Introduction: The Jewish Lawyer
PART I
The Biblical Narrative: The Lawyer Abraham
1. God Meets Abram—and So Do We
2. God Tests Abraham and Abraham Passes—at Least the First Test
3. Abraham Refuses to Argue with God and with His Wife over the
Lives of His Children—Failing God’s Next Test
4. Abraham Negotiates to Buy a Burial Cave for Sarah
PART II
In the Footsteps of Abraham: Jews on Trial, as Defendants and
Defenders
Introduction
5. The Trial of Jesus, the Conviction of the Jews, and the Blood
Libel
6. Alfred Dreyfus, Leo Frank, Rudolf Slansky, Anatoly Sharansky,
and the Nation-State of the Jewish People on Trial
7. The Jewish Lawyer as Abrahamic Idol Smasher, Advocate,
Collaborator, Rescuer, and Deal Maker
Epilogue: The Future of Abraham’s Descendants
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ is the New York Times best-selling author of more than thirty books. His articles have appeared in hundreds of publications, including The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Huffington Post, Harvard Law Review, The Yale Law Journal, The Jerusalem Post, and Haaretz. He is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law, Emeritus, at Harvard Law School, and has worked for more than fifty years in the areas of civil liberties, human rights, and criminal law. Honors he has received include the Anti-Defamation League's William O. Douglas First Amendment Freedom Award.
“At once frank and wry, Dershowitz demonstrates how the Jewish
value of the rule of law, and the actions of Jewish lawyers
themselves, have contributed to the pursuit of justice. Clear and
accessible, with endnotes to please scholars, this book will likely
appeal to both Jews and non-Jews.” —Publishers Weekly
“This is the biblical Abraham as you have never seen him before: as
the father of a long line of Jewish lawyers. Here is a story told
with wit, verve, and penetrating insight by one of the great Jewish
lawyers of our time—the fearless, peerless Alan Dershowitz. A
brilliant, entertaining, and wonderfully stimulating
book.”
—Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, author of Not in God’s Name
“We live in a period of dangerously escalating tensions among
religious communities, with old hatreds and stereotypes making
ominous comebacks. In this corrosive atmosphere, as Jews,
Christians, and Muslims try to sort out the intricate relationships
among their traditions so that a mutually respectful atmosphere can
be created, no single figure is more significant than Abraham. The
ancient patriarch is respected as the ‘Father of Faith’ by all
three communities, but how well is he understood? Alan Dershowitz
deftly reveals him in a fresh light, as the Jewish lawyer par
excellence, enabling us to appreciate the man from Ur of the
Chaldees in a new and lively way.”
—Harvey Cox, Hollis Research Professor of Divinity, Harvard
University, and author of How to Read the Bible
“The wit of the book’s subtitle continues in this sparkling history
of the world’s first Jew and the world’s first lawyer. You don’t
have to be Jewish, or a lawyer, or even a believer in the existence
of Abraham and his main legal adversary to be entertained and
informed by this delightful book.”
—Steven Pinker, author of The Language Instinct and The Better
Angels of our Nature, and Rebecca Goldstein, author of Betraying
Spinoza and Plato at the Googleplex
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