[ ]Paternity and Continuitynia could not ignore the teachings of the Mishnah, which insisted that
halitza was a legitimate, socially acceptable choice. Clearly, the Bavli is
comfortable with halitza even though it means denying the deceased
an heir. This correlates with a growing concern for the feelings of the
levir and the levirate widow, and an increasing willingness to ignore the
claim of the dead on the living. Furthermore, despite a cultural milieu
that supported levirate as a vehicle for acquiring an heir for a childless
man, the rabbis of Babylonia did not recognize the child of a levirate
union as the offspring or heir of his mother’s deceased husband.
Procreation and Paternity
Levirate, as imagined by the rabbis, is not a true strategy of heirship
or continuity. A man who marries his childless brother’s widow is des-
ignated as his heir. Should no brother be willing or able to marry the
widow, all of the deceased’s brothers divide his estate; if the deceased’s
father survives him, he may inherit the property and later bequeath it to
his remaining sons along with the rest of his estate. Levirate results in
horizontal inheritance or in vertical ascending inheritance, not the ver-
tical descending inheritance that it was intended to achieve. Further-
more, the assignment of the deceased’s property is not really influenced
by the decisions of his brothers; in any event, whether there is a levirate
marriage or halitza, his property will devolve on his brother(s). Even the
birth of multiple children to the levir and his brother’s widow has no im-
pact on the continuity of the deceased. Nor is this reworking of levirate
accompanied by the introduction or endorsement of other strategies of
heirship. This leads to the impression that continuity through direct
vertical descent was not of great value to the ancient rabbis.
That impression seems problematic, given that the rabbis also pre-
sent procreation as a divine commandment, a religious obligation, at
least for men. Despite exhortations to “be fruitful and multiply,” the
Hebrew Bible presents procreation as a personal goal, motivated by the
desire of individuals to preserve their name or property. Abraham com-
plains that unless he has a son, his property will devolve on his servant.
Rachel pleads with Jacob, “Give me children or I shall die.”^58 The daugh-
ters of Zelophehad seek a holding among their male kin so the name of
t hei r fat her “w i l l not be lost to h is cla n because he has no son.”^59 L ev i rate
is designed, according to Deuteronomy , to prevent the loss of a child-