Levirate Marriage and the Family[ ]which she acts out both her power and her lack of power. As we have al-
ready seen, wh i le t he lev i rate w idow ca n not i n t heor y exercise t he power
granted to other women — the power to consent to or reject a marriage
partner — she exercises exceptional power in the ritual of halitza. Al-
though rabbinic divorce is controlled entirely by the husband, with the
wife the silent recipient of her bill of divorce, the levirate widow is the
primary actor in the halitza ritual. She spits at, removes the shoe of, and
verbally berates her levir, while he stands silent and passive. This alone
presents a disturbing picture of the yevama as a woman with a powerful
voice raised in protest against her brother-in-law’s decision.^73 In addi-
tion to clarifying and regularizing the status of the yevama, the Bavli, I
will demonstrate, seeks to rein in the yevama by t ra nsfer r i ng some of her
power to the sages.
Betrothed Woman, Married Woman, or Widow?
Judith Romney Wegner posits that the Mishnah recognizes six types of
women: the minor daughter, the wife and the levirate widow, the eman-
cipated daughter, the divorcée, and the normal widow.^74 The first three
types have minimal rights because their sexuality is controlled by male
relatives; the latter three have broader rights because their sexuality is
not assig ned to a ma n. In Weg ner’s ta xonomy, t he lev irate w idow’s sex u-
ality is assigned to her levir, and she is more chattel than person.
The levirate widow, in fact, has a more problematic status than the
other women in Wegner’s taxonomy. She is no longer her father’s minor
daughter, and even if she were to return to her father’s home while wait-
ing for the levir’s decision, she would not be categorized as an eman-
cipated daughter. She is neither wife nor widow, and her relation to
the levir is not precisely like that of a betrothed woman to her future
husband.
Rather than discuss the levirate widow’s status in the abstract, the
Talmuds consider it in relation to her behavior during the period be-
tween her husband’s death and her levirate marriage or halitza. Her sta-
tus before her husband’s death is clear; she is a wife. Once her levir has
acted, she will be either a wife or a widow, albeit a widow with some of
the qualities of a divorcée.^75 The question that underlies the Talmuds’
discussions of the levirate widow is the precise nature of her relation-
ship to the levir. Is she to be treated as his betrothed, despite the ab-