Monday, August 28, 2000
Legal scholar examines Biblical sagas
In Called by Stories, UGA legal scholar and Presbyterian minister Milner Ball examines sagas and tales from the Bible for the light they shed on the practice of law and on the meaning of a life lived in the legal profession.
Scholars and lay-people alike typically think of the law as a discipline dominated by reason and empirical methods. Ball shows that many of the dilemmas and decisions that legal professionals confront are more usefully approached through an experience of narrative in which readers come to know themselves and their actions through stories.
He begins with Moses, who is obliged both to speak for God to the Hebrews and to advocate for the Hebrews before God. What, asks Ball, does Moses’ predicament say to lawyers professionally bound to zealous representation of only one client?
In a discussion of “The Gospel According to John,” Ball points out that the writer of this gospel is free simultaneously to be critical of law and to rely extensively on it. Ball uses this narrative to explore the boundaries of free will and independence in lawyering. By venturing into the world of powerful events and Biblical characters, Ball enables readers to contest their own expectations and assumptions.
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