David Novak #1

David Novak (1941-) is a scholar of Jewish philosophy, law (Halakha) and ethics. He has Conservative rabbinical ordination and has trained with Catholic moral theologians. Trained at Georgetown University, Novak has taught at the University of Virginia and currently teaches at the University of Toronto.

Novak has contributed to Jewish ethics by advocating a Jewish social ethics drawn from both the natural law tradition and Halakha. To this end, he interprets the rabbinic approach to Noahide laws as a useful grounding for cross-cultural moral reasoning. He also writes extensively on Jewish-Christian relations. His expertise includes Maimonides, John Courtney Murray, and Paul Tillich.

His specific normative claims in Jewish ethics include a curious mix of what may be characterized as liberal and right-wing positions. An ordained rabbi, Novak had been affiliated with the Conservative movement in Judaism and then shifted to the Union for Traditional Judaism.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Novak

People of the Covenant

by John T. Pawlikowski

Copyright (c) 1996 First Things (April 1996).

The Election of Israel: The Idea of the Chosen People
By David Novak
Cambridge University Press, 285 pages, $54.95

David Novak, deeply rooted as his writing always is in classical Jewish religious thought, here addresses the issue of religious identity in light of the challenge of modernity. While his sources and his response are quite specifically Jewish, his questions and his method of inquiry put before all believing people today fundamental issues of religious identity. Seeing this volume as the logical sequel to his earlier works The Image of the Non-Jew in Judaism and Jewish–Christian Dialogue, Novak asks the fundamental question for the contemporary Jew who desires to live out in the world: What does it mean to be part of an “elected” or “chosen” people?

http://www.firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=3845&var_recherche=wyschogrod

--> Michael Wyschogrod (the contemporary Orthodox Jewish philosopher who has reaffirmed Israel’s election as a central tenet in his book The Body of Faith: Judaism as Corporeal Election).