“One of our Predecessors”

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Otto
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Law ◽  
Biblical Narratives ◽  
Mosaic Law

Origen mentions Philo by name only three times in his surviving works. More often, he refers to Philo obliquely as “one of our predecessors” or, more literally, “one of those who came before us.” An analysis of Origen’s references to Philo in light of his usage of the terms Jew, Hebrew, Israel, and Ebionite in Contra Celsum and the Commentary on Matthew reveals Origen’s approval of Philo’s allegorical interpretations of biblical narratives. Yet on one occasion, Origen criticizes Philo for failing to interpret the commandments of the Jewish law “according to the spirit” rather than “according to the letter.” Origen charges Philo with committing the same error that he charges against Jews in general, namely, the failure to interpret and observe the commandments of the Mosaic law spiritually rather than literally.

Finding God’s Purpose: Hermann Cohen’s Use of Maimonides to Establish the Authority of Mosaic Law

2010 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Y. Kohler
Keyword(s):  
Central Point ◽  
Jewish Law ◽  
Rational Theology ◽  
The Law ◽  
Mosaic Law ◽  
Religion Of Reason ◽  
Guide Of The Perplexed ◽  
Original Reading ◽  
Jewish Religion

AbstractThe most important Jewish source for Hermann Cohen’s rational theology of Judaism is Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed. Indeed, the Guide is of such importance that Cohen bases his entire idealistic interpretation of the Jewish religion on it. In particular, Cohen derives his discussion of the continued authority of Mosaic law from the Guide. What follows focuses on Cohen’s discussion of the “Law” in his Religion of Reason out of the Sources of Judaism, and attempts to fill a gap in recent Cohen research by dealing with questions of halakhah and the interpretation of rabbinical sources. Cohen’s original reading of, inter alia, Guide III.31‐32 led him to formulate a theory wherein Mosaic law—and by extension Judaism—guarantees the highest end of human morality. In identifying God with this end, Cohen eventually finds the ultimate criterion for the decision of how much of traditional Jewish law must still be observed in the need for the preservation of the purest monotheism—another central point in Maimonides’ philosophy.

Stoic Ethics in the Service of Jewish Law

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maren R. Niehoff
Keyword(s):  
Ethical Principles ◽  
Jewish Tradition ◽  
Jewish Law ◽  
Philosophical Interpretation ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Mosaic Law ◽  
Harsh Criticism ◽  
Jewish Religion

This chapter shows how Philo's exposition of Mosaic law is motivated by the apologetic need to counter Apion's slanders and persuade a broader Roman audience of the value of Jewish customs. Confronted with harsh criticism of the Jewish religion, which has immediate political implications for his embassy to Gaius, Philo devotes several treatises to the Decalogue and the special laws, which hardly interested him in his early Alexandrian period. He engages typically Stoic notions, using them not only as general gestures, as he did at the beginning of his career, but accepting the fundamental ethical principles of the school most popular in Rome. Philo also appeals to the realia of Roman feasts and law to explain the Jewish tradition in an understandable way. Ultimately, Philo's philosophical interpretation of Mosaic law offers an enlightened form of ethnicity.

Islamic and Jewish Religious Feminists Tackle Islamic and Jewish Oral Law: Maintenance and Rebellion of Wives

2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-63
Author(s):  
Ruth Roded
Keyword(s):  
State Policy ◽  
Political System ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Jewish Law ◽  
Modern Times ◽  
Parallel Case ◽  
First Time

Beginning in the early 1970s, Jewish and Muslim feminists, tackled “oral law”—Mishna and Talmud, in Judaism, and the parallel Hadith and Fiqh in Islam, and several analogous methodologies were devised. A parallel case study of maintenance and rebellion of wives —mezonoteha, moredet al ba?ala; nafaqa al-mar?a and nush?z—in classical Jewish and Islamic oral law demonstrates similarities in content and discourse. Differences between the two, however, were found in the application of oral law to daily life, as reflected in “responsa”—piskei halacha and fatwas. In modern times, as the state became more involved in regulating maintenance and disobedience, and Jewish law was backed for the first time in history by a state, state policy and implementation were influenced by the political system and socioeconomic circumstances of the country. Despite their similar origin in oral law, maintenance and rebellion have divergent relevance to modern Jews and Muslims.

Carnal Knowledge: How Performance Criticism can Provide Insights into Biblical Women

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tracy Radosevic
Keyword(s):  
Biblical Story ◽  
The Past ◽  
Performance Criticism ◽  
Left Brain ◽  
Biblical Narratives ◽  
Biblical Women

Biblical Performance Criticism, among other things, relies on how a biblical story is embodied and, as a result, viscerally experienced by the performer as a means for gaining a better understanding of how to more fully comprehend and appreciate, and then potentially interpret with more accurate integrity, the biblical narratives. This process goes way beyond the left-brain intellect, permeating the very physiology of the teller in a way that provides a more multidimensional grasp of scripture, giving insights that perhaps could not be gleaned in any other way. This article, written by a woman, specifically focuses on how the stories of certain biblical women took on more profound meaning when embodied, experienced, and understood through the unique reality of females throughout the past few millennia.

Religious Zionism, Jewish Law, and the Morality of War

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Eisen
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legitimate Authority ◽  
Jewish Law ◽  
Jewish State ◽  
Moral Issues ◽  
Law And Ethics ◽  
Present Book ◽  
History Of ◽  
State Of Israel ◽  
Morality Of War

When the state of Israel was established in 1948, it was immediately thrust into war, and rabbis in the religious Zionist community were challenged with constructing a body of Jewish law to deal with this turn of events. Laws had to be “constructed” here because Jewish law had developed mostly during prior centuries when Jews had no state or army, and therefore it contained little material on war. The rabbis in the religious Zionist camp responded to this challenge by creating a substantial corpus of laws on war, and they did so with remarkable ingenuity and creativity. The work of these rabbis represents a fascinating chapter in the history of Jewish law and ethics, but it has attracted relatively little attention from academic scholars. The purpose of the present book is therefore to bring some of their work to light. It examines how five of the leading rabbis in the religious Zionist community dealt with key moral issues in the waging of war. Chapters are devoted to R. Abraham Isaac Kook, R. Isaac Halevi Herzog, R. Eliezer Waldenberg, R. Sha’ul Yisraeli, and R. Shlomo Goren. The moral issues examined include the question of who is a legitimate authority for initiating a war, why Jews in a modern Jewish state can be drafted to fight on its behalf, and whether the killing of enemy civilians is justified. Other issues examined include how the laws of war as formulated by religious Zionist rabbis compares to those of international law.

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