Throughout history, law has carried two parallel identities: a reflection of society’s highest ideals and a mechanism for resolving disputes. In ancient civilizations such as Babylon, Egypt, and Greece, legal codes often blended moral vision with social order—Hammurabi’s Code invoked divine justice, while Athenian law linked civic duty to democratic participation. Roman law introduced the idea of *jus civile* and *jus naturale*, suggesting that human legislation could aspire to universal principles. During the Middle Ages, canon law and emerging common law traditions shaped societies’ understanding of fairness, rights, and moral authority. The Enlightenment transformed these foundations, with thinkers like Montesquieu and Rousseau proposing that law should embody rationality, equality, and the collective will. As modern nation-states developed, constitutions became explicit repositories of shared ideals, promising liberty, justice, and human rights. At the same time, industrialization and globalization expanded the law’s role as a pragmatic tool for managing complex social and economic conflicts.