Nevertheless, he had risen to great heights of rhetorical and legalistic reason. And this corresponds to the position that the legalistic opposition had now taken. If he still has time, he can devote it to legalistic discussions, and it wouldn`t hurt. Al-Mughni`s testimony was technical, legalistic, convoluted and totally unconvincing. The crisis becomes less dangerous when it becomes legalistic and technical. They protect against exaggeration and abuse of already defended freedom against legalistic encroachments. The author is ill-equipped to assess the special value of Roman legalism to humanity. In law, using legalism as a guiding principle means reviewing the decisions of established courts and laws of Congress, and then deciding cases based on those decisions alone. If a starving person steals food, legality would require a judge to find them guilty of theft based on applicable law, regardless of their specific circumstances. Legalism is derived from the Latin lex, “rule”. Britannica.com: Encyclopedia article on legalism Legalism is a strict and literal interpretation of the law, regardless of specific circumstances.
So we have the introduction of legalism into the occasional affairs of the tropics and the disappearance of primitive license. Is it a disinterested and impartial justice, the high legalism of the Golden Rule, which would be the way of the humanist? The legalistic controversy over missionary methods had previously absorbed so much energy that there was not much left for missionary work. (a self-righteous legalism arises) Page 140: The subconscious has become the subconscious. 1843, with -ic + legalist “one who advocates strict respect for the law”, especially in theology (1640s); See Legal + -ist. Legalism in theology has been attested since 1838. This legalism was accompanied by a spirit of intense exclusivity and narrow ecclesiasticalness. Two great intellectual currents came together in the last century to bring America into this state of hyper-legalism.