ABSTRACT
This chapter explains some central strands of traditional approaches to an understanding of the meaning of law. The issue that stands behind nearly every controversy in contemporary legal theory is the problem of how law is to be understood in relation to moral values. Within the present-day common law jurisdictions, there is a general expectation that the written law and legal judgement will at least roughly approximate to prevailing moral values and moral judgements. The myth of the congruence between morality and law is also exposed by any reflection on the history of institutionalised injustice and the struggles for equality and human rights. On the one hand, the law is in many respects less demanding than any serious moral code. On the other hand, however, the law is in some senses more demanding than morality. The positivist separation thesis insists that the law is one thing and morality, or the moral evaluation of the law, is another.
