For the source text click/tap here: Yevamot 122
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Our last Mishna in the masechat relates a story where a group of people who were traveling left one of their party behind in a pundak – an inn – when he became ill. Upon their return they inquired as to their comrade’s health, and the pundika’it – the woman who was in charge of the inn – responded that he had died and that she buried him. Based on her word, the Sages allowed his widow to remarry.
The Gemara relates that in this last case, the pundika’it was a non-Jewish woman, who was believed based on the fact that she was mesihach lefi tumah – she was telling a story, and she did not realize that she was offering testimony. The believability of a mesi’ach lefi tumo is accepted by the Sages because we assume that the person telling the story has no vested or personal interest, and no reason to lie.
What is the nature of the innkeeper’s wife and how does she fare in antiquity? Was she innkeeper or zonah? (Rahab) and how in Women and domestic economies in antiquity, Innkeepers, Ship-owners, Prostitutes were the Three ‘Female’ Business Activities.
We end with the use of the typology of the innkeeper in chassidic tales.