Jewish Law

Lesson # 503 - The KETUBA

When a man marries a woman he obligates himself to her for ten things. Three of these obligations are found in the Torah and the other seven are of Rabbinic origin. When marrying her she is obligated to him for four things.
The Torah states in Sh’mot 21:10 that a husband is obligated to provide his wife with her food, her raiment, and her conjugal rights. These are the three obligations of Torah origin.
The seven of Rabbinic origin are contained in the ketuba and are as follows: To treat her if she becomes ill; to ransom her if she is captured; to bury her if she dies; to provide for her maintenance out of his estate; to let her dwell in his house after his death during the period of her widowhood; to let her daughters sired by him receive their maintenance; to let her male children sired by him to inherit her ketuba in addition to their share with their half-brothers in his estate.
The four things he is entitled to are all of Rabbinic origin: he is entitled to her earnings; to anything that she finds; to the usufruct [Ed. note: use and income of her property; not the principal] of her estate during her lifetime. And should she die in his lifetime he is her heir, with precedence to anyone else as to her estate.
The Rabbis have enacted that a wife’s earnings are chargeable against her maintenance, her ransom against the usufruct; her burial expenses against the husband’s inheritance of her ketuba.
Thus a wife can insist that she does not want his maintenance nor give him her earnings. The husband may not say I will not support you nor take your earnings. This is because her earnings will not suffice for her support.
All of the terms of the ketuba are considered to be part of the ketuba even if not explicitly so stated therein—even if the ketuba was not written down and the marriage was contracted without it. Once the marriage takes place, the husband is entitled to his four rights, and the wife to her ten, and there is no need to specify them.
A husband can stipulate that he is exempt from one of his obligations, or if the wife stipulates that he is to forfeit one of his privileges, the stipulation stands valid except in three things, which are not subject to stipulation, so that any stipulation regarding them is null and void. They are her conjugal rights, the statutory ketuba and his right to her estate. Thus if the husband stipulates that the wife is to have no conjugal rights due from him, he remains obligated for her conjugal rights inasmuch as he has stipulated a condition contrary to the Torah, and the condition does not involve money.
If after the marriage he stipulates that he is not to be her heir his condition is null and void because even though the husband’s rights to her estate is of Rabbinic origin, the Rabbis gave their enactment the same full force as that of the Torah.
How much maintenance is the wife to be given? The halacha makes certain provisions; I have intentionally omitted them since they were enacted in times when the purchasing power of a shekel or zuz was considerable.
Just as a man is liable for the maintenance of his wife, so is he liable for the maintenance of his minor sons and daughters according to a schedule enacted by the Sages. If a man has gone off to another country and his wife comes before the Beit Din seeking maintenance, for the first three months she is not provided with maintenance since it is presumed that he left for her in the house three months of maintenance. If he has real estate the Beit Din may seize it and sell some of it to provide for her maintenance. If while she was using her husband’s assets to maintain herself, anything that she earned must be given to her husband when he returns.
Just as Beit Din may sell some of his property for the maintenance of the wife while he is away so may Beit Din also sell it for the maintenance of his sons and daughters if they are less than six years old.
Some of the Geonim taught that no allowance may be granted for the maintenance of a wife whose husband has gone overseas unless she produces her ketuba. If she does not produce her ketuba, Beit Din may suspect that she has already collected her ketuba from her husband.
If a woman whose husband has gone overseas borrows money for her maintenance, the husband upon his return is obligated to repay it. If the husband says to the wife at the time of his departure, “Use your earnings for your maintenance”,  she is not entitled to maintenance because had she not agreed to this arrangement and acquiesced in it, she could have demanded from him or said to him “My earnings are not adequate for me.”
The question is raised: How much clothing is the husband obligated to provide for his wife? The Talmud and some of the earlier codes stipulated certain amounts; Rambam writes “The principle to be observed is that the husband is obligated to give her garments suitable for the rainy season and for the dry season worth not less than what any housewife in that country would require for her apparel. Included with the garments that he is obligated to give her are the house furnishings and the dwelling itself in which she resides. The codes describe in detail some of his individual obligations such as clothing, home, furniture, etc.
The obligations apply not only to the wife. The husband must also supply his little sons and daughters six years old or younger with garments for them, utensils and a dwelling to live in. He is likewise obligated to give her toilet articles, such as colored fabrics to wind around her head and forehead, eye-paint, rouge, and the like so that she may not seem unattractive to him.
The foregoing applies to the poor in Israel. As for the wealthy, everything should be commensurate with his wealth. “Even if he can afford to buy her silken and embroidered garments and gold jewelry, he should be compelled to do so.” The principle is this: Whosoever he is obligated to provide with maintenance, both during his lifetime and after his death, him he must also provide with clothing, house furnishing and shelter.

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