Welcome to the Daily Daf Differently. In this episode, Rabbi Danny Nevins looks at Masechet Ketubot, Daf 76.

The feminist critique of kiddushin is that it is ultimately about treating women as chattel—the sages are anxious to know whether the kinyan or purchase was valid, or whether it was a false sale. Daf 76 gives an example of just this, comparing the purchase of a deformed bride to a property exchange between the owner of a cow and the owner of a donkey. On page B it is partially redeemed by the adage that kiddushin were not designed to be invalidated, and it is only in cases of doubt that verification procedures are required. Still, this entire discussion reminds us of the problematics of the kiddushin model for contemporary marriage, making more urgent the need to develop partnership models of shutafut for straight couples such as those developed for same sex marriage.

To view the text of Ketubot, Daf 76 on Sefaria, please click here.

The opening and closing music for this podcast is Ufros from The Epichorus album One Bead.

This podcast is a collaboration with The Conservative Yeshiva in Jerusalem.