In Search Of: Justice
Mark Estepp - 4/11/2021
In Search of: Justice
Psalm 89:14
Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne; steadfast love and faithfulness go before you.
Job 34:12
Of a truth, God will not do wickedly, and the Almighty will not pervert justice.
Psalm 140:12
I know that the Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted, and will execute justice for the needy.
Proverbs 18:5
It is not good to be partial to the wicked or to deprive the righteous of justice.
Genesis 18:19
For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him.”
Amos 5:24
But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
Isaiah 1:17
Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause.
Isaiah 30:18
Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.
Isaiah 61:8
For I the Lord love justice; I hate robbery and wrong; I will faithfully give them their recompense, and I will make an everlasting covenant with them.
Jeremiah 9:23-24
Thus says the Lord: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord.”
Jeremiah 22:3
Thus says the Lord: Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place.
Micah 6:8
He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
Which Justice?
Case Studies:
1. Earlier Enlightenment Thinkers
sought a basis for morality and justice not in God or religion but one that could be discovered by human reason alone.
2. David Hume, Enlightenment Thinker
The only basis for our moral decisions was not reason but sentiment–moral intuitions grounded largely in our emotions rather than in our thinking. Today his successors have taken his ideas out to their logical conclusion, that all moral claims are culturally constructed and so, ultimately, based on our feelings and preferences, not on anything objective.
3. John Rawls, Harvard Philosopher
“Veil of Ignorance”
People wouldn’t know what race, age, level of intelligence or talent, gender, or education level they will be or occupy in this new society, but they created the kind of society that they would want if they were poor, in a position weak in social power, then a society would develop that honored human rights without requiring any moral values or religious beliefs, all of which should remain private.
Michael Sandel, Harvard Political Philosopher
All notions of justice are “inescapably judgmental.”
The idea that “we should not bring moral or religious convictions to bear on public discussions about justice” is frankly impossible.
“Whether we’re arguing about . . . questions of justice are bound up with competing notions of honor and virtue, pride and recognition.”
Alasdair MacIntyre, Author of “Whose Justice? Which Rationality?”
There is no simple way to reason or to understand justice. Our rationality and understanding of justice depend on our beliefs about right and wrong, the nature of virtue, the relationship of the individual to the group, and many other things.
4. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
A uniqueness, it gives him worth, it gives him dignity. And we must never forget this as a nation: there are no gradations in the image of God. Every man from a treble white to bass black is significant on God’s keyboard, precisely because every man is made in the image of God.
Hebrew Word for Justice: Mishpat
Mishpat is giving people what they are due, whether punishment or protection or care. - Tim Keller
Luke 4:18-19
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”
The gospel of Jesus brings grace to the disgraced.
The gospel of Jesus breaks the cycle.
The gospel of Jesus calls us to do justice.