פירוש על סוטה 1:5

שוברת כתובתה – she writes a receipt on her Ketubah–marriage contract: “I have run about as a prostitute–been unfaithful and I have lost [the right to] my Ketubah in order that she would not be able to return and claim her Ketubah from him, but in a place where they do not write a Ketubah, but rather rely upon a condition of the Jewish court, is where she writes a receipt, but in a place where they write a Ketubah, she tears up her Ketubah and does not write a receipt.

Introduction This mishnah begins to describe the Sotah ritual. I should make at this point a general note about the process. We are going to encounter now a ceremony that was intended to disgrace the woman. I believe that the rabbis thought that by disgracing women who actually went through with the ceremony, they would discourage the ceremony from ever taking place. Furthermore, the public humiliation would serve to deter others from committing the same crimes. Finally, as I pointed out in the introduction to Sotah, it is likely that this woman has indeed committed adultery, for she secluded herself with the same man about whom her husband warned her. Nevertheless, we should appreciate how harsh the process is for the woman and that especially for the innocent woman who would have been dragged through the process, it would have been a trauma.

מעלין אותה לשער המזרח – they bring her up and take her down in order to tire her so that perhaps her mind will become insane and she will confess.

If she said, “I am defiled to you”, she gives him a receipt for her ketubah and goes out [with a get]. If, after the warnings are stated to her, she admits that she did commit adultery, she does not drink the Sotah waters. Rather, she loses her ketubah, gives her husband a receipt for the ketubah (even though she didn’t receive it), and is divorced. Note that she is not tried as an adulterer since, even if there were witnesses, she was not warned about the consequences of her act when she committed adultery. In general, as we learned in Sanhedrin, it is exceedingly difficult in Jewish law to convict a person of a capital crime.

שעל פתח שער נקנור – a man whose name is Nicanor who brought doors to that opening from Alexandria of Egypt and miracles occurred for him and it is called the Gate of Nicanor in his name as we state in [Tractate] Yoma [38a].

But if she says, “I am pure”, they bring her up to the east gate, Nicanor’s gate, where they give women suspected of adultery the water to drink, purify women after childbirth and purify lepers. If she continues to insist that she is innocent, she is brought to the east gate of the Temple. The mishnah notes that two other ceremonies were also performed at this gate. There women who had given birth waited while the priests offered their sacrifices which are mandatory for a woman to purify herself after birth (Leviticus 12:6-7) and there lepers waited while priests offered their purificatory sacrifices (Leviticus 14:11). Neither lepers nor women who had given birth could go further into the Temple courtyards since they were impure until their sacrifices were offered.

ששם משקין את הסוטות – since we require “before God.”

A priest seizes her clothing if they are torn, then they are torn, and if they become unstitched, then they are unstitched, until he uncovers her bosom, and he undoes [the braids of] her hair. Rabbi Judah says: if her bosom was beautiful he does not uncover it, and if her hair was beautiful he does not undo it. The mishnah prescribes that the priest publicly shame her. Part of the function of this process was to deter others from committing the same sin. By publicly at least partially stripping her and undoing her hair, the nature of her crime would be literally and figuratively laid bare to all. Rabbi Judah seems to note that this process may have had an opposite effect. While it is intended to deter others it may have served as a source of titillation. Therefore, if the effect of baring her bosom, or undoing her hair would serve to arouse others for she is a beautiful woman, it is not to be done.

ומטהרין את היולדות – in order that they will stand on top of their sacrifices and the same law applies regarding men and women with a flux which require a sacrifice.

ומטהרין את המצורע – as it is written (Leviticus 14:11): “These shall be presented before the LORD [with the man to be cleansed at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting] by the priest who performs the cleansing.”

אוחז בבגדיה – at their front of the neck.

אם נקרעו – he does not suspect and if they were torn, he does not suspect for the rending of garments is greater than rending, which was rent into many torn pieces. Another language: tearing from the sides is tearing by length.

עד שמגלה את לבה – as it is written (Numbers 5:18): “[the priest] shall bare the woman’s head.” I don’t know anything other than her head; her body – from where? The inference teaches us: “the woman.” If so, what is the inference concerning “her head?” It teaches that he cuts her hair.

רבי יהודה אומר כו' – perhaps she goes out innocent and the young priests become jealous of her for they saw that her heart was pleasant and her beautiful hair, but the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Yehuda.