Levirate Marriage and the Family[ ]These definitions of levirate alert us to a sharp distinction between
levirate as generally constructed and levirate in rabbinic Judaism. In
rabbinic sources, levirate is understood to be marriage, and the children
of a levirate marriage are the heirs of their father, not of the deceased.
These differences suggest either that rabbinic constructs represent a de-
parture from earlier Israelite formulations of levirate or that levirate in
early Israel was radically different than it was and is in most cultures.
These definitions of levirate force us to ask pointed questions about le-
virate when we look at biblical texts, rather than to automatically project
rabbinic readings of levirate back onto the Bible.
There are a number of practices that are sometimes referred to as or
associated with levirate but that should be distinguished from it. One
of these practices is widow-inheritance, a custom that assigns a man’s
widows, together with his land and movable property, to his heir(s), usu-
ally his son(s) or brother(s).^8 Another is ghost marriage, a practice that
requires a man to take a wife and sire children on behalf of a kinsman
who died before marrying.^9 Widow-inheritance differs from levirate in
that the children of the second union are regarded as the children of
the new partner rather than of the deceased.^10 In ghost marriage, the
children are legally recognized as the offspring of the deceased; how-
ever, t he woma n i nvolved i n t he u n ion is not t he decea sed’s w idow, but a
previously unmarried woman. Some scholars distinguish between levi-
rate and remarriage of a widow involving a kinsman of the woman’s first
husband; in the latter, the second union is recognized as marriage and
marked by marriage rituals, and the children of the union are legally
recognized as the offspring of their genitor.^11
In post-bibl ica l Juda ism, lev i rate is t reated a s a for m of ma r r iage, but i n
many societies levirate unions are not, technically speaking, marriages;
t hat is, lev i rate u n ions may not be ma rked by r it ua ls a nd habits associated
w it h ma r r iage. In societ ies i n wh ich a ma n pays br ide-wea lt h to h is br ide’s
family, bride-wealth is not required for a levirate union. The levir is not
legally the husband of the widow, nor are the children born to their union
legally his.^12 In some communities, the widow and the levir do not live
together, and the levir and the widow may have no economic responsibili-
ties to each other.^13 When the children of a levirate union are regarded as
the children of the woman’s deceased husband, the children will not be
the levir’s heirs and he may have no financial obligations to them.^14