Organ Donation and the Divine Lien in Talmudic Law
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Organ Donation and the Divine Lien in Talmudic Law

Organ Donation and the Divine Lien in Talmudic Law

By
Madeline Kochen (Author)  

Hardback

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This book offers a new theory of property and distributive justice derived from Talmudic law, illustrated by a case study involving the sale of organs for transplant. Although organ donation did not exist in late antiquity, this book posits a new way, drawn from the Talmud, to conceive of this modern means of giving to others. Our common understanding of organ transfers as either a gift or sale is trapped in a dichotomy that is conceptually and philosophically limiting. Drawing on Maussian gift theory, this book suggests a different legal and cultural meaning for this property transfer. It introduces the concept of the 'divine lien', an obligation to others in need built into the definition of all property ownership. Rather than a gift or sale, organ transfer is shown to exemplify an owner's voluntary recognition and fulfilment of this latent property obligation.
Madeline Kochen, a former Law Professor at the University of Michigan, is a public interest lawyer and a Talmudic scholar, with a PhD in religion and political philosophy from Harvard University, Massachusetts. After representing indigent defendants on appeal at the Legal Aid Society, she worked as an attorney for the New York Civil Liberties Union, where she eventually founded and directed the NYCLU Reproductive Rights Project. Kochen has also taught at Harvard and at Stanford Law School, where she was an Assistant Dean. Her publications have appeared in Aramaic Studies in Judaism and Early Christianity, The Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception, the New York Law Journal and the Jewish Law Association Studies. Kochen has also served as a board member at the Michigan and Arizona ACLUs.
  • Contributor: Madeline Kochen
  • Imprint: Cambridge University Press
  • ISBN13: 9780521493383
  • Number of Pages: 276
  • Packaged Dimensions: 152x229x17mm
  • Packaged Weight: 540
  • Format: Hardback
  • Publisher: Cambridge University Press
  • Release Date: 2014-08-21
  • Binding: Hardback
  • Biography: Madeline Kochen, a former Law Professor at the University of Michigan, is a public interest lawyer and a Talmudic scholar, with a PhD in religion and political philosophy from Harvard University, Massachusetts. After representing indigent defendants on appeal at the Legal Aid Society, she worked as an attorney for the New York Civil Liberties Union, where she eventually founded and directed the NYCLU Reproductive Rights Project. Kochen has also taught at Harvard and at Stanford Law School, where she was an Assistant Dean. Her publications have appeared in Aramaic Studies in Judaism and Early Christianity, The Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception, the New York Law Journal and the Jewish Law Association Studies. Kochen has also served as a board member at the Michigan and Arizona ACLUs.

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