Israel’s Chief Rabbinate has introduced limits on ketubah payments for the first time after grooms promised “imaginary sums” which they had “neither the intention nor the ability to pay”.
The rabbinate, which regulates halachic law in the Jewish State, has now introduced precedent-setting maximum and minimum sums for marriage contracts.
The payments are written into the contracts, with wives allowed to collect them under defined circumstances, most often divorces either initiated by the wife or by mutual consent.
However, there have been several cases in Israel’s rabbinical courts complicated by the fact that the ketubah contained a promised payment which the husband had no realistic means of paying, often as a way for the groom to display his status or as a token of his affection.
Such cases are the subject of gemirut da’at, a long-running halachic debate over whether the contract can be considered valid if such a pledge was undertaken without genuine intent to follow it through.
“A situation developed in which grooms commit in the ketubah to imaginary sums that it is clear from the outset they have neither the intention nor the ability to pay, thereby undermining the very halachic meaning of the document,” Rabbi Kalman Meir Ber, president of the Chief Rabbinate Council, told Ynet.
“At the same time, the matter cannot be left completely open without any defined minimum, because the ketubah is intended to provide the woman with real financial security.”
The rabbinate has now set the lower limit for such payments at 36,000 shekels (around £9,000), with the upper barrier at 360,000 shekels (around £90,000).
Guy Raveh, chair of the divorce-focussed non-profit Shared Parenting = The Child’s Best Interest, added: “We hope this positive directive will reduce disputes between parents, and we are looking forward to the recommendations of the committee appointed by [Sephardi Chief] Rabbi David Yosef to examine child support payments and adapt them to present-day realities.”
To get more Israel news, click here to sign up for our free Israel Briefing newsletter.