Responsa, the plural of the Latin responsum meaning answer, comprise a genre of written decisions and rulings given by legal scholars in response to questions addressed to them; in Jewish tradition the genre is known as she'elot u-teshuvot, Hebrew for questions and answers. The genre consists of written rulings issued by poskim, deciders of Jewish law, addressing practical and theoretical inquiries from community members on matters not covered by existing law codes, functioning similarly to legal precedent and consulted by later decisors much as case law is consulted in other legal traditions. Covering subjects from ethics and business conduct to philosophy and textual interpretation, responsa supplement established legal codes, are sometimes incorporated into later legal compilations, and provide valuable historical and cultural documentation of Jewish communities across roughly seventeen centuries.
Facts
Notable ExampleDigesta (Digests) in 90 books by the second century Roman jurist Salvius Julianus 1 Defining TraitIn Jewish law, answers to practical questions on new contingencies for which the codes of law make no provision 1 Sources
1. Responsa - Wikipedia
Section In the Roman Empire, second paragraph
consisting of responsa on real and hypothetical cases, cited by many later Roman legal writers.
Section In Judaism, fifth paragraph
The questions forwarded are usually practical, and often concerned with new contingencies for which no provision has been made in the
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