Behold now, your servant has found favor in your eyes, and you have magnified your kindness that you have done with me to keep me alive; but I cannot flee to the mountain, lest the evil overtake me and I die.
English: “Lest the evil overtake me.” A husband may not force his wife to move from one dwelling to another against her will—even from a bad dwelling to a good one—because the good dwelling itself tests her, as it is written, “lest the evil overtake me and I die.”
On the daf / in context: Lot’s fear of moving even to a better place is cited as the basis for the rule that a wife cannot be compelled to change residences against her will.
Type of Learning
Derash on the verse (Yerushalmi) — not a formal named middah of the 13. A narrative fear is generalized into a halakhic protection for a wife’s domicile.
What Is Learned
A husband may not compel his wife to leave her dwelling for another, even a better one; Lot’s words “lest the evil overtake me” support this protection.