You searched for: “judge
judge (s) (noun), judges (pl)
1. A high-ranking court officer, or a public official who hears and decides cases brought before a court of law: The judge decided to give the accused man a suspended sentence and allowed him to go.
2. Someone who supervises court trials, instructs juries, and pronounces judicial sentences: Frederik has been a well-known judge in the community for over twenty years.
3. A person, sometimes one of several, appointed to assess entries or performances in a competition and decide who wins: Sam was one of the judges for the artistic exhibition contest.
4. Someone who forms an opinion about some action or criticizes the behavior of another person or people: The teacher decided that he couldn't judge Lorna's school work adequately because she has been absent too often.
5. Etymology: "to form an opinion about", from Anglo-French juger, from Old French jugier "to judge", from Latin judicare "to judge", from judicem "to judge", a compound of jus "right, law" + root of dicere "to say".
This entry is located in the following unit: jud-, judic- (page 1)
judge (verb), judges; judged; judging
1. To form an opinion about something after considering all the details or facts: Judge Clifford was given the responsibility of judging this special case.
2. To decide who or what is the winner of a competition: Amy was authorized to judge who was the champion of the contest.
3. To assess the quality of something or to estimate probabilities: Each suggestion must be judged on its own merits.
4. To form an opinion about someone or something; especially, after thinking whether it has met certain standards: The group judged Trudy's cake to be the best in the baking competition.
This entry is located in the following unit: jud-, judic- (page 1)
More possibly related word entries
A unit related to: “judge
(Latin: consider, judge; spectator, listener, witness; originally, "decided by one's own discretion or judgment")
(Latin: to count, to reckon, to assess, to estimate, to value, to deem, to judge; judgment, criticism; Latin censura and French censure)
(Greek: to separate; a separating, putting apart; a decision, decide; to judge)
(Greek: a judge; right, order, law, manner; justice)
(Latin: to suppose, to think, to judge)
Word Entries containing the term: “judge
district judge (s) (noun), district judges (pl)
A high-ranking court officer, or a public official, who presides over a U.S. Federal or State court.
This entry is located in the following units: distric- (page 1) jud-, judic- (page 1)
Wife-beating is "sanctioned" by Koran according to a German judge

A German judge has stirred a storm of protest in Frankfurt, Germany, by citing the Koran in turning down a German Muslim wife's request for a fast-track divorce on the ground that her husband beat her.

In a remarkable ruling that underlines the tension between Muslim customs and European laws, the judge, Christa Datz-Winter, said the couple came from a Moroccan cultural environment in which it is common for husbands to beat their wives. The Koran, she wrote, sanctions such physical abuse.

News of the ruling brought swift and sharp condemnation from politicians, legal experts, and Muslim leaders in Germany; many of whom said they were confounded that a German judge would put seventh-century Islamic religious teaching ahead of German law in deciding a case of domestic violence.

While legal experts said the ruling was a judicial misstep rather than evidence of a broader trend, it comes at a time of rising tensions in Germany and elsewhere in Europe, as authorities in many fields struggle to reconcile Western values with their burgeoning Muslim minorities.

Last fall, a Berlin opera house canceled performances of a modified Mozart opera because of security fears stirred by an added scene that depicted the severed head of the Prophet Muhammad.

Stung by charges that it had surrendered its artistic freedom, it staged the opera three months later without incident.

To some people here, the ruling reflects a similar compromising of basic values in the name of cultural sensitivity.

Muslim leaders agreed that Muslims living here must be judged by the German legal code, but they were just as offended by what they characterized as the judge's misinterpretation of a much-debated passage in the Koran governing relations between husbands and wives.

For some people, the greatest damage done by this episode is to other Muslim women suffering from domestic abuse. Many already fear going to court against their spouses.

There have been a series of so-called "honor killings" here in which Turkish Muslim men have murdered women.

—Compiled from excerpts of an article,
"German judge rouses anger by citing Koran: She claims it sanctions wife-beating";
by Mark Landler; International Herald Tribune; March 23, 2007; pages 1 & 4.
This entry is located in the following unit: sanct-, sancti- (page 3)