כי יקח איש אשה ובא אליה ושנאה ושם לה עלילת דברים והוצא עליה שם רע ואמר את האשה הזאת לקחתי ואקרב אליה ולא מצאתי לה בתולים ולקח אבי הנער ואמה והוציאו את בתולי הנער אל זקני העיר השערה ... וענשו אתו מאה כסף ונתנו לאבי הנערה כי הוציא שם רע על בתולת ישראל (19-22:13 )
Parshas Ki Seitzei discusses the case of a man who marries a woman and comes to hate her, so he falsely accuses her of engaging in immoral conduct before their wedding as grounds to terminate the marriage. As the allegation against the bride is also an attack on her parents and the upbringing that they provided her, her parents come to her defense and debunk the unfounded claims.
If they prove their case, the elders of the city punish the husband with lashes, and he must also pay 100 silver shekels to his wife’s father for attempting to besmirch the family’s reputation. Curiously, in referring to the bride as aנערה (adolescent woman), the passage begins by spelling the term נער , with a kamatz under the ר in lieu of aה at the end of the word, but it concludes by describing her as aנערה – with a ה.
The Vilna Gaon (Niddah 5:7) writes that when a woman gets married, she becomes a partner in all her husband’s traits and accomplishments. This is represented by the attachment of a feminineה to each of them. For example, if she marries a wealthy עשיר, she becomes an עשירה. Accordingly, when discussing a single girl, it is appropriate to describe her as aנער with a kamatz under the ר, with theה at the end omitted to symbolize that she does not yet possess the shared attributes that come through marriage.
With this insight, Rav Mordechai Gimpel Yaffe explains that the slandered young woman is initially called aנער - without aה - because her husband is attempting to sever their ties on the pretext of his accusation. By the end of the passage, her parents have successfully disproven his false allegation and the elders of the town have ruled that he was lying. In such a case, the Torah stipulates that he is forbidden to divorce her and she shall remain his wife forever, and it alludes to this permanent bond by referring to the wife as a נערה, which connotes that she is now a fully married woman.
