Shabbat Parashat Naso - 5786

Shabbat Parashat Naso - 5786

Rabbi Hal Miller

  And he shall cause the woman to drink the bitter, afflictive waters, and the afflictive

  waters shall come into her as bitter. [Bamidbar 5:24]

  He shall cause the woman to drink the water. [Bamidbar 5:26]

  He shall cause her to drink the water, and it shall be that if she had become defiled ...

  [Bamidbar 5:27]

The case of the sotah, the wayward wife, is both distasteful and strange. One could ask many questions upon it and still not find comfort with the idea. For example, why do we have three commands to the Kohen to make the woman drink, in three verses practically next to each other? Most commentators address the individual verses, but few address them as a whole.

Rashi suggests that these verses are not in sequential order, for the minchah offering in verse 25 should come first. Thus he says that verse 24 is only to inform that when the Kohen will soon cause the woman to drink, the waters will become bitter, and the purpose of the verse is merely to discuss what punishment will accrue. Rashi does not explain why the punishment is repeated in verse 27 except to imply that the latter verse is a more detailed expansion on what was said in 24. He then says that 27 is a directive to the Kohen to force the woman to drink if she had refused to do so after the scroll was erased. While not saying so, he implies that the actual command to give her to drink is in verse 26.

Rav Hirsch separates 24 by saying that the 'drinking' there is actually a matter of accepting one's fate from God, leaving only two verses to reconcile. For 26 he follows Rashi, but in 27 Rav Hirsch says that the woman can admit guilt even after the erasure and they do not make her drink. Torah Temimah follows Rashi as to verse 27 that if after the scroll is erased she still refuses, they make her drink.

The Gemara in Sotah [14a, 19b-20a] explains that at any time during the process, prior to the erasure of the scroll, the woman may admit guilt, at which time she will be subject to divorce (see Bamidbar 5:13), but not this terrible death. If she insists on her innocence, they make her take a vow, after which the Kohen brings her minchah offering, thus covering verses 24 and 25. If she refuses the oath, the entire process is halted as "useless" and she is deemed guilty but not made to drink. Should she make the vow, verse 26 is the command to the Kohen to do the erasure and give her to drink. If she then refuses, verse 27 says to force her. The Gemara then says that the first verse [24] is for the command itself, the second [26] that the Kohen only gives to her after the erasure has dissolved, and the third [27] as Rashi explains it. Rabbi Shimeon says that the first sets out the process, that the minchah comes before offering the drink, the second that it is valid even if done in the other order, and the third as Rashi explained.