Search

Jewish Ethics Since 1970

Writings on Methods, Sources, & Issues

Jonathan K. Crane, Emily Filler, Mira Beth Wasserman

The present volume bespeaks the conviction that to focus on methods of reasoning is a compelling and generative way to study, and to teach, Jewish ethics. The field of Jewish ethics, we contend, is never far from foundational questions about how to do Jewish ethics – and these questions are inseparable from other kinds of scholarly conclusions or prescriptions. In part because we experience Jewish ethics deliberatively, the volume is organized not by standalone essays but by small sets of curated conversations between scholars from different time periods, academic subfields, and religious commitments (or lack thereof), in hopes that these deliberate juxtapositions will encourage scholars and students to similar meta-ethical analyses on Jewish ethics, broadly construed. For us, Jewish ethics is not just a set of propositions or principles; it cannot be reduced to a single trajectory of thought or abstracted as an elaborate system of ideas. For us, Jewish ethics is the field of study that engages Jewish texts, ideas, history, and experience in conversations about values and virtues, justice and good judgment, human relations and responsibilities. This volume presents some of those conversations and it is our hope that it will spark many more.

Paper: $29.95 | Cloth: $90 | E-book: $28.95
ISBN-13: 9781684582631
Pages: 350 | Size: 6 in. x 9 in.
Date Published: July 20, 2025

Additional Images

Book Trailer

About the Author

Emily A. Filler

Emily A. Filler is an assistant professor in the Religion Department at Washington and Lee University. Her research focuses on modern Jewish and continental philosophy, political and ethical theory, and classical Jewish texts. She is the coeditor of the Journal of Jewish Ethics. Her publications include “Reading ‘Zionism and its Jewish Critics’ after October 7,” forthcoming in Shofar 2024 and “Can Classical Jewish Sources Make Any Ethical Claims at All?” forthcoming in Journal of Jewish Ethics, 2024.

Mira Beth Wasserman

Mira Wasserman is the Director of the Center for Jewish Ethics and Associate Professor of Rabbinic Literature at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. She is the author of book, Jews, Gentiles, and other Animals: The Talmud after the Humanities which was awarded the Baron Prize for the best first book in Jewish studies, and the forthcoming “‘Halakhah’ and ‘Aggadah’ and What the Talmud is Made of,” in What is the Talmud? edited by Christine Hayes and Jay Harris.

Jonathan K. Crane

Jonathan K. Crane is the Raymond F. Schinazi Scholar of Bioethics and Jewish Thought at the Ethics Center; professor of Medicine, Emory School of Medicine, and affiliated faculty in the Department of Religion, Emory College of Arts and Sciences. He is coauthor of Ahimsa: The Way to Peace, co-editor of The Oxford Handbook of Jewish Ethics and Morality, author of Narratives and Jewish Bioethics, editor of Beastly Morality: Animals as Ethical Agents, author of Eating Ethically: Religion and Science for a Better Diet, and editor of Judaism, Race, and Ethics: Conversations and Questions. He is the founder and co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Jewish Ethics.

Award

Table Of Contents

Other Relevant Titles