Naturally, I added and instructed that at the end of the day we will return to the questions that are directly related to the parasha before us. My colleague Justice Rivlin was puzzled by my order to hold another hearing in the judgment in the appeal, and I am puzzled by his astonishment. Indeed, my opinion is – and my opinion is determined – that it would have been appropriate for the Apropim ruling to have another hearing held shortly after her birth, and since this has not been done, it is appropriate that another hearing be held as it is today, if only for the determination of its boundaries and boundaries.
Ways of interpreting a contract
- The methods of interpretation of a contract by a court were determined by law, and this is how the legislature instructed us insection 25(a) of the Contracts (General Part) Law, 5733-1973 (the Contracts Law):
| Interpretation of a Contract | 25. (a) A contract shall be interpreted according to the intentions of the parties, as it is implied in the contract, and to the extent that it is not implied by it, from the circumstances. |
We will note in this place – and we will return to this issue later in our discussion below – that the concept of a "contract" is a normative concept. A contract means a certain and binding relationship between two parties, and in the words of section 1 of the Contracts Law: "A contract is concluded by way of an offer and acceptance under this law." Section 23 of the Contracts Law further instructs us that "a contract may be made orally, in writing or in any other form, unless there is a certain form that is a condition for its validity by law or agreement between the parties." It is important that we remember this from the very beginning, since the halakha speaks, primarily, of a written contract, whereas we must remember that this is not necessarily the case.
- Everyone agrees that the essence of the interpretation of a contract is the disclosure of the joint intention of the parties – i.e., the disclosure of the intentions of the parties – and that the interpreter's task is to reveal and disclose that common intention. However, while the purpose of the interpretation is known and agreed upon by all, there are differences of opinion as to how the interpreter will make his way at the time of his activity to reveal the intention of the parties and what will be the technique that he will use in the act of interpretation. Instead, we found two main theories of interpretation. At the beginning of the journey, the two are close to each other, but as the road progresses, the paths separate and each goes in its own way.
- One Torah, the one that ruled the Dome for many years, is the Torah called the Torah of the "Two Stages." It originates from the provision of section 25 of the Contracts Law, and its essence is the existence of a two-stage interpretation process to identify the intentions of the parties. In the first stage, we learn the intention "as it is implied in the contract", and in the case of a written contract – from the written language of the contract; However, if the parties' opinion is not implied by the contract ("and to the extent that it is not implied"), the interpreter is referred to the second stage, in which the "circumstances" that may also testify to the intention of the parties are examined. The two-stage theory assumes, therefore, that the intention of the parties may be implied in the contract, and in this spirit the case law instructs us that the court is not required to interpret "from the circumstances" where the contract is clear and explicit. We discussed the principles of the two-stage doctrine in the case of Skelly v. Doran (Civil Appeal 5795/90, IsrSC 46(5) 811, 817), and we said as follows:
An interpreter is supposed to pass through two stations when he seeks to assess the opinion of the parties to the contract: the first station is the opinion of the parties as implied in the contract, and the other station is – to the extent that their opinion is not implied in the contract – (estimating) the opinion of the parties as implied by the circumstances. In the interpretation of section 25(a) of the Contracts Law, the Halakha further determined that interpretation is not required according to the circumstances except where the opinion of the parties is not implied in the contract itself.