ABSTRACT
The relations between law and conscience- conscience in which civil disobedience is rooted- in classical Jewish thought are extremely subtle and complex. Conscience, as a specific concept of value, does not appear in the Hebrew Scriptures. The dialectic of the conceptual relations between the demands of conscience and those of enacted law or orders of the state is probably impossible to express with any precision. Civil disobedience is not offered as an everyday method for meeting unwelcome situations, for the amelioration of which society and individuals must find other methods and agencies. In the light of the Talmudic principles of non-violent civil disobedience, the attitude of the Rabbis to Masada and its defenders, led by Eliezar ben Yair, is entirely understandable. The legal order provides a constitutional or higher law by which a man is commanded to disobey certain orders, even when they are made by the king or other high officers of the state.
