Legal History Law

Trial Stories in Jewish Antiquity: Counternarratives of Justice

By Chaya T. Halberstam
Oxford University Press May 2024

Specifications

ISBN-13
9780198865148
Publisher
Oxford University Press
Publication
May 2024
Format
Hardback
Jurisdiction
U.K. ? Countri(es) for reference only

Details

What can early Jewish courtroom narratives tell us about the capacity and limits of human justice? By exploring how judges and the act of judging are depicted in these narratives, Trial Stories in Jewish Antiquity: Counternarratives of Justice challenges the prevailing notion, both then and now, of the ideal impartial judge. As a work of intellectual history, the book also contributes to contemporary debates about the role of legal decision-making in shaping a just society. Chaya T. Halberstam shows that instead of modelling a system in which lofty, inaccessible judges follow objective and rational rules, ancient Jewish trial narratives depict a legal practice dependent upon the individual judge's personal relationships, reactive emotions, and impulse to care.

Drawing from affect theory and feminist legal thought, Halberstam offers original readings of some of the most famous trials in ancient Jewish writings alongside minor case stories in Josephus and rabbinic literature. She shows both the consistency of a counter-tradition that sees legal practice as contingent upon relationship and emotion, and the specific ways in which that perspective was manifest in changing times and contexts.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
1:The Case for Impartiality
2:The King Who Cares in Daniel 6
3:Feeling the Way to Justice in Susanna
4:The Collapse of Judgment in the Trial of Jesus
5:Dissolving Trials in Josephus's Jewish Antiquities
6:Parables of Judgment in Tannaitic Literature
7:Judging within the Rabbinic Household in the Babylonian Talmud
Bibliography
Index
HKD 958.36 −3%
HKD 988.00

Inclusive of HK delivery

Ready to ship
Delivery Time: around 4-5 weeks
Extra 2-10 working days if shipping address outside Hong Kong
  • Free HK shipping over HK$1,000
  • International shipping to 35+ countries
Order Form
Save

Recommended

You may also be interested in these books:

More titles from Law

View all