Lawyers and judges are familiar with various competing theories or methods of legal interpretation and with arguments for and against those theories. (This chapter uses the terms theory of legal interpretation and method of legal interpretation interchangeably.) Leading theories include, for example, textualism, originalism, intentionalism, and purposivism. The questions of which theory is correct, and of the different theories’ pros and cons, are important. But there is a more fundamental question that is less often addressed: what is legal interpretation? More specifically, what does legal interpretation, by its nature, seek? What is its constitutive aim?