wife take a vow not to derive benefit from her. If a man had a guarantor sign on his ketubah and then he divorced his wife, if the man cannot afford to pay, the guarantor must pay in the husband’s place. In this situation, we fear that the husband will divorce his wife and allow her to collect from the guarantor. Then he will remarry, thereby cheating the guarantor. To protect the guarantor, we make the husband vow that he will not derive any more benefit from his wife.

הערב לאשה בכתובתה – and the husband lacks property and needs a guarantor to pay off her Ketubah settlement. The guarantor should not pay her Ketubah settlement until the husband first makes her take a vow that he will not be able to take her back [as his wife]. For we suspect lest it is his intention to take her back and to consume her Ketubah settlement after she collects it from the guarantor. And the legal decision in the law of the guarantor of the Ketubah is explained at the end of [Tractate] Bava Batra [Chapter 10, Mishnah 7].