Ideals Face Reality

Description:

In this scholarly study, Fram draws upon the ordinances of Polish Jewry's political leadership, Polish legal records, and the responsa of some of the outstanding poseqim of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to show how Polish jurists responded to those complexities. His case studies, gleaned from a period of exceptional creativity in the annals of Polish Jewry, deal with weddings on the Sabbath, the rights of daughters to familial wealth, women in the marketplace, the personal reliability of those who dealt in the sale of kosher wine, competition among Jews for sources of livelihood obtained through leases (arendy), the transfer and payment of personal debts via bills payable to bearers (membrany), and personal insolvency. Fram shows how the Polish community, at times consciously and at times unconsciously, transformed some of its traditional values until they may have been unrecognizable to Jews from an earlier age.

subjects: Jews,  History,  Politics and government,  Legal status, laws,  Jewish law,  Cases,  Ethnic relations,  Jews, poland,  Jews, history, 70-1789,  Juifs,  Histoire,  Eastern,  Joden,  Gewoonterecht,  Politique et gouvernement,  Droit juif,  Procès,  Juis,  Statut juridique,  Jews, politics and government

Places: Poland

Times: 17th century,  16th century