91̽»¨

Chaim Saiman

Professor of Law
Chair in Jewish Law

Biography

Chaim Saiman is a scholar of Jewish law, insurance law and private law and publishedÌýHalakhah: The Rabbinic Idea of LawÌýwith Princeton University Press. Saiman has served as the Gruss Visiting Professor of Talmudic Law at both Harvard Law School and the University of Pennsylvania Law School, a visiting fellow at Princeton University and a visiting professor at the University of Toronto, Bar-Ilan, Hebrew University, IDC and Pepperdine University faculties of law. Saiman sits as a rabbinical court judge (dayyan) with the Beth Din of America andÌýserves as an expert witness in insurance law and Jewish law in federal court.

Saiman received his BS from Georgia State University and his JD from Columbia University School of Law. He also studied for a number of years at Yeshivat Har-Etzion (Gush) and Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh in Israel. Prior to joining the faculty at Villanova, he was an Olin Fellow at Harvard Law School a Golieb Fellow at NYU Law School, a law clerk to Judge Michael McConnell on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals and worked as a corporate associate with the firm Cleary Gottlieb in New York. At Villanova, Saiman teaches contracts, insurance law, insurance coverage disputes, Jewish law and arbitration.

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Practice Experience

  • Judicial Clerk to Michael McConnell, United States Court of Appeals (10th Circuit)
  • Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen and Hamilton (New York)
  • Joined the faculty in 2006

Recent Publications

  • Arbitration and the Rise of the Neo-Kahal (forthcoming), Scholarly, New , March 2025

  • Legal Fictions in Jewish Law (forthcoming) , Horeb: Studies in Rabbinic Culture , January 2025

  • The Authority of the Shulhan Arukh: A Case Study in the Halakhic Development of the Laws of Triage (forthcoming), Submitted, October 2024

  • Journal of the Beth Din of America, July (3rd Quarter/Summer) 2024

  • Oxford U. Press, July (3rd Quarter/Summer) 2024

Recent Presentations

  • 'Jewish and Islamic Legal Studies Forum', Conference Organizer & Respondant, 91̽»¨Law School, Villanova, PA . May 2025

  • 'Jewish Law Seminar', Arbitrating Pluralism, Tel Aviv U. Law School, Tel Aviv, Israel. May 2025

  • 'Religious Law and Power', Arbitrating Religious Autonomy and Power: A Qualitative Study of Rabbinical Courts in the American Legal System, NYU-Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv. May 2025

  • 'The Life and Thought of R. Dr. Aharon Lichtenstein ', R. Aharon Lichtenstein-- The Last Exilic Halakhist? , Bar Ilan U., Israel. May 2025

  • 'Harvard Hillel - Scholar in Residence', Series of 3 talks on Jewish law, Harvard U. , Cambridge, MA. April 2025

Office:ÌýRm 339, John F. Scarpa Hall
Phone:Ìý610-519-3296

Courses and Seminars

  • Advanced Insurance Seminar
  • Abitration: Law, Policy, and Procedure
  • Commercial and Religious Arbitration
  • Contracts
  • Insurance Law
  • Jewish Law Seminar
  • Legislation

Education

  • Columbia University School of Law, JD
  • Georgia State University, BA
  • Yeshivat Har Etzion
  • Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavne