- Title Pages
- Dedication
- Dedication
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Note on Transliteration and Conventions Used in the Text
-
Part I Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter One Three Themes in Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter Two On Dating Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter Three Piety, Pietism, and German Pietism: Sefer Ḥasidim I and the Influence of Ḥasidei Ashkenaz -
Chapter Four Pietists and Kibbitzers -
Chapter Five The Midrash, Sefer Ḥasidim, and the Changing Face of God -
Chapter Six Two Notes on the Commentary on the Torah of R. Yehudah he-Ḥasid -
Chapter Seven Topics in the Ḥokhmat ha-Nefesh - Methodological Issues
-
Chapter Eight On Reading Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter Nine Sefer Ḥasidim and the Social Sciences -
Chapter Ten Ravad of Posquières: A Programmatic Essay -
Chapter Eleven The Literary Remains of the Gedol ha-Mefarshim -
Chapter Twelve A Response to R. Buckwold’s Critique of ‘Rabad of Posquières: A Programmatic Essay’, Part I -
Chapter Thirteen A Response to R. Buckwold’s Critique of ‘Rabad of Posquières: A Programmatic Essay’, Part II -
Chapter Fourteen Jewish and Roman Law: A Study in Interaction -
Chapter Fifteen The Riddle of Me’iri’s Recent Popularity -
Chapter Sixteen Printing and the History of Halakhah -
Chapter Seventeen Angle of Deflection - Bibliography of Manuscripts
- Source Acknowledgments
- Index of Names
- Index of Places
- Index of Subjects
Angle of Deflection
Angle of Deflection
- Chapter:
- (p.407) Chapter Seventeen Angle of Deflection
- Source:
- Collected Essays
- Author(s):
Haym Soloveitchik
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
This chapter reflects on the principle of 'angle of deflection' or 'measurable deflection'. This principle has been utilized superbly by Mark Cohen in his path-breaking work on Jewish economic activity in the Islamic world. But the principle of angle of deflection still has its critics. Some have seen in it a reflection of legal formalism. Whether law develops from within, as a consequence of an internal dynamic, or whether its motor force is social pressures and the personal predilections and ideologies of judges is an ancient jurisprudential question. The principle of angle of deflection is, however, not a jurisprudential but an evidentiary one. Both formalists and realists agree that the dominant motor force in a system does not operate to the exclusion of all else. The rule of the angle of deflection provides the historian with a criterion by which to assess whether or not a specific jurist in a specific case was influenced by outside considerations.
Keywords: angle of deflection, measurable deflection, legal formalism, law, formalists, realists, judges
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- Title Pages
- Dedication
- Dedication
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Note on Transliteration and Conventions Used in the Text
-
Part I Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter One Three Themes in Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter Two On Dating Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter Three Piety, Pietism, and German Pietism: Sefer Ḥasidim I and the Influence of Ḥasidei Ashkenaz -
Chapter Four Pietists and Kibbitzers -
Chapter Five The Midrash, Sefer Ḥasidim, and the Changing Face of God -
Chapter Six Two Notes on the Commentary on the Torah of R. Yehudah he-Ḥasid -
Chapter Seven Topics in the Ḥokhmat ha-Nefesh - Methodological Issues
-
Chapter Eight On Reading Sefer Ḥasidim -
Chapter Nine Sefer Ḥasidim and the Social Sciences -
Chapter Ten Ravad of Posquières: A Programmatic Essay -
Chapter Eleven The Literary Remains of the Gedol ha-Mefarshim -
Chapter Twelve A Response to R. Buckwold’s Critique of ‘Rabad of Posquières: A Programmatic Essay’, Part I -
Chapter Thirteen A Response to R. Buckwold’s Critique of ‘Rabad of Posquières: A Programmatic Essay’, Part II -
Chapter Fourteen Jewish and Roman Law: A Study in Interaction -
Chapter Fifteen The Riddle of Me’iri’s Recent Popularity -
Chapter Sixteen Printing and the History of Halakhah -
Chapter Seventeen Angle of Deflection - Bibliography of Manuscripts
- Source Acknowledgments
- Index of Names
- Index of Places
- Index of Subjects