Monday, February 9, 2009

A note on R' Herzog's notes

In a ulogy on R' Herzog printed in Shanah B' Shanah, I saw a rather funny story on R' Herzog's trip to America. Apparently, he had to visit the Mayo Clinic and since he couldn't read anything heavy the Rabbi who was with him got him a copy of the Readers Digest. He said that when he returned a bit later, every page of the Readers Digest was covered with notes pointing out that the ideas mentioned in various articles could already be found in Shas or were contradicted from Shas.

To some extent, R' Herzog's work in Mishpa Ha'Ivri follows a similar pattern. He places a great deal of effort into demonstrating the uniqueness of the Jewish Law, fiercly attacking any view that see non-Jewish jurisprudence as superior to the Jewish sources or to show that the Jewish law is derived from Gentile laws.

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