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When a get is placed in a woman's courtyard (chatzer), does it work through ownership (kinyan) or an expanded definition of "giving into her hand"? Rashi (רש"י) sees chatzer as creating ownership—a "nesina kol du" (constructive giving)—while Tosafos (תוספות) views chatzer as an extension of yado itself (klal u'prat u'klal). This fundamental dispute has major implications for whether issur hana'ah works in chatzer and how the parallel gemara (גמרא) regarding theft (geneivah) should be understood.
This shiur analyzes a fundamental dispute between Rashi (רש"י) and Tosafos (תוספות) on Gittin 77b regarding how kinyan chatzer (courtyard acquisition) operates in the context of divorce and theft. The discussion opens with a close reading of Rashi on the Mishna, which states that if a husband throws a get into his wife's courtyard, she is divorced through the principle of "konso chatzer ke'ilu nasan b'yado" (acquiring the courtyard is like placing it in her hand). Rabbi Zweig challenges Rashi's formulation, asking why kinyan is needed at all in gittin. The Torah (תורה) permits writing a get even on issur hana'ah (something from which one may not derive benefit), where no kinyan is possible since there is no ownership. If divorce merely requires the physical transfer of the get from husband to wife—not ownership—why does Rashi invoke kinyan chatzer? This suggests Rashi holds there are two distinct mechanisms for gittin: actual nesina (placing in her hand) and nesina kol du (constructive giving through ownership). When the get is in her chatzer, she becomes the owner, and this ownership is equivalent to nesina even though it wasn't physically handed to her.
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Gittin 77b
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