1 Biblical Republicanism: John Cotton's "Moses His Judicials" and American Hebraism Shira Wolosky In 1636, John Cotton was invited by the Magistrates of Massachusetts Bay Colony to "make a draught of laws agreeable to the word of God, which may be the fundamentals of this commonwealth." 1 Cotton's code was published as an "Abstract of Laws," called by John Winthrop "Moses his Judicials." Although not itself formally adopted by Massachusetts Bay Colony, the "Judicials" nevertheless significantly influenced subsequent Massachusetts law and became the basis of law for the New Haven Colony, later Connecticut. 2 Something like a constitution in the form of Biblical commentary, the "Judicials" were constructed as compilations of passages mainly from Deuteronomy, Exodus and Leviticus. As such, the document has been dismissed as "purely Old Testament legalism." 3 Theodore White Bozeman, for example, in his extensive treatment of Cotton, devotes a few passages to the "Judicials," presenting them as but another demonstration of Puritanism as a disciplinary, coercive regimen, in unyielding opposition against inner spirituality. This ultimately resulted in an "antinomian backlash" against the outward and repressive religion that fixated on Old Testament law. 4 This stark division, however, between external law as betraying inner spirituality, is one that misreads both theological innovation and social vision among the Puritans, not least as posited by John Cotton. In Puritan New England, theology emerges in close relationship to polity and government. 5