| פרק ב משנה א | |
| המביא גט ממדינת הים |
If one brought a get from overseas |
| ואמר בפני נכתב |
and says "It was written before me |
| אבל לא בפני נחתם |
but it was not signed before me"; |
| בפני נחתם |
"It was signed before me" |
| אבל לא בפני נכתב |
but it was not was written before me"; |
| בפני נכתב כולו |
"It was written in its entirety before me |
| ובפני נחתם חציו |
but only half of it was signed before me" (i.e. by only one witness); or |
| בפני נכתב חציו |
"[The second] half of it was written before me |
| ובפני נחתם כולו |
and it was completely signed before me"; |
| פסול |
It is invalid. |
| אחד אומר בפני נכתב |
If one says "It was written before me" |
| ואחד אומר בפני נחתם |
and one says "It was signed before me" |
| פסול |
it is invalid [in cases where only one of these two were appointed as the husband's messenger to deliver the get]. |
| שנים אומרים בפנינו נכתב |
If two [who neither of whom was the appointed messenger] say "It was written before us" |
| ואחד אומר בפני נחתם |
but one [the messenger] says "It was signed before me" |
| פסול |
it is invalid; |
| ורבי יהודה מכשיר |
and Rabbi Yehuda says it is valid. |
| אחד אומר בפני נכתב |
If one says "It was written before me" |
| ושנים אומרים בפנינו נחתם |
and two say "It was signed before us" |
| כשר |
it is valid [as we have two witnesses to validate the signatures, as could be done for any legal document]. |
| פרק ב משנה ב | |
| נכתב ביום ונחתם ביום |
[If] it was written by day and signed [that same] day, |
| בלילה ונחתם בלילה |
at night and signed [that same] night, or |
| בלילה ונחתם ביום |
at night and signed [the following] day, |
| כשר |
it is valid. |
| ביום ונחתם בלילה |
[If it was written] by day [and dated for that day] and signed at [the following] night |
| פסול |
it is invalid; |
| רבי שמעון מכשיר |
Rabbi Shimon says it is valid |
| שרבי שמעון אומר |
as Rabbi Shimon says |
| כל גיטין |
all legal documents |
| שנכתבו ביום ונחתמו בלילה |
that are written by day [and dated for that day] and signed at [the following] night |
| פסולין |
are invalid |
| חוץ מגיטי נשים |
except for women's divorce documents. |
NOTES
משנה א
בפני נכתב חציו - A get is comprised of two parts: the first part, known as the תרף, sets forth the parties' names and the date, while the second part, known as the טפס, contains boilerplate language used in all divorces. It is the תרף that is critical to the divorce process, and if it was that first half that the messenger had seen being written, while it was the writing of טפס that he had missed, we would validate the divorce.
ורבי יהודה מכשיר - The ת"ק holds that we require the messenger to testify to both the writing and signing of the get, as otherwise people might come to believe that the signature on all documents can be validated by a single witness, while ר"י holds that we are not concerned about such confusion.
משנה ב
According to the ת"ק, we require dates in גיטין, and disqualify pre-dated גיטין as one could be given to an adulteress by her husband to allow her to escape punishment by claiming to have been divorced at the time of the adultery. On the other hand, ר"ש holds that we require the date on a גט to prevent a husband from selling the פרות from his ex-wife's assets after the divorce. With an undated divorce, a woman would have difficulty in proving at what point in time she regained her right to the פרות. Furthermore, according to ר"ש, a husband loses his rights to his wife's פרות from the time he decides to divorce her. As such, in our case where the husband had decided to divorce his wife, and began the process by having the get written, he has lost his rights to the פרות and a get dated from that point in time will therefore be valid.