Table of Contents

Acknowledgments viii

Introduction 1

1 Ethics in the Axial Age 16

2 Some Aspects of Rabbinic Ethics 52

3 Medieval Philosophical Ethics 88

4 Medieval Rabbinic and Kabbalistic Ethics 124

5 Modern Jewish Ethics 156

Conclusion 199

Index 202

About the Author

Alan Mittleman is Professor of Jewish Thought at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York City. His books include Hope in a Democratic Age (2009) and The Scepter Shall Not Depart from Judah (2000). Mittleman's work seeks to bring Jewish thought into a constructive conversation with ethics, political theory, and philosophy of religion.

Reviews

This is a fine study and relatively accessible for anacademic work ... The book is mostly descriptive rather thanevaluative. Dr. Mittleman does seem particularly concerned to showthe value of Jewish ethics to those operating from mainstreamsecular philosophical schools of thought. Recommended. (Association of Jewish Libraries Reviews, 1 September2012) For those with some background, Mittleman provides athoughtful tour through a number of seminal moments in Jewishethical reflection. Summing Up: Recommended. Someadvanced undergraduates, graduate students, andresearchers/faculty. (Choice, 1 July 2012)"[It] admirably recounts the Jewish tradition of ethical inquiryfrom its biblical beginnings until today. Mittleman is thoroughlyat home in the primary sources and secondary literature. He is alsoan expert on contemporary moral philosophy, which enables him tocontextualize Jewish thought within a wider framework of ethicaltheory ... He covers a vast amount of information in 200 pages, andthe reader who perseveres will learn much about the broad sweep ofJewish ethical thinking." Jewish Ideas Daily