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Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

2008

Religion

Mark C Modak-Truran

Articles 1 - 3 of 3

Full-Text Articles in Law

Book Review: Michael J. Perry, Toward A Theory Of Human Rights: Religion, Law, Courts (2007), Mark C. Modak-Truran Jan 2008

Book Review: Michael J. Perry, Toward A Theory Of Human Rights: Religion, Law, Courts (2007), Mark C. Modak-Truran

Mark C Modak-Truran

This book review analyzes Michael J. Perry's most recent book Toward a Theory of Human Rights: Religion, Law, Courts. Perry's book brings together two previously separate aspects of his thoughtful and pioneering scholarship dealing with the proper relation of morality (especially religious morality) to law and human rights and the role of courts in protecting human rights. Perry's argument concentrates on three related issues: whether the morality of human rights has a religious or secular ground or both, the relation between the morality of human rights and the law of human rights, and the proper role of courts in protecting …


Introduction: Symposium On Religion, Religious Pluralism, And The Rule Of Law, Mark C. Modak-Truran Jan 2008

Introduction: Symposium On Religion, Religious Pluralism, And The Rule Of Law, Mark C. Modak-Truran

Mark C Modak-Truran

The articles and essays in this Symposium on Religion, Religious Pluralism, and the Rule of Law were presented for a Section on Law and Religion panel at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the Association of American Law Schools. The Symposium aims to move the debate about the relationship between law and religion beyond conflicts between secularists and religionists by focusing attention on presuppositions about religion, religious pluralism, and the rule of law. Focusing on these presuppositions helps get beyond the tendency of most legal scholars, judges, and lawyers to think through the law rather than about the law. The articles …


Beyond Theocracy And Secularism (Part I): Toward A New Paradigm For Law And Religion, Mark C. Modak-Truran Jan 2008

Beyond Theocracy And Secularism (Part I): Toward A New Paradigm For Law And Religion, Mark C. Modak-Truran

Mark C Modak-Truran

The continued vitality of religion has motivated many scholars in sociology, anthropology, political theory, international relations, and philosophy to revisit their assumptions about how religion relates to their disciplines. Despite this robust re-examination in other disciplines, two outmoded paradigms about the relationship between law and religion —theocracy (pre-modern) and secularism (modern)—continue to dominate legal theory. Under the modern paradigm, the secularization of law—that the law is or should be independent of any religious foundation or values—arguably constitutes the most widely-held but least-examined assumption in contemporary legal theory. My thesis is that two quandaries or crises for legal theory—legal indeterminacy and …