Contemporary people love tikkun olam because they think of it as revolutionary and progressive, and I want to make the case that the origins of tikkun olam are actually the opposite. It’s a conservative measure. Of course it’s revolutionary as a matter of process because you’re circumventing the typical legal process to enact something, but in terms of what you’re trying to achieve you’re trying to conserve social order, and you’re worried that the law is leading to some kind of anomaly, so it’s less about justice and more about just keeping society functional and surviving.

On the latest PloughCast, Susannah and Zohar discuss the meaning of tikkun olam.