I confess: I used to love watching soap operas, particularly General Hospital. (I stopped when my eldest started to understand what was going on.) A common device of such shows is the sudden discovery of a deathbed will that disinherits a presumptive heir. But since this is not just the stuff of television, on today’s daf, the mishnah describes how we might determine the validity of such a will:
With regard to one who died, and a will (dayetikei) written by this person on his deathbed is found bound to his thigh, this is nothing (i.e., the will is not valid). If he transferred ownership of the will to the designated recipient through another person, whether one of the heirs or not one of the heirs, it stands.
We can imagine that a dying person writes a new will and, so that everyone knows it’s not a forgery, ties it to his thigh, to be discovered upon his death. (In several instances, the Torah uses thigh as a euphemism for genitals, so it’s possible this document is actually located in a more intimate place.) Alas, even though it’s apparent the deceased wrote it, the will is not considered valid. Only if the deceased transferred ownership to the recipient is the will accepted.
The mishnah identifies this last minute document as a dayetikei, which the Gemara defines as a document that dictates what will happen after the author’s death. This makes it different from a gift which allows the recipient to use the inheritance even while the person is alive, with ownership officially transferred after death.
Next, the Gemara brings another example of an unsuccessful last-minute attempt to transfer property:
Rabba bar Rav Huna was sitting in the balcony of Rav’s study hall and sat and said in the name of Rabbi Yohanan: If there is a person on his deathbed who says: “Write (a deed of transfer) and give 100 dinars to So-and-So,” and he then died, one does not write and give it. This is because perhaps he resolved to transfer it to him only with a deed of transfer, and since the deed was not written in his lifetime it cannot be written after his death, as a deed of transfer is not effective after the death of the owner.
According to Rabba bar Rav Huna, a directive to write such a deed gifting property to someone else is only valid if the dying person is still alive when the document is written. Otherwise, how do we know if the dying person changed their mind at the last minute? Because of this concern, it’s not accepted.
And what if, soap-opera-like, there are two dayetikeis?
When Rav Dimi came from Eretz Yisrael to Babylonia, he stated … a dayetikei cancels a previous dayetikei.
Just as in our current legal system a new will cancels the old one, so does a new dayetikei cancel the old. Like the first one, though, it’s only valid if it is written while the person is alive. A surprise document tied to the deceased’s body, as dramatic as it might be, is still considered to be nothing. (That is, until they return from the dead after having had plastic surgery. Then, all bets are off!)
Read all of Bava Batra 135 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on November 7, 2024. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
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