KETUBAH[1]

What came about in our presence on Sunday, the fourth day of the month of Tammuz of the five thousandth six hundred and eighty-first year (Sunday, July 10, 1921) since the world’s creation, according to the manner in which we count the years, here in the city of Luninetz, was how Reb David Ber the son of Reb Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg from the city of Telechan came before us and said to us that Elka the daughter of Reb Yosef Leib of Telechan, she being a maiden at the time, had married him in the city of Telechan on Thursday the sixth day of the month of Shevat in the year five thousand six hundred and thirty nine (Thursday January 30, 1879) since creation, in accordance with the law for the daughters of Israel upon their getting married to their menfolk through the Chuppah and Kidushin (i.e. the marriage ceremony under the canopy) and with a Ketubah; and now that she has lost her Ketubah document which was written on the day of her marriage to him, and since our sages, may their memory be for a blessing, have said that it is forbidden for a daughter of Israel to live with a man without a Ketubah, I have thus requested that another Ketubah be written for her. 

And so, we, of the city of Telechan, are bearing witness and providing the signatures below, since the original witnesses that had signed the previous lost Ketubah are no more.  We have written for her this Ketubah as a replacement for the previous Ketubah on this day and in the (same) wording that was written in the previous Ketubah that was lost.  (Namely that) Reb Dov Ber the son of Reb Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg of the city of Telechan had said to her - his wife - Ms. Elka the daughter of Reb Yosef Leib, when she was a maiden back in the year 5639, “Be thou my wife in accordance with the Law of Moses and of Israel. And I shall work for thee, honour, sustain and maintain thee in accordance with the regulations of Jewish men who work and honour and sustain and maintain their wives in truth.  And I shall give thee, in exchange for thy virginity, one hundred zuz, that has been prepared for you in accordance with the Torah, and I shall provide for your nourishment and your clothing and your needs; and I shall come to you, as is the manner of all the world.”  And Ms. Elka daughter of Reb Yosef, being at that time in 5639 a virgin, consented and brought with her as dowry from her family both in silver and in gold, jewelry, clothing, furniture, and bedclothes.  And Reb Dov Ber the son of Reb Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg, the bridegroom, agreed to everything and the exchange of one hundred silver coins.  And Reb Dov Ber the son of Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg, on his part, added to it an additional one hundred silver coins of his own, totaling 200 silver coins.  And so Reb Dov Ber the son of Reb Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg said, “ I take upon myself and my heirs after me the responsibility of this marriage contract, of the dowry and of the additional sum, so that all this shall be paid from the best part of my property, real and personal, that I now possess or hereafter acquire.  All my property, even the mantle on my shoulders, shall be mortgaged as security for this contract and of the dowry and of the addition made thereto.”  Reb Dov Ber the son of Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg has taken upon himself the responsibility for all the obligations of this Ketubah made for the daughters of Israel in accordance with the regulations of our sages, may their memory be for a blessing.  It is not to be regarded as an illusory obligation or as a mere form of document.  We have followed the legal formality of symbolic transfer (Kinyan) from Reb Dov Ber the son of Mordechai Yitzhak Ajzenberg, of the first part, to Elka the daughter of Reb Yosef of the second, who in the year 5639 was then a maiden at the time of her marriage to him, and we have employed an instrument legally fit for the purpose to strengthen all that is stated above.  And everything is valid and established.

Signed: Shlomo son of Reb Zelig Kosovsky

Signed: Chaim son of Reb Yisra’el Serebrovsky of the city of Telechan

This is the signature of the witness Reb Shlomo the son of Reb Zelig Kosovsky and the signature of Reb Chaim the son of Reb Yisra’el Serebrovsky who are from the city of Telechan.  They have signed with their actual own hand, and I have certified and established that these are their signatures, and all the above mentioned has been done in my presence, and, as evidence to that, I have come to affix my signature on the same day, month and year as that indicated above.

Yehudah the son of Reb Yitzhak, may his memory be for a blessing, Zolar, resident of the city of Luninetz.