The Different Status Of An Arusah And Nesua As It Relates To Teruma

לע"נ הרבנית מרת גיטל מירל בריינדל האדמו"ר ר' יוחנן זצ"ל
ולרפואת ישי דב הלוי בן נרי בתוך שח"י


The gemara [Kiddushin 5] attempts to derive from a kal va-chomer that chupah is koneh for kiddushin. If kiddushei kesef, which [is weaker isofar as that it] does not enable a bas yisrael to eat trumah when betrothed by a kohen, nevertheless effects a kinyan, then chupah which [is stronger insofar as that it] DOES enable a bas yisrael woman to eat trumah [after chuppah-nisuin a woman married to a kohen may eat trumah] must certainly effect a kinyan kiddushin. The gemara then rejects this kal va-chomer by proving that even kiddushei kesef enables a woman to eat trumah [and thus it is not more "kal" than chuppah].

The Rogochover quotes two Yerushalmis which imply that there is an opinion that a betrothed woman may NOT eat trumah [as in the gemara's hava amina].

Then he adds an interesting point. Even according to the way we hold, that a woman may eat trumah as an ארוסה there is nevertheless a difference between an ארוסה and a נשואה.

דנשואה אכלה מחמת קדושה ואישות וארוסה גדר קנין  - When a נשואה eats trumah she is doing so not as a בת ישראל married to a kohen but as a female kohen. She herself receives the kedusha of kehuna and becomes a koheness! An ארוסה betrothed to a kohen is not a koheness but just גדר קנין - by dint of the קנין made by her ארוס כהן she may eat trumah but not because of a change in her essential, inherent, personal status.

What is the nafka minah, you ask. Good question!!:-) The nafka minah would be if she was מזנה and thus becomes אסור to her husband and forbidden to eat trumah. The Yerushalmi [Trumos 8/2] teaches that if she is a נשואה and eats trumah she need not pay the חומש penalty. The Rogochover adds that if she is an ארוסה she must pay the penalty because it is as if a זרה ate the trumah. As a נשואה who was מזנה she may be forbidden to eat the trumah but she still doesn't have the status of a זרה because by being a נשואה she adopts קדושת כהונה. All she must pay is the principal. In contrast an ארוסה must pay the extra חומש because she is considered [now that she has been מזנה] a זרה.

The Achronim [Rav Yosef Engel, Rav Shmuel Rozovsky, Rav Yisrael Gustman] discuss the status of an אשת כהן. Here I presented the Rogochover's understanding that there is a distinction between a נשואה and ארוסה. It emerges according to him that the gemara remains partially with it's hava amina. Kesef does not fully allow an ארוסה to eat trumah. She eats as the קנין כהן but not as a full fledged koheness herself.