In his works from the past decade, Menachem Fisch offered an analysis of a crucial distinction between two modes of rationalized transformation: an intra-framework transformation and an inter-framework one, the latter entailing a revolutionary shift of the framework itself. In this article, I analyze the attempt to produce such a framework transition in the tradition of Jewish Halakha (i.e., Jewish Law) by one of the key figures in its history, Moses Maimonides (1135–1204), and to explore how this transition was rationalized (...) and promoted by the utilization of crisis discourse. Using discourse analysis, I analyze the introduction to Maimonides’ great legal code, Mishneh Torah, and explore the modes by which he sought to establish, install and stabilize a homogenous and centralistic legal order at the center of which will lie one – that is, his own – Halakhic book. (shrink)

Interiority and Law presents a groundbreaking reassessment of a medieval Jewish classic, Baḥya ibn Paquda's Guide to the Duties of the Hearts. Michaelis reads this work anew as a revolutionary intervention in Jewish law, or halakha. Overturning perceptions of Baḥya as the shaper of an ethical-religious form of life that exceeds halakha, Michaelis offers a pioneering historical and conceptual analysis of the category of "inner commandments" developed by Baḥya. Interiority and Law reveals that Baḥya's main effort revolved around establishing a (...) new legal formation - namely, the "duties of the hearts" - which would deal entirely with human interiority. Michaelis takes up the implications of Baḥya's radical innovation, examining his unique mystical model of proximity to God, which he based on an increasingly growing fulfillment of the inner commandments. With an integrative approach that puts Baḥya in dialogue with other medieval Muslim and Jewish religious thinkers, this work offers a fresh perspective on our understanding of the interconnectedness of the dynamic, neighboring religious traditions of Judaism and Islam. Contributing to conversations in the history of religion, Jewish studies, and medieval studies on interiority and mysticism, this book reveals Baḥya as a revolutionary and demanding thinker of Jewish law. (shrink)