Public Administration of Justice

Public Administration of Justice.

References to law and its administration are found even in the patriarchal period, when the head of one family and his associates were supreme in authority. Legal processes were simple and effective. In the period of the judges, the so-called judge was the court of final appeal. But after the establishment of the kingdom the king occupied the supreme bench. In postexilian times the people elected their own judges. Numerous statements distributed in different periods of history are found as to the purpose, the method, and the results of various penalties inflicted by authority. The laws concerning all of these specifications are codified in the Pentateuch.

As a subject of the state, each individual had certain property rights. When the tribes settled as husbandmen on their newly won territory, each family occupied its own land. This was its permanent possession. It could lease the same; but in the year of jubilee the land reverted to its first owners. The forfeiture of property rights for political offenses, such as is mentioned in Ezra, was unusual. Marriage also carried with it certain rights, carefully specified in the law. Personal property, the rights to buy and sell, regulations concerning debts, restitution, inheritance, etc., were amply protected or prescribed in the legal provisions of Israel. See Procedure, dure, Chattels, Sale.

Judaic, Archeology and Biblical

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