A promise is a commitment by someone to do or not do something.

In the law of contract, an exchange of promises is usually held to be legally enforceable, according to the Latin maxim pacta sunt servanda.

Types [link]

Both an oath and an affirmation can be a promise. One special kind of promise is the vow.

A notable type of promise is an election promise.

In contract law, a promise is a manifestation of intention to act or refrain from acting in a specified way.^[1] It is so made as to justify a promisee in understanding that a commitment has been made. The person manifesting the intention is the promiser. The person to whom the manifestation is addressed is the promisee. Where performance of the promise is assumed to benefit a person other than the promisee, that person is a beneficiary. But in contract law, the word promise is commonly used to refer to promises which result in the promiser's word justifying expectations of performance from which a legal duty will arise in term of results. For instance, A orally agrees to sell land to B. This is an offer. B agrees to buy the land and pays $1000 to A. This is an acceptance of the offer. If the land did not legally belong to A, his is a fraud and B is legally expected to recover his $1000 By virtue of this indirect recognition of the duty to convey promise accurately, the agreement is a contract.If the promise is obviously misunderstood, the contract is void. Some say that the contract is a promise for a promise.

Oath: Individuals that take oaths should be honest and sincere about their statement or goal and be committed to fulfil a specified oath.^[2]

Examples [link]

My friend promised me she would be there for my birthday.

My friend promised to do as I say.

My stepfather promised not to be cruel to me. - Cinderella

She gave me her promise.

I promise to watch this tv show before i go to bed.

Conditional commitment[link]

In loan guarantees, a commitment requires to meet an equity commitment, as well as other conditions, before the loan guarantee is closed.

Religion[link]

Religions have similar attitudes towards promises.

Christianity[link]

In Christianity, a distinction is made between simple promises and oaths or vows. An oath is a promise invoking God as a witness.^[3] A vow is a solemn form of a promise typically made to commit oneself to a moral good with God as witness, and binds oneself to its fulfillment over time.^[4]

Some groups of Christians, such as the Religious Society of Friends and the Mennonites, object to the taking of both oaths and affirmations, basing their objections upon a commandment given in the Sermon on the Mount, and regard all promises to be witnessed by God.

See also biblical covenants and biblical alliance.

Islam[link]

In An-Nahl, god forbids Muslims to break their promises after they have confirmed them. All promises are regarded as having Allah as their witness and guarantor. In the Hadith, the Prophet states that a Muslim who made a promise and then saw a better thing to do, should do the better thing and then make an act of atonement for breaking the promise.^{[citation needed]}. It is frowned upon/forbidden to break a promise in Islam. However when someone does break a promise, they are required to beg for forgiveness. One of the many ways of doing so is fasting for a prescribed amount of time. One of the four types of promises that are punished quickly is when you want to harm a relationship when the other person wants to keep it .^[5]

Philosophy[link]

Philosophers have tried to establish rules for promises. Immanual Kant suggesed promises should always be kept, while some cosequentialists argue that promises should be broken whenever doing so would yield benefits. In How to Make Good Decisions and Be Right All the Time, Iain King tried to reconcile these positions, suggesting that promises should be kept 'unless they are worth less to others than a new option is to you,' ^[6] and that this requires a relevant, unforeseen and reasonably unforeseeable change in the situation more important than the promise itself arising after the promise is made.^[7]

Politics[link]

Promises are made to offer assurance, especially during election. Political tactic to offer promise that would guarantee a better future to lure voters. However, certain promises are made with few realistic supports to ever become existent. 2008 US presidential election, candidate Obama promised to "Prevent drug companies from blocking generic drugs from consumers." The promise was to prevent drug companies producing newer drugs to be granted the permission to block alternative drugs to be offered at a cheaper price, forcing consumer to purchase drugs with a heightened retailed price. Since his election as president, Obama has proposed a bill to counteract the current problem. However, after the introduction of the bill, no further progress has been made. ^[8]

See also[link]

• Contract law
• Asmachta
• Documentality

References [link]

• Plato, The Republic (ca 370 BC) Book I, 33IB
• Cicero, De Officiis (ca 20 BC) I, C. IO, III, cc. 24-25
• Decretales of Gregory IX lib. II, tit. 26, C. 27, canon law did not enforce all promises
• Reinach, The Apriorischen Grundlagen des Bürgerlichen Rechtes (1922) §§ 2-4, that all rational societies need to have some way of making promises binding

Notes[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Promises