Comments on: Justice defined and illustrated

By: Rachel

Rachel — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 00:34:05 +0000

One thing concerns me about the monk’s scenario of divine justice: it involves lying. To give up having more peaches, and then say that you don’t like them when you do, isn’t honest or true. I can see, though, simply eating one peach and saying you don’t want another one, since there is a level of wanting where you want your friend to eat and enjoy as much as possible.

By: Stacy

Stacy — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 04:27:36 +0000

I like what Barnabas said… I’ll go with that.

By: Barnabas Powell

Barnabas Powell — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 09:39:06 +0000

Oh, I’ve come to the conclusion that the whole concept of “fairness” is an illusion.

Not that it doesn’t exist, but that humans do not have the ability to actually understand the concept or to apply it.

The idea of “fair” has been used to enslave whole societies to a notion of redistribution that creates the elevation of mediocrity to a virtue.

As I told my daughters growing up, there is no such thing as “fair,” only kindness and mercy. Seek “fairness and you will be condenmed to perpetual bitterness and disappointment.

Jesus illustrated this best with the parable of the rich man and his workers. The workers who started working in the vinyard late received the same wage as those who had started at the beginning of the day. and those workers were angry that they hadn’t received more.

Yep, no such thing as “fair.”

By: Karl Thienes

Karl Thienes — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 15:44:44 +0000

Re: what Jan said - this principle is illustrated quite poignantly in Lewis’ “Screwtape Letters” by the mother of the patient who prides herself on not being a glutton while all the while saying she only wants a “good cup of tea”….

Also re: what Paula said - silence is far better than words. If to acheive divine justice one must lie (”I don’t like peaches very much…”) there is something amiss. Far better to simply divy them up 50/50 than to delude one’s neighbor.

By: Paula

Paula — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 17:28:13 +0000

Jan, I think your cynicism stems from the common experience of finding oneself seemingly the beneficiary of largesse only to learn that it was a set-up. This happens so often that I find myself not trusting someone who seems to be too kind.

One can accomplish the divine justice scenario without saying anything, simply eating a peach and leaving the rest. Unless skillfully done, words can actually convey the impression that one has the power to give or withhold peaches which are actually a shared commodity.

Two similarly inclined individuals would perhaps eat one peach apiece (say that three times fast!) everyday so that a peach is consumed by each for five days. That is not only just, it is comradely.

By: Jan

Jan — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 15:12:44 +0000

In reality, as most people practice it, it would be, “Oh, please, I hate peaches. Eat them all,” and then later, “What a pig. He ate all the peaches. He should have known how much I love them.” In such a case, human justice would be kinder and more honest.

The other thing that happens in real life: “Oh, A doesn’t like/need/want peaches as much as B does, so A should give all the peaches to B. And I’ll just keep my own.”

Sorry to drop a bag of cynicism on your blog. I should probably keep it to myself.

By: Divine Justice « The Blog of Seth

Divine Justice « The Blog of Seth — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 08:32:07 +0000

[…] Read the rest at his site. It’s really good and should not only be read and thought about, but practiced more. […]

By: Stacy

Stacy — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 04:12:03 +0000

Wow… that really is a hard lesson to learn. I mean, who am I kidding?? I’d be doing good to get to the human justice part… or to simply not pat myself on the back for sharing 3 when I could have just taken them all for myself.

Hmmm… good mirror in which to see myself. Bad reflection