Resistance of Talmudic law against Roman law? Introductory remarks based on the rules on liability for animals. It is sometimes assumed that Talmudic civil law was barely more than a copy of Roman law. Rabbis indeed lived in a Roman-law environment and a superficial look at Talmudic and Roman law does reveal many similarities. However, an attentive analysis of the rules on liability for animals unveils Talmudic law’s single characteristics and indeed its resistance to external influences in this context; verisimilar the rabbis endeavoured to preserve the independence of Talmudic law from the secular ruling authority rather than conforming with it.