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Concept
Jewish ethics
Summary
Jewish ethics is the ethics of the Jewish religion or the Jewish people. A type of normative ethics, Jewish ethics may involve issues in Jewish law as well as non-legal issues, and may involve the convergence of Judaism and the Western philosophical tradition of ethics.
Ethics in the Bible
Ethical traditions can be found throughout the Hebrew Bible and the rabbinic Oral Torah that both interpreted the Hebrew Bible and engaged in novel topics.
Ethics is a key aspect of legal rabbinic literature, the literature of halakhah, found in the Mishnah, Talmud and other texts. Ethics is also a key aspect of non-legal rabbinic literature, the literature of aggadah. The best-known text in Rabbinic Judaism associated with ethics is the non-legal Mishnah tractate of Avot (“forefathers”), commonly translated as “Ethics of the Fathers".
In the medieval period, direct Jewish responses to Greek ethics may be seen in major rabbinic writings. Notably, Maimonides offers a Jewish interpretation of Aristotle (e.g., Nicomachean Ethics), who enters into Jewish discourse through Islamic writings. Maimonides, in turn, influences Thomas Aquinas, a dominant figure in Christian ethics and the natural law tradition of moral theology. The relevance of natural law to medieval Jewish philosophy is a matter of dispute among scholars.
Medieval and early modern rabbis also created a pietistic tradition of Jewish ethics. This ethical tradition was given expression through musar literature, which presents virtues and vices in a didactic way. The Hebrew term musar, derived from a word meaning "discipline" or "correction," is often translated as ethics, morality, moral instruction, or moral discipline.
Examples of medieval Musar literature include:
Chovot ha-Levavot ('Duties of the Heart') by Bahya ibn Paquda.
Ma'alot ha-Middot by Yehiel ben Yekutiel Anav of Rome.
Orchot Tzaddikim (The Ways of the Righteous) by an anonymous author.
Kad ha-Kemah by Bahya ben Asher.
Halakhic (legal) writings of the Middle Ages are also important texts for Jewish ethics.
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