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Though many rabbis shun prenuptial agreements because they think it isn't appropriate for young couples to talk about divorce, the topic wasn't taboo for students at Rutgers University Hillel Nov. 11.

Rabbi Shlomo Weissmann, director of the Beth Din of America (BDA), spoke to students about the BDA's prenuptial agreement from two perspectives -- as a solution for the modern agunah problem, in which women whose marriages are functionally over cannot obtain a get (Jewish divorce document), and as a document students should seriously consider when they are ready to get married.

Weissmann was making his second campus visit, after a previous stop at Brooklyn College, as part of a series sponsored by the BDA and the UJA Federation of New York. Rabbi Yisroel Porath, director of the Orthodox Union's Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus at Rutgers, said college students have much to gain from exploring prenuptial agreements because they "are at the age when many people are dating, many people are looking for their better half." Porath said there are many engaged Jewish couples at Rutgers, including three that were present for Weissmann's speech.

Asked why there is often unease in the Jewish community surrounding prenuptials, Weissmann explained that Jewish leaders are often slow to accept change, especially for Jewish marriage rituals that have been in place for 2,000 years, and also believe that talking about divorce and similar topics is simply "not nice" to do before marriage. To follow up, Rutgers Hillel Executive Director Andrew Getraer asked Weissmann that if rabbis don't want people to talk about divorce, why do Jews read the ketubah document, which like a prenuptial obligates men to pay their wives in the event of a divorce, at weddings?

"It's in Aramaic, no one knows what it says," Weissmann responded about the ketubah.

But the BDA's prenuptial agreement, which has existed for 15 years, is written in English. The three-page document requires each spouse to appear in beth din, a Jewish court, if they are no longer living together. The beth din acts as an arbitration panel and decides all issues related to the get. When a couple separates, the BDA prenuptial states that the husband must pay his wife $150 per day as long as they are still married under Jewish law, in lieu of the Torah obligation for males to support their wives.

If a beth din determines that the woman is eligible for the $150 per day, she can go to a secular court to enforce the decision because the BDA prenuptial is a legally binding arbitration document in the U.S. If either spouse does not appear in beth din, the spouse that does appear can go to secular court and hold the other party in contempt of court. The BDA prenuptial is approved by the Rabbinical Council of America, and Yeshiva University sent out a letter in 1999 urging couples to sign it, Weissmann said.

About 1,000 years ago, Rabbeinu Gershom ben Yehuda ruled that men and women needed to give each other mutual consent for a get; under talmudic law, all a man needed to do was throw a get into his wife's home to dissolve the marriage, Weissmann explained.

"What that means practically speaking is that Jewish marriages are strong," Weissmann said. "You can't just on a whim have a fight and one spouse unilaterally ends the marriage."

The Torah grants a beth din power to make sure husbands follow through on giving their wives a get, Weissmann said. In 12th-century northern France, the beth din would strip recalcitrant husbands of communal privileges like getting an aliyah to the Torah, he said.

Needless to say, such leverage isn't as powerful in modern times, and in an open society like America, prenuptial agreements are critical leverage for women because a beth din doesn't have nearly as much power as it used to, Weissmann said. Without prenuptials, a beth din has very limited tools to solve the agunah crisis, he said, leading to situations like women who are physically abused by their husbands yet cannot obtain a divorce.

"All too often, the contemporary bet din is left with very few options in imposing the proper pressure on a person to give a get," Weissmann said.

However, in the 15 years of the BDA's prenuptial, the document has ensured that after a hearing, a get is given in a timely manner and without acrimony 100 percent of the time, Weissmann said.

Weissmann gave students three arguments for why they should sign the BDA prenuptial when the time comes. From an idealistic perspective, Weissmann said that even if a couple feels its marriage will be perfect and that the prenuptial is unnecessary, that couple should sign the prenuptial for the sake of others who will be touched by the agunah crisis, because the only way the prenuptial will be effective is if it gains widespread popularity.

"For better or worse, people do what other people do," Weissmann said.

Weissmann's pragmatic reason for signing the prenuptial was that divorces are often long, bitter, and expensive battles, and instead of both sides running out of money before reaching a settlement in court anyway, it's wiser to make a pre-marital pact to skip the fighting and settle right away. There is even a romantic reason for signing prenuptials, Weissmann said, because spouses promise each other when they marry that they will get through tough times. A prenuptial ensures that even if a marriage collapses, spouses will not harm each other, making it a document that starts off the marriage with a foundation of mutual respect, he said.

Asked if the BDA prenuptial is also enforceable outside the U.S, Weissmann said the document is recognized in Israel but not in Canada, because Canada has a law prohibiting arbitration panels from deciding family law matters.

Weissmann's mother was in attendance, and being that Weissmann's wedding took place in Canada, she asked him again about the power of the BDA prenuptial there. But Weissmann was prepared for his mother's challenge, responding that if you live with your spouse in the U.S., which Weissmann does, and if you file for divorce in the U.S., American law applies and the BDA prenuptial is completely enforceable.