For the source text click/tap here: Ketubot 73
To download, click/tap here: PDF
Today, conditional marriages are discouraged, if not entirely disallowed. The Mishna (72b), however, discusses cases where a person made the marriage conditional on the fact that his wife does not have vows that she has taken on herself or physical deformities. In such cases, if the woman is found to have such vows or physical deformities there is no need for a divorce, since the condition upon which the marriage was based was not fulfilled.
If, for example, the husband marries her with stipulations regarding preexisting vows, the couple can be divorced. Of course it is understood that a man would not engage in licentious sexual intercourse knowingly.
In other words, he would not engage in intercourse with his wife if he knew that she had made a vow that forbade their intimacy.
We explore the halacha of civil unions in galut and in Israel.
We also visit the history of civil unions following the French Revolution as well as the tragic consequences of the Nuremberg laws for civil unions.