Oratie dhr. prof.dr. G. Falcone: The 'mysterious' beauty of laws

Oratie: dhr. prof.dr. G. Falcone

Titel: The 'mysterious' beauty of laws

Leeropdracht: Byzantine Law

Faculteit: Rechtsgeleerdheid

The beauty of the laws, proclaimed by Justinian in the constitutions which introduce his juridical monument (the Digest), far from being an empty rhetoric image, is a fundamental propaganda-motif. It alludes to the result achieved through the grandiose work of compilation concerning both the imperial constitutions and the texts of the classical jurists: result, which does not relate to the external form of the texts, but to a substantial characteristic. Such a reference to beauty is expression of a precise Byzantine conception of the law and of the imperial power; and the dimension of mysteriousness calls into question, from a particular point of view, the peculiar perspective of sacralisation of legal texts. The re-reading, in the modern age, of the relationship between beauty and mystery in relation to the laws marks a radical change of perspective: it is an example of that encounter between Byzantine propositions and ideas, on the one hand, and Western legal culture, on the other, which is one of the components, yet little explored, of the European legal tradition.