Lexical Legal

A word of warning. The notion of concept plays an important role in legal theory, but generally legal theorists take the nature of the concepts themselves for granted. With the exception of work on the nature of law, where the notion of concept is sometimes questioned, legal theory rarely addresses profound questions about the nature of the concepts themselves. The ensuing discussion ignores many important philosophical questions about concepts. It is the lexicon of legal theory, not the lexicon of philosophers. For an introduction to philosophical issues, I recommend the entry on concepts in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which is cited in the bibliography at the end of this dictionary entry. The method of reflective equilibrium can be compared to what Rawls called “the method of geometry”. The analogy with geometry is intended to show the possibility that theories at the meta level can be justified by “first principles” arguments. If there were a set of principles of political morality or normative legal theory that were of course true, it might be possible to justify a theory at the meta-level with deductive arguments. The practical problem with such a theory is that there does not seem to be agreement on what the obvious premises of political morality are. At the beginning of the first year of law school, students will likely realize that facts are crucial. But the law school curriculum is designed in such a way that the process of establishing legal facts becomes almost invisible. Traditional first-year courses focus on appellate cases and legal norms.

The facts are there. The standards of appellate review largely isolate the factual finding of trial courts from review by appellate courts. And casebooks focus on legal rules, largely excluding cases that focus on the factual process. The law school`s primary course, which emphasizes fact-finding, is evidence, but in many versions of this course, the focus on issues of admissibility of evidence is not on trials in which jurors and judges move from evidence to findings of fact. The distinction between open-ended and controversial issues highlights another important concept – the concept of “permanent law”. Since a question of law may be contested even if it is not open, the notion of “permanent law” is not identical to all points of law for which there are relevant precedents. In addition, the permanent law can become “unstable” when lawyers and judges begin to question the appropriateness of binding participations (in the context of vertical stare decisis). The process of legal uncertainty is sometimes associated with major shifts in legal theory. For example, if the Supreme Court`s approach to interpretation and construction shifts from a mixture of purposivism and intentionalism to textualism, then many questions of law interpretation that are not “open” may become “controversial.” Even before entering law school, law students probably know that lawyers work with words and ideas.

But most law students will likely survive the first year without learning one of the most fundamental differences in legal theory — the distinction between words and concepts — and the closely related distinction between sentences and sentences. This article in the Legal Theory Lexicon provides a very brief introduction to these ideas and their applications in legal theory. The modal must be difficult both in the interpretation of the terms that contain it and in the translation of these terms. Traditionally, in legal texts, modal involves an obligation or obligation as opposed to its common function: the expression of the future (Tiersma: 105) 9. More importantly, Sabra (1995:31)10 argues that any legal verb preceded by “shall” is usually translated into Arabic in its current form. For clarity, we attach the following examples with their Arabic translations: When translating such a diverse lexical list of model sentences from Arabic to English, the translator`s task becomes relatively easier due to the existence of the corresponding archaic terms, so the translator tends to follow the standards in the target language: that is, an archaic term instead of an Arabic model term or an Arabic phrase. To illustrate this idea, here are some examples from the Leeds Arabic Legal Corpus: The English legal lexicon consists largely of archaic legal terms. However, this touch of archaism is not in vain, it is done intentionally. There are reasons for this tendency towards archaic words. Tiersma (1999)4 states that “legal language often aspires to a great formality, it naturally tends towards an archaic language” p. 95. What does “reverence” mean? Standard dictionary definitions define reverence as “respect and appreciation due to a superior or elder,” but this is not the technical legal meaning of reverence.

It is difficult to define the concept of “deference,” but deference appears to imply a relationship between two legal actors or institutions, for example, a court and a legislature. Deference usually refers to situations where the previous institution has some power over the institution to which it could appeal. Examples include (1) an appellate court, which reviews the decision of a court of first instance, (2) a court that reviews the constitutionality of laws, and (3) a court that reviews the legality of the actions of an administrative authority. It is perhaps not surprising, then, that most law students have never seriously thought about the logical structure of the fact-finding process. I have the impression that most students have a basic knowledge of the distinction between deductive and inductive arguments, but I suspect that many (or perhaps almost all) law students are not familiar with the idea of “interfering in the best explanation” or “abduction.” In fact, many readers might assume at this point that this dictionary entry will deal with an obscure topic that is of interest only to legal theorists: how important it might be to draw conclusions about the best explanation if law students, lawyers, and judges have never heard of it. But in fact, factual arguments based on the conclusion of the best explanation are pervasive in law. Knowing something about how such arguments work can be revealing and extremely helpful. Abstract concepts are also crucial in the field of international law, such as human rights documents. Although the terms (freedom – الحرية, privacy – الخصوصية, law – الحق, fundamental human rights – حقوق الإنسان الأساسية and equity – الانصاف) are commonly used in our daily lives, they are subject to many interpretations in the legal field. The translator must therefore take into account the differences in meaning that these terms may have in general and in the legal context [24, p. 116].

Expressions such as (reasonable measures – خطوات معقولة, reasonable measures – التدابير المعقولة, reasonable person – شخص عاقل and probably reasonable – ما لا يدع مجالا للشك) are typical common law phrases whose translation into Sharia or even civil law can be misleading.