[ ]Mapping the Familyviewed by Ego as members of his extended family. While relationships
may be defined very clearly through kinship terminology, which dis-
tinguishes a mother’s brother from a father’s brother, a person may call
both of these men “Uncle.”^118
T he Bav l i now con sider s a genera l r u le t ra n sm it ted by Juda h ba r Shela
[F]: “Any situation in which a female relative is forbidden by the Torah,
the wife of the corresponding male relative is forbidden as a secondary
relative.” This rule expands prohibitions against sexual relations with
one’s female relatives to include the wives of one’s corresponding male
relatives. This rule explains the extension of the prohibition against
inter course between a man and his mother’s sister to his mother’s broth-
er’s wife. Rava questions this general rule [G], noting situations in which
a woman is forbidden but the wife of the corresponding male relative is
indeed permitted. The Bavli’s response [I] serves as a comment on the
strength of relationships created through marriage:
What is the difference between these {the wife of a man’s father-in-
law, the wife of the son of the mother-in-law, and the other women
mentioned in Rava’s objection, all of whom are permitted} and this
one {the wife of the mother’s brother from the same mother who is
forbidden}? This one is related to him through one marriage, while
these are only related to him through two marriages.
When a man and a woman marry, their marriage creates a bond be-
tween each of them and the other’s relatives. Through her marriage, a
woman acquires new relatives — her husband’s parents become her
father-in-law and mother-in-law, her husband’s children become her
stepchildren, and so on. A man’s marriage transforms his legal relation-
ship to his wife’s female relations; his mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and
stepdaughter, women who might once have been available to him, be-
come forbidden.
In the cases described here, a distinction is made between a connec-
tion created by one marriage and one created through two marriages.
When a man’s maternal uncle (even an uncle who shares only a mother
with Ego’s mother) marries, that marriage produces a connection be-
tween Ego and his uncle’s wife, and that connection excludes the possi-
bility of a sexual relationship between them. Ego’s relationship with the
other women discussed here is built on two marriages, the marriage be-