Jacob Neusner

The Social Teachings of Rabbinic Judaism Jacob Neusner

The systematic and orderly presentation of the Halakhah, normative law, of Rabbinic Judaism in its formative age makes its principal statements in response to a program of social reconstruction; it speaks through the details of norms of law about the community, Israel. In the first part of the project, on Corporate Israel and the Individual Israelite we ask where and how the Halakhah sorts out the relationships of the individual and the community. Volume II turns to relationships between Israelites, with particular attention to those that require resolving conflict Volume III raises the third and final question of the social order: God's role in society. For Rabbinic Judaism to be "Israel" means to live in God's kingdom, under God's rule, in a very particular way. That imperative addresses not individuals alone or mainly but, rather, corporate Israel, that is, the entire social order.