When a husband gets married and accepts upon himself all of the obligations of the Ketubah (marriage contract), he also accepts upon himself the obligation to support his minor daughters if he passes away, until they reach adulthood or until they are halachically (according to Jewish law) engaged, whichever comes first. We’ll talk about whether he was rich or poor and how that affects the inheritance after he dies.
The Mishnah says: If somebody dies and has both sons and daughters who are his inheritors, his daughters would not inherit anything, and his sons would inherit his estate. How everything is divided up depends on the size of his possessions. In a situation where he has many properties, where he’s a rich man, and the estate is large enough both to give his sons their inheritance and to allow the daughters to support themselves from it until they reach adulthood, the sons would inherit the entire estate, and the daughters would receive support from them. The sons take possession of the estate, and they have to take care of the daughters.
But if the properties are few, there’s not enough money in the estate to support the girls and also give the inheritance to the boys. In that case, the daughters would be supported from whatever money is in the estate until they reach adulthood. And the sons have nothing. They have no money, so they have to go around begging at people’s doorsteps for food.
The fact is, according to this opinion, the obligation mentioned in the Ketubah is first and foremost that the daughters are going to be supported from the estate. If there’s not enough money to support them until they reach adulthood, then we have to give them everything. They have to get everything. So the boys would be left with nothing. They have to go beg for food.
Admon is going to disagree. Admon says that the son could claim, “Just because he’s a man, he now loses out? Why should he? Generally, a son has the inheritance. He gets to keep everything, and the daughter doesn’t, really. So why should the fact that he’s male put him on a lower level than the daughter when it comes to inheritance? Usually, the men have a stronger case when it comes to inheritance.” So Admon says that when there’s not enough money in the estate to support all the children until the daughters become adults, what we do is divide everything equally. The daughters and the sons receive the same amount. They are supported until there’s nothing left in the estate, and there’s nothing that’s only set aside specifically for the daughters. I see the opinion of Admon. The opinion of Admon is correct and makes sense to me.