No justice, no God

July 17, 2015

Many of my siblings and their families will be hanging out at our place this weekend. We have an annual reunion that my husband and I are blessed to be able to host and it’s great fun. When we were all much younger my siblings and I shared living space every day but that was usually not so much fun. Fights regularly broke out over who was not doing their share of the work or took something that didn’t belong to them or got a bigger piece of cake. “That’s not fair!” was an oft-heard refrain.

We seem to have an innate sense of justice and fair play that presents itself at a very early age and which, I believe, is evidence that we are not just an uncreated happenstance of purpose-lacking time and chance [yes, I know I just used that expression last time, but I like it and it’s my blog and you’re not my mother, you can’t tell me what to do…so there]. Whoa…slipped into a little finite regress there.

If we are all simply the product of random mutations and natural selection, a soulless though highly-evolved and exquisite assemblage of matter and energy dancing to our DNA, as Richard Dawkins believes, why do we even have this instinctive awareness of justice? Why should fairness matter?

But it does matter and we do instinctively apprehend an objective reality that seems to require that we all treat each other fairly and demands that those who fail to do so suffer the consequences. Our justice system is founded on more than arbitrary rules instituted to keep the peace and protect citizens. It originates in a tangible, insistent, shared concept of real justice that inescapably bears on each one of us.

Only theism can adequately account for this. If we are merely the product of blind, natural processes, determined to gyrate to our genes and lacking free will, there is no overarching requirement of impartiality and equity and no guilt that can be laid for any perceived misdeed.

And only Christianity has the solution for the injustices that our shared history is riddled with, and the guilt that our personal history is marked by. The God of the Bible in the person of Jesus Christ will ultimately ensure perfect justice for the wicked and unrepentant, and has ensured perfect atonement for those who believe and trust in him.

Hitler, Stalin, and every Muslim terrorist has or will receive his just due. We instinctively know they should. Only a Christian worldview can affirm that they do.

Category : FAITH, LIFE AND JUSTICE

Tags : atheism, Christianity, faith, forgiveness, God, Jesus, judging, justice, life, salvation

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6 thoughts on “No justice, no God”

john zande on July 17, 2015 at 10:59 am said:

why do we even have this instinctive awareness of justice?

Because it has great evolutionary benefits.

That’s rather simple.

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john zande on July 17, 2015 at 11:03 am said:

Hitler, Stalin, and every Muslim terrorist has or will receive his just due. We instinctively know they should. Only a Christian worldview can affirm that they do.

Erm, no, pretty much every religion on the planet has a concept of cosmic justice. That’s what makes religions so appealing. This is a paragraph from my book:

Whether real or imagined, immediate or simply anticipated, fear is a vigorous source of massive confusion. It is the great motivator, the spring of almost all human—and animal—activity, and what finer statement of confused action is there than the erection and worship of a fallacious idol designed to combat fear itself? Is it not natural, after all, for a frightened child to run as far and as fast away as possible from that which terrifies her the most? Is it not natural, the Impartial Observer asks, for the horrified and distressed to reach for the thing which promises the greatest possible protection from danger and turmoil, when danger and turmoil saturate everything? Is it not natural to lust after justice—even if only promised in another world, in another life—when there is no justice to be had in this one?

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cogitatingduck on July 17, 2015 at 11:43 pm said:

HI John. If I’m not mistaken, in Islam Allah is fairly capricious. It’s not even clear Muhammad will enter Paradise. And in Asatru, don’t forces of darkness prevail over Valhalla? I’m more hesitant to say cosmic justice is universal.

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- john zande on July 18, 2015 at 11:22 pm said:
  
  Hi Duck
  
  Apologies, I didn’t see that you had replied to me.
  
  In my defense, I did say, “pretty much every religion.” And I’m not sure if you know this, but Allah is Yhwh. Muslims worship the same god as Jews and Christians: the Middle Eastern god of Abraham. Abraham is, in fact, described in the Qur’an as Yhwh’s best friend.
  
  Now, all eastern religions hold the concept of cosmic justice as central theme, and in the annals of the earth’s oldest and most copied monotheistic tradition, Zoroastrianism, the madness that has been caused by a malignant and unbalanced spirit, Angra Mainyu, will be corrected in a great settlement delivered by a saviour figure—the Saoshyant: the World Renovator and Victorious Benefactor—who will “defeat the evil of the progeny of the biped,” deliver “retribution for offenses,” reward noble deeds, and establish “the Kingdom of Good Thought” (righteousness).
  
  So, yes, it is pretty much universal. Now don’t get me wrong, I can fully appreciate why the concept is so tantalising to people. As i wrote above, the extract from my book, in a world so daringly deficient of integrity and equity, it is only natural for people to dream up such sweet solutions, even if those solutions (those reckonings) only unravel in another life, in another world.
  
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