HaPraklit

HaPraklit is a legal journal published by the Israel Bar Association since 1943. For more than eight decades, it has provided a leading forum for professional and academic discussion of Israeli law. In the state’s early years, before the law faculties established their own journals, it was the only legal periodical serving Israel’s lawyers and judges. Its history therefore belongs not only to legal publishing, but also to the formation of Israel’s Hebrew legal culture and public institutions.

Established during the Yishuv

The journal began with a decision taken at the 1943 conference of the Association of Jewish Lawyers in Mandatory Palestine to establish a legal publication. The task was assigned to the association’s president, attorney and Dr. Mordechai Eliash, and to his deputy, Moshe Dukan. The first issue appeared in Tel Aviv that same year under the auspices of the Association of Jewish Lawyers.

Patiel Dikstein was the journal’s first editor. He was later succeeded by Aharon Polonsky, whose articles in the early issues also appeared under the pen name “Apollo.” The journal’s launch during the Second World War, amid shortages of paper, public distress and global upheaval, represented an act of institution-building and a declaration of faith in law’s ability to shape the future of society.

In his introduction to the first issue, Mordechai Eliash wrote that the journal was entering the world “in a time of destruction and ruin,” when law, human freedom and the value of life were being trampled. Yet he also expressed hope that victory would bring renewed development of legal, political and social values for humanity, the Jewish people and the Land of Israel. From its beginning, HaPraklit thus presented law not merely as a professional technique, but as part of the effort to build a responsible, free and just society.

A forum for the emerging Israeli legal system

In the years before statehood and during Israel’s first years, HaPraklit became a central forum for debate about the character of the country’s legal system. Its pages addressed fundamental questions raised by state-building: the adoption of a new legal system, the place of Jewish law, the meaning of the Declaration of Independence, the importance of legal formalism, and the relationship between law, society and government.

Its contributors included leading figures in Israeli law and scholarship, among them Justices Haim Herman Cohn and Moshe Zilberg, as well as Professors Gad Tedeschi and Benjamin Akzin. Their participation demonstrated the journal’s role as a bridge between legal practice, the judiciary and the university. The articles and debates helped a young legal community confront questions that were practical as well as theoretical: how to construct a legal system in a new state, how to connect different legal traditions, and how to ensure that law would serve society rather than merely regulate it.

Before the law faculties created their own periodicals, HaPraklit was the principal professional platform for Israeli lawyers and judges. Its issues therefore preserve more than legal scholarship. They also record the concerns, aspirations and professional language of the generation that helped establish Israel’s legal system.

From an association publication to the Bar Association’s journal

In 1961, following the enactment of the Bar Association Law and the transformation of the association into a statutory body, HaPraklit became the Israel Bar Association’s principal professional legal journal. Around the same period, the Faculty of Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem joined the journal’s editorial framework. This development reflected the journal’s established place within the institutional infrastructure of the legal profession.

Over the decades, HaPraklit published the work of academics, judges and practicing attorneys. It gave the legal community a continuing venue for research, analysis of judgments and discussion of changes in legislation and professional practice. In this way, the journal connected legal knowledge with the daily work of those responsible for interpreting and applying the law in Israel’s changing society.

Editorial continuity and legal education

For many years, the journal was edited by Professor Miguel Deutch. From 2006 onward, Professors Yoram Rabin and Yaniv Vaki of the School of Law at the College of Management Academic Studies served as editors. During this period, the journal was produced in cooperation with students at the school, linking professional training with the practical work of legal research, writing and editing.

In more recent years, law students at the College of Management Academic Studies have continued to participate in editing the journal under the guidance of a senior faculty editor. This model extends HaPraklit’s educational role, allowing new generations of legal professionals to take part in preserving and renewing a longstanding institution.

As of 2010, the journal appeared twice a year, and its most recent issues were made available in full on its website. No new issues were published between 2016 and 2022. In 2022, the Israel Bar Association’s website began publishing a new issue of HaPraklit, edited by Dr. Yaniv Vaki and Dr. Alon Rhodes, marking an effort to resume the journal’s publication.

Why this legacy belongs in Moreshet

HaPraklit merits inclusion in Moreshet because it documents and embodies a formative chapter in the history of Israeli law, society and public institutions. Established during the Yishuv, it continued through the transition to statehood and helped sustain the professional community that developed Israel’s legal vocabulary and the institutions in which that law was studied, debated and applied.

Its importance lies in more than its longevity. For decades, the journal brought together judges, attorneys and scholars, while also providing a setting for discussion between Jewish legal tradition and modern legal systems. It enabled generations of legal professionals to engage with questions of liberty, responsibility, governance and the relationship between law and society. The continued involvement of students underscores its lasting influence: HaPraklit is not simply an archive of legal ideas, but an institution that helps prepare those who will shape Israel’s legal life in the future.

By preserving the history of this journal, Moreshet.com gives readers a broader context for understanding how a Hebrew and Israeli legal culture was built. The legacy of HaPraklit is a legacy of professional knowledge, institutional development, public debate and the conviction that law can provide a foundation for a free and just society.