Download Free Jewish Law And Legal Theory Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online Jewish Law And Legal Theory and write the review.

Anthology of writings about Jewish law in the modern world
In The Authority of Law in the Hebrew Bible and Early Judaism, Vroom identifies a development in the authority of written law that took place in early Judaism. Ever since Assyriologists began to recognize that the Mesopotamian law collections did not function as law codes do today—as a source of binding obligation—scholars have grappled with the question of when the Pentateuchal legal corpora came to be treated as legally binding. Vroom draws from legal theory to provide a theoretical framework for understanding the nature of legal authority, and develops a methodology for identifying instances in which legal texts were treated as binding law by ancient interpreters. This method is applied to a selection of legal-interpretive texts: Ezra-Nehemiah, Temple Scroll, the Qumran rule texts, and the Samaritan Pentateuch.
This is the first book to present a systematic and synthetic introduction to Jewish law.
How the rabbis of the Talmud transformed Jewish law into a way of thinking and talking about everything Typically translated as "Jewish law," halakhah is not an easy match for what is usually thought of as law. This is because the rabbinic legal system has rarely wielded the political power to enforce its rules, nor has it ever been the law of any state. Even more idiosyncratically, the talmudic rabbis claim the study of halakhah is a holy endeavor that brings a person closer to God—a claim no country makes of its law. Chaim Saiman traces how generations of rabbis have used concepts forged in talmudic disputation to do the work that other societies assign not only to philosophy, political theory, theology, and ethics but also to art, drama, and literature. Guiding readers across two millennia of richly illuminating perspectives, this panoramic book shows how halakhah is not just "law" but an entire way of thinking, being, and knowing.
Ernst-Joachim Mestmacker reviews Richard Posner's and Friedrich A.von Hayek's legal theories. Both are famous for their contributions to law and economics. They are, however, adversaries in their concepts of law and how it is to be informed by economics. Posner finds the only scientific legal theory in the external (economic) analysis of law. With Friedrich von Hayek the role of rules of conduct and legislation is to be determined by the principles that govern a free and competitive order. There are, contrary to Posner, important contributions from legal scholarship, legal history and comparative law.
This book offers a novel approach for the study of law in the Judean Desert Scrolls, using the prism of legal theory. Following a couple of decades of scholarly consensus withdrawing from the "Essene hypothesis," it proposes to revive the term, and suggests employing it for the sectarian movement as a whole, while considering the group that lived in Qumran as the Yahad. It further proposes a new suggestion for the emergence of the Yahad, based on the roles of the Examiner and the Instructor in the two major legal codes, the Damascus Document and the Community Rule. The understanding of Essene law is divided into concepts and practices, in order to emphasize the discrepancy between creed, rhetoric, and practices. The abstract exploration of notions such as time, space, obligation, intention, and retribution, is then compared against the realities of social practices, including admission, initiation, covenant, leadership, reproof, and punishment. The legal analysis yields several new suggestions for the study of the scrolls: first, Amihay proposes to rename the two strands of thought of Jewish law, formerly referred to as "nominalism" and "realism," with the terms "legal essentialism" and "legal formalism." The two laws of admission in the Community Rule are distinguished as two different laws, one of an association for a group as a whole, the other as an admission of an individual. The law of reproof is proven to be an independent legal procedure, rather than a preliminary stage of prosecution. The methodological division in this study of thought and practice provides a nuanced approach for the study of law in general, and religious law in particular.
A myth exists that Jews can embrace the cultural components of Judaism without appreciating the legal aspects of the Jewish tradition. This myth suggests that law and culture are independent of one another. In reality, however, much of Jewish culture has a basis in Jewish law. Similarly, Jewish law produces Jewish culture. Roberta Rosenthal Kwall develops and applies a cultural analysis paradigm to the Jewish tradition that departs from the understanding of Jewish law solely as the embodiment of Divine command.
By departing from accounts of a universalist component in Israel's early foreign policy, Rotem Giladi challenges prevalent assumptions on the cosmopolitan outlook of Jewish international law scholars and practitioners, offers new vantage points on modern Jewish history, and critiques orthodox interpretations of the Jewish aspect of Israel's foreign policy. Drawing on archival sources, the book reveals the patent ambivalence of two jurist-diplomats-Jacob Robinson and Shabtai Rosenne-towards three international law reform projects: the right of petition in the draft Human Rights Covenant, the 1948 Genocide Convention, and the 1951 Refugee Convention. In all cases, Rosenne and Robinson approached international law with disinterest, aversion, and hostility while, nonetheless, investing much time and toil in these post-war reforms. The book demonstrates that, rather than the Middle East conflict, Rosenne and Robinson's ambivalence towards international law was driven by ideological sensibilities predating Israel's establishment. In so doing, Jews, Sovereignty, and International Law disaggregates and reframes the perspectives offered by the growing scholarship on Jewish international lawyers, providing new insights concerning the origins of human rights, the remaking of postwar international law, and the early years of the UN.
"This book is about the attempt of Orthodox Jewish Zionists to implement traditional Jewish law (halakha) as the law of the State of Israel. These religious Zionists began their quest for a halakhic sate immediately after Israel's establishment in 1948 and competed for legal supremacy with the majority of Israeli Jews who wanted Israel to be a secular democracy. Although Israel never became a halachic state, the conflict over legal authority became the backdrop for a pervasive culture war, whose consequences are felt throughout Israeli society until today. The book traces the origins of the legal ideology of religious Zionists and shows how it emerged in the middle of the twentieth century. It further shows that the ideology, far from being endemic to Jewish religious tradition as its proponents claim, is a version of modern European jurisprudence, in which a centralized state asserts total control over the legal hierarchy within its borders. The book shows how the adoption (conscious or not) of modern jurisprudence has shaped religious attitudes to many aspects of Israeli society and politics, created an ongoing antagonism with the state's civil courts, and led to the creation of a new and increasingly powerful state rabbinate. This account is placed into wider conversations about the place of religion in democracies and the fate of secularism in the modern world. It concludes with suggestions about how a better knowledge of the history of religion and law in Israel may help ease tensions between its religious and secular citizens"--
An innovative approach to the study of ten centuries of Jewish culture and history A Companion to Late Ancient Jews and Judaism explores the Jewish people, their communities, and various manifestations of their religious and cultural expressions from the third century BCE to the seventh century CE. Presenting a collection of 30 original essays written by noted scholars in the field, this companion provides an expansive examination of ancient Jewish life, identity, gender, sacred and domestic spaces, literature, language, and theological questions throughout late ancient Jewish history and historiography. Editors Gwynn Kessler and Naomi Koltun-Fromm situate the volume within Late Antiquity, enabling readers to rethink traditional chronological, geographic, and political boundaries. The Companion incorporates a broad methodology, drawing from social history, material history and culture, and literary studies to consider the diverse forms and facets of Jews and Judaism within multiple contexts of place, culture, and history. Divided into five parts, thematically-organized essays discuss topics including the spaces where Jews lived, worked, and worshiped, Jewish languages and literatures, ethnicities and identities, and questions about gender and the body central to Jewish culture and Judaism. Offering original scholarship and fresh insights on late ancient Jewish history and culture, this unique volume: Offers a one-volume exploration of “second temple,” “Greco-Roman,” and “rabbinic” periods and sources Explores Jewish life across most of the geographic places where Jews or Judaeans were known to have lived Features original maps of areas cited in every essay, including maps of Jewish settlement throughout Late Antiquity Includes an outline of major historical events, further readings, and full references A Companion to Late Ancient Jews and Judaism: 3rd Century BCE - 7th Century CE is a valuable resource for students, instructors, and scholars of Jewish studies, religion, literature, and ethnic identity, as well as general readers with interest in Jewish history, world religions, Classics, and Late Antiquity.