Law and Humanities

Author: Lin Laifan
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2007-01-01
Features: The close relationship between law and the humanities can also be examined through the actual connection between law and the humanities. The term "humanities" refers, according to the interpretation of contemporary Taiwanese scholar Yang Yihua, to "human culture," meaning various human activities centered on human survival, such as economics, architecture, religion, law, art, literature, music, philosophy, and so on. The categories are too numerous to list, vast in scope, and can all be encompassed by the term "humanities." Therefore, treating law as a humanities discipline is a matter of course. Since legal texts are the embodiment of the human spirit, and the "creation" (enactment and revision) and "interpretation" (explanation or interpretation) of law can also be directly understood as a humanistic activity, then how to refine and uncover the humanistic spirit within law, or how to nourish and even reflect on law with the humanistic spirit, as well as how to break through the closed state of law as a "narrowly focused discipline" as described by Japanese comparative law scholar Daito Masao, and further grasp and handle the natural close relationship between law and other fields that also belong to the humanities from multidimensional perspectives, has become a topic worthy of our high attention. In a country with a particularly rich foundation in the humanities, especially in the current context of inevitable value pluralism and fluidity, where the "confusion of polytheism" is unavoidable, and law is often entirely regarded as a "social science" or a cold discipline, the aforementioned topic is particularly important.