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Jewish Law: Home

An introductory guide to research in Jewish law; resources for research in Jewish law.

What's in this guide

This guide deals with Jewish law, the religious-legal tradition of the Jewish people. This research guide will provide basic information on the structure and content of the Jewish legal tradition, and resources for further research in Jewish law.

(It should not be confused with Israeli law, the secular law of the modern State of Israel.)

Introduction

There are two main sources of primary law within the Jewish legal tradition:

  • The Written Law, which originates from the Torah, the primary Jewish sacred scriptures, which date from the 6th to 5th centuries BCE.
  • The Oral Law, which originates from discussions and debates of leading Jewish scholars between 200 CE and 1200 CE. These debates are recorded in a collection of writings collectively referred to as the Talmud.

Much of the corpus of Jewish law deals with matters of religious and ritual significance, but a great deal of attention is also paid to matters we may think of as civil or criminal law: family relationships, business relationships, evidence, torts, property, theft, etc.