SEPARATING THE ADULT FROM ADULTERY

Mishnah: When adulterers multiplied, the ceremony of the bitter

water was discontinued and it was R. Yochanan ben Zakkai who discontinued it....

Gemara: When adulterers multiplied: Our rabbis taught:“And the husband shall be free from iniquity”(Num. 5:31). At a time when the husband is free from iniquity, the water proves his wife; but when the man is not free from iniquity, the water does not prove his wife.... Come and hear:“I will not punish your daughters when they commit whoredom, nor your brides when they commit adultery”(Hos. 4:14). And should you say that his sin with a married woman[prevents the water from proving his wife] but not if it is with an unmarried woman, come and hear:“For they themselves go aside with whores and with harlots”(Hos. 4:14)...R. Eleazar said:“The prophet said to Israel : If you are scrupulous with yourselves, the water will prove your wives; otherwise the water will not prove your wives.”*

The rabbis plainly admonish men that they cannot expect their wives to be subject to legal scrutiny when they themselves are guilty of adulterous behavior. The sages even insert a clear protest against those men that use the cloak of polygamy to whore with unmarried women while these very same husbands demand that their wives be rigorously checked for any hint of adultery. The pretext for doing away with the test of“bitter waters” is the idea that it is improper to make women undergo a difficult scrutiny for adultery under conditions where men are similarly guilty of adultery and licentiousness. This talmudic ruling could well have formed a solid foundation for a modern extension of the same principle: that it is unfitting to apply onerous penalties to women for adultery in circumstances in which men are similarly guilty but are either not halakhically acknowledged as adulterers or are not punished in the same way. A declaration that sexual relationships between married men and single women are to be Jewishly regarded as adultery and that married men should be subject to the same penalties for

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