Jesus and Old Testament Justice

Introduction to the Old Testament Essay 2020

The New Testament describes a God who chose to become a lowly man to call sinners to Himself. This man, Jesus, showed continuous concern for the poor and suffering during His ministry, and desired justice for them. He blessed and healed them and brought many out from poverty. Being a part of His consistent nature as God, and of the nature of creation as He intended it, Jesus never alters the meaning of justice. This justice took both a retributive and restorative form and was intended to encourage a flourishing of all who were created in His image. The justice of the Old Testament is the same justice that was at the core of Jesus’ concern for the vulnerable.

Justice is a central component in Israel’s history and law. This is because it is an attribute of God Himself and was woven into the very fabric of His creation. It describes what ought to be, or what was intended to be. Justice is an intimate and unchangeable part of God. We know that God loves and is love (1Jn4:8), and His desire for justice is rooted in this truth (Ps33:5, 37:28, Is61:8). God loves justice because He loves His creation, and active justice enables His creation to flourish. Unlike other gods of the ancient near east who were associated with the upper class, the God of Israel is described as a God of the powerless and suffering (Ps68:5, 146:7, Pr14:31). He cannot tolerate injustice (Hb1:13) and He has the authority to deal out both judgement and mercy in response to it. The Old Testament is full of examples of man’s sinful injustice and God’s restoring justice – often taking the form of acts of deliverance and punishment. God’s just character is reflected in His creation. Humans are separated from all other creatures as the “image of God” (Gn1:27). Because of this, each person is equal and deserving of dignity and justice. “Tsedeka” (“righteousness”) refers to right relationships, and to treating others with the worth that is due to them as an image of God. The book of Proverbs indicates that “chokmah” (“wisdom”) is a universal force that guides people to make good and just decisions. Proverbs is widely considered the guidebook to having mastery over life. The prophet Amos seems to encourage the idea that justice is intrinsically connected to life (Am5:6, 14, 24), which then implies that Proverbs is a guidebook to having mastery over the ways of justice. Chokmah is an attribute of God that He used to create the world, so is deeply woven into the fabric of reality. It produces an ordered world in which good people prosper and bad people struggle (Pr13:20). In the intended world, chokmah manifests as justice, which is an obedience to the will and standards of God. To be just is not necessarily to be sinless, but to trust and follow God. Because God is holy, biblical justice begins with holiness, and is therefore manifest only in those who fear Him. Justice again intertwines with chokmah, as, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of chokmah” (Pr9:10). Justice is a feature of God (and therefore also Jesus), is due to all members of humanity, and is an underlying element of creation as it was intended.

The Hebrew term for “justice” is “mishpat.” It sometimes refers to the retributive justice that punishes wrongdoers, but it most often refers to restorative justice, which is concerned with the fair treatment of all people in line with their God-given dignity. It means seeking out the vulnerable and exploited and helping them and standing up for them (Pr31:8, Je22:3). Tsedeka and mishpat are used synonymously in the Old Testament, and their ancient meanings are often confused by the English understanding of justice. During the Patriarchal period, tsedeka referred to conformity to an accepted standard, which would later be identified as God’s standard, which is the highest measure of human conduct and holiness. The word would also relate to grace. In Psalms 51:14, David seeks a redemptive tsedeka, praying for forgiveness for having Uriah killed. God makes the unworthy righteous, and commands believers to help the poor and suffering via justice (Is1:17). In the later part of the Old Testament, justice refers to charity and giving to the vulnerable. The Hebrew word “rashah” refers to wickedness or injustice. About forty times in the book of Proverbs, rashah is described in opposition to tsedeka, in that a person with this characteristic ignores the dignity of those created in God’s image. At the centre of justice, in whatever slight variation it may be used, is the idea that man is created in God’s image and is deserving of dignity and equal treatment. Mishpat refers to people’s God-given rights, which should be granted and protected simply because they are creatures made in His image. And indeed, people relied upon these rights. For example, the Levite tribe did not own land. They looked after the temple. Various passages (Nu18, De14, 18) talk about the temple tax, and the tithes that the Levite priests were to live on. The Levites had a mishpat (a right) to a tenth of the income of the other tribes. Had their mishpat been violated, they would have starved. The law, writings and prophets demonstrate a special concern for the lowly, or those who scholar Nicholas Wolterstorff would call members of the “quartet of the vulnerable,” that is the widow, the orphan, the immigrant and the poor. These were the people who lived in instability due to having no association with a family who owned land, and being a patriarchal society, it was easy to take land from a widow. Injustice was not evenly dealt. When discussing mishpat, members of this group are often referred to. The prophets and psalmists seem to regard the care for the vulnerable as so intrinsic to justice that they do not bother to argue for it, they simply assume that this is the case – Israel’s history implied enough. From the time of Abraham, they were intended to be a just people who followed the ways of God (Gn18:19). When they were oppressed as slaves, God declared Egypt to be rashah, sending plagues and a deliverer. While in the desert, journeying to the Promised Land, they were given the law (De16:20). The law warned against partiality to either the poor or rich, and against the bribery of judges, saying, “you are to judge your neighbour fairly” (Le19:15, as well as Ex23:2, De1:16-17, 16:18-19). The powerful were called to respect the dignity of the powerless (Ex22:24-26) and vice versa. As Wolterstorff puts it, “Security is everyone’s right,” and everyone is equal under the law, no one is above it (Le24:22). In fact, the law required of landowners to leave part of their harvest for the vulnerable so that they might provide for themselves on their land (Le19:10, De24) – this was a mishpat of the vulnerable. Laws regarding the Sabbath and Jubilee years are a radical example of Old Testament justice. Every seven years was a year of rest and a cancellation of debts, and after seven of these sabbatical years, the Jubilee year would have slaves set free and ancestral land returned to its original owners (Le25, De15). These laws meant that those who feel on hard times were able to be restored to a position where they might be allowed to flourish. Of course, Israel failed to live up to these laws and a succession of evil kings would guide the people toward the ways of injustice. While all the prophets touch upon the injustices of Judah and Israel, and emphasise God’s desire for righteousness, Amos focusses most strongly on the issue in his message against the affluent. In Israel, the poor were being exploited and oppressed, the judicial and religious institutions were corrupt, and the elite were apathetic toward their own sins and impending destruction. Amos accuses them, “You have turned mishpat into poison, and the fruit of tsedeka into wormwood” (6:12), which means that they were being declared guilty of rashah (Ps37:12), and they would face retributive justice for it (2Ki25, Ze7). This Old Testament understanding of justice was the same understanding that Jesus had during His ministry. The book of Luke emphasises Christ’s concern for the vulnerable. At the very beginning of His ministry, He reads from Isaiah 61:1-2, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor” (Lu4:14-27). He helped those who couldn’t help themselves, and He tells His followers to do the same (Lu14:12-14, Jn13:34). To love your neighbour (Lu10:27) is to “do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God” (Mi6:8). Jesus is saviour because He is just, and His restorative-redemptive justice is seen in every aspect of His ministry, coming to a climax at His death and resurrection – the ultimate act of helping the helpless (2Co8:9).

Throughout this discussion of justice, there have been numerous relevant Bible references in brackets, and these are not nearly all that the Old Testament has to say regarding justice. Justice is a huge and consistent theme throughout the Judeo-Christian tradition as a whole. Justice, as either mishpat or tsedeka, is grounded in the understanding of humans as creatures made in God’s image. All people should be free from oppression, and be given opportunity to flourish, because they have equal worth and dignity due to them. Justice is an intimate element of God and the intended order of the world and how people should relate in it. Being God, Jesus loved justice, and this was evident in both word and deed throughout His ministry.

Boadt, Lawrence. Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction

https://brill.com/view/journals/vt/53/3/article-p283_1.xml

https://thebibleproject.simplecast.com/episodes/703c805b-8c64aafe

https://scholarship.law.edu/lawreview/vol51/iss2/2/?utm_source=scholarship.law.edu%2Flawreview%2Fvol51%2Fiss2%2F2&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages

Payne, J B. The Illustrated Bible Dictionary: Goliath-Papyri Part Two

Wolterstorff, Nicholas. Justice: Rights and Wrongs.

Zodhiates, Spiros. The Hebrew-Greek Key Study Bible.