The Limits of Justice
In his magisterial work The Four Cardinal Virtues, Josef Pieper concludes his reflection on Justice with a section on “The Limits of Justice.” Here are the last two paragraphs:
Communal life will necessarily become inhuman if man’s dues to man are determined by pure calculation. That the just man give to another what is not due to him is particularly important since injustice is the prevailing condition in our world. Because men must do without things that are due to them (since others are withholding them unjustly); since human need and want persist even though no specific person fails to fulfill his obligation, and even though no binding obligation can be construed for anyone; for these very reasons it is not “just and right” for the just man to restrict himself to rendering only what is strictly due. For it is true, as Thomas says, that “mercy without justice is the mother of dissolution”; but, also, that “justice without mercy is cruelty.”
Now it becomes possible to state the inner limits of justice: “To be willing to watch over peace and harmony among men through the commandments of justice is not enough when charity has not taken firm root among them.” (pp. 112-113)
Very often, people present mercy and justice as polar opposites, as things that temper one another or replace one another. But the whole Catholic tradition insists that God’s mercy and justice are, in fact, the same thing. God’s various attributes are not really “various” at all. It is simply the case that God’s love is perceived in different ways depending upon one’s vantage point. It is from within this tradition that Pieper can write that, in an unjust world, the just man cannot restrict himself to merely giving each his due. An eye for eye makes the world blind.
The fact is that once sin has entered the world, strict justice no longer works to establish equilibrium. What occurs when strict justice is attempted are blood feuds, sometimes lasting for generations. The simple fact is that, in most cases (maybe all cases), that of which which one is deprived by another cannot be restored. This is obvious if you kill my brother. There is no way to get my brother back. But it is also true if you steal my TV. Even if you buy me another, better, TV, you cannot give me back the night when I missed watching my favorite pitcher pitching a no-hitter because I had no TV. Heck, you can’t even really give me back Grey’s Anatomy. You can buy me a DVD, but you can’t give back the experience of watching my show, on my night, in my home. The moment has passed.
In stealing my TV you took more than a material object, you took away experience. And not just experience of watching TV, but also experience of security. Ask anyone whose home has been broken into what the worst part of it was. Not the missing electronics, but the sense of vulnerability.
We could continue in this vein. The point is that sin cannot be undone. When Jesus appeared in the upper room he appeared wounded. Even the resurrection doesn’t undo sin. Therefore, if we seek a theory of atonement whereby strict justice is perfectly fulfilled, we will be left unsatisfied. Strict justice cannot be perfectly fulfilled. No, what is needed is not bare, abstract justice, but forgiveness. Without forgiveness, without mercy, justice damns the whole world.
Brett Salkeld is a doctoral student in theology at Regis College in Toronto. He is a father of three (so far) and husband of one. He is the author of Can Catholics and Evangelicals Agree about Purgatory and the Last Judgment?
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Thanks for your insightful posts – I wish that I had more time to comment on more of them. I agree that strict justice isn’t really possible. I’d like to ask two questions:
1. Following Jesse Couenhaven, I wonder if forgiveness can be translated into a secular framework. Is forgiveness available to public reason? (You note that Pieper writes from “within” the Catholic tradition, which is based on the attributes of God.) Couenhaven says that some thinkers will define “forgiveness” as refraining from retailiation, because a victim recognizes that she is interconnected with the perpetrator and her whole community benefits from avoiding revenge. Couenhaven also says that some thinkers suggest that it is psychologically healthy to “get over” anger.
But he worries that this makes “forgiveness” the result of calculated self-interest. It’s better described as pardon or amnesty.
2. I worry that some Christians sharply distinguish between divine and human forgiveness. God can forgive because he is immutable and impassible, and, furthermore, can always offer a perpetrator new life in communion with him. Thus, in such a view, it is unrealistic for human beings, who have retributive emotions and do not always have the resources to offer a life-in-communion, to forgive. We recognize that we are called to image God’s forgiveness, but tragically acknowledge that, in many situations, we will be unable to do so.
So, are divine and human forgiveness analogous?
Thanks.
Would you consider mercy the fulfillment and perfection of justice?
Great post and good comments. I’m struck by Dan’s question, which seems to suggest that Justice be associated, say, with the Law, and Mercy with “Grace and Truth,” to quote John 1. In other words, the law was given through Moses (and expressed God’s Justice), and grace and truth were given through Jesus Christ, and expressed God’s Mercy as the “fulfillment and perfection” of the older law. (This is too simplistic, finally, but it may be helpful as a kind of rough and ready heuristic distinction.)
I think the scene with Jesus and the adulterous woman in John 8 is a nice dramatization of this view. Jesus is the only person who in perfect justice can kill the woman, and yet instead he offers mercy. (Note also that he does so before she expresses any contrition, before she asks for it, in other words. The mercy comes first, and then the challenge not to sin comes after; it’s not the other way around.)
@WJ — Spot on!
But the whole Catholic tradition insists that God’s mercy and justice are, in fact, the same thing.
What a beautiful insight…I would suggest that your thought is contained in this stanza from Psalm 85:
Mercy and faithfulness have met;
justice and peace have embraced.
Faithfulness shall spring from the earth
and justice look down from heaven
In a time of contemplation I can imagine the faithful/merciful soul looking up and sharing a peaceful gaze with the God of justice who smiles and looks down from heaven.
Wonderful. “Faithfulness shall spring form the earth”? Looks like the Incarnation to me.
Strict justice cannot be perfectly fulfilled. No, what is needed is not bare, abstract justice, but forgiveness. Without forgiveness, without mercy, justice damns the whole world.
I would even take this a step further and argue that what we perceive to be justice in the temporal order is imperfect at best, and illusory at worst. If I cannot forgive the person who stole my TV because of the injustice they did to me, am I not actually the one who is unjust – valuing the empty joy of a fleeting experience more than a permanent relationship with a being of intrinsic value?
Indeed, strict justice is an illusion. The only just justice is a merciful one.
Hello Brett. Just wanted to say that’s excellent you chose this book to comment on here at Vox Nova. This book was recommended to me by one of the Gr. 12 moral theology teachers at my high school alma mater, St. Michael’s College School, when I asked him about re-reading/learning what I had lost and forgotten of the course. The 4 cardinal and 3 theological virtues are still part of that course.