Jerusalem rabbinical court seeks cap on ketubah alimony pledges

Jerusalem’s regional rabbinical court asks Israel’s chief rabbinate to set a 1 million shekel limit on the compensation that Jewish grooms may prenuptially pledge to pay their wives in case of a divorce.

The unusual request earlier this month follows a divorce in which a man’s ex-wife demanded he pay her NIS 555,555 (roughly $145,000) because that was the sum he pledged to pay on his ketubah – the Hebrew-language name for a marriage contract conforming to Orthodox Jewish law, the news site NRG reported Monday.

Her ex-husband argued he made the pledge as a testament of his love and appreciation for her, not thinking it would be legally binding. But in Israel, where rabbinical and other religious tribunals act as family courts within the framework of the judiciary, ketubot are admissible as a prenuptial agreement.

Many grooms pledge sums they cannot afford, attaching many zeros to the number 18, which is associated with life because of Jewish numerology, or to 555,555, which is especially popular among Sephardic Jews who believe it is lucky. The custom of reading out the ketubah to the wedding guests adds incentive to name high figures, which the court defined as unrealistic.

The panel of three rabbinical judges, or dayanim, reviewing the divorce case in question was divided, with one dayan ruling in favor of the ex-wife’s demand. But his colleagues were of the opinion the ex-husband should not be made to pay the full sum. The rabbinical court, or beit din, finally awarded the woman the equivalent of $31,600 from her ex-husband, or NIS 120,000.

In the regional beth din’s request to the rabbinate to set a 1 million shekel cap on ketubah pledges, the dayanim demonstrated that unrealistic undertakings date back centuries. They quoted a senior dayan in Morocco, Rabbi Shaul Even Danan, who 200 years ago denounced the custom.

“The unwanted addition to custom of the inflated ketubot, which has spread through our lands reaching the millions, has become a laughable matter. Paupers without so much as a slice of bread to their name cannot be trusted to pay even a fraction of what they commit to paying – an action which is tantamount to lying outright,” he writes.

— JTA