Sunday Times 2
Christianity and the judicial process
Christian teaching has much to offer on the duties of those who administer and practise the law. There is a vast amount of literature over the centuries, which is relevant to this topic, but it is seldom realised how much direct teaching there is on this topic by Jesus himself. This article will examine some of these teachings which are so surprisingly relevant to legal professions and judiciaries twenty centuries later.
Jesus depicted as healing the sick and the poor. Sketch courtesy CNN
Chapter 23 of the Gospel according to Matthew sets out a number of observations of Jesus on those who teach and administer the law. It should indeed be required reading for all lawyers and judges.
Legal expertise is not a means of self-advancement
In the first place, Christ gives an overall perspective to the legal profession when he stresses that knowledge and expertise in the law is not a means of advancing oneself, but a means of brotherly service and help to those in society who need assistance.
Jesus stressed the fact that those who are versed in the law often seek to use their learning to gain recognition for themselves. As learned people of their society, he points out that their expert knowledge is not a means of seeking leadership or special recognition for themselves. “The greatest among you must be the servant of all” (Matthew 23:11). This applies with special force to judges who hold such an important position in society.
The degree of detail Jesus gives about the ways in which people with legal knowledge seek to advance themselves is quite striking — they seek the best places at feasts, reserved seats in public assemblies, and parade their learning in whatever way they can so that people will see them, notice them and respect them. On the contrary what Jesus teaches is that they should be using their knowledge to seek to relieve people of the loads they carry and should themselves follow the law in every detail, practising what they preach.
Judicial integrity
This reminder that law must not be used as a road to self-advancement is an important principle for the judiciary to bear in mind. The judges do not hold office to advance themselves or to seek governmental favour or to lay the foundation for obtaining higher positions in society, but they are there to use their expert knowledge for the benefit of the public and those who come before them for relief. It would indeed be an absolute contradiction of the rock bottom principle of judicial integrity that judges should seek to gain favour with the government of the day by delivering judgments that would please those in power.
The topic of judicial integrity also follows directly from Christian teachings. Righteous conduct and honesty in all one’s dealings and the effort to secure peace and justice in society was the essence of Christ’s teaching. This was a duly imposed on all members of society by Christ himself.
It would apply a fortiori to the judges — and perhaps more intensely to them than to those in any other walk of life.
It is useful to note in this connection the way in which modern professional and judicial ethics reflect this teaching by disapproving of lawyers advertising themselves and judges from seeking self-advancement through their judicial decisions. In regard to judges, the Bangalore Principles of Judicial Ethics, which embodies a code of ethics for the global judiciary, and is now followed in many countries across the world, specially embodies this principle. Christ’s teaching that law and legal knowledge should be used as an instrument of service is directly the opposite of using such knowledge for self-advancement.
Keeping up a facade of justice while harbouring injustice
Jesus warns us that those who administer legal systems often desire to display to the world an appearance of justice and integrity, while not really practising it themselves. In his eloquent words “You clean the outside of your cup while the inside is full of violence and selfishness”. He also says that the justice they administer is often like “white-washed tombs” which look fine from the outside, but are full of decaying corpses inside.
One often notices how judicial systems wish to project a vision of themselves as clean and spotless, whereas a closer examination of the inside of their work shows that injustice is permitted to remain without being totally extricated from the judicial process. Jesus condemns this as hypocrisy and a sin.
Trapping the weak and letting the powerful escape
Yet another observation, full of relevance to our time, is that legal systems often entrap and punish the smaller offender while the more powerful offender escapes untouched by the law. In the words of Jesus “You strain a fly out of your drink but swallow the camel”. (Matthew 23:24) The little offender is caught and punished but the rich and powerful often go unscathed and carry on their illegal activities often within the legal system itself, without impediment.
A reality of many legal systems is that when the poor litigant is ranged against the rich and powerful, he often cannot keep up the legal struggle owing to the expense involved in postponements and appeals to higher courts. However just his cause may be, he often has to give up the struggle through lack of resources for payment of legal fees and other expenses. These do not trouble the rich and powerful and the rich often get away with wrongdoing under formalistic legal systems.
Judges need to be conscious of this and the observation of Jesus two thousand years ago is full of relevance in our time.
Judges need to bear in mind the expenses of litigation and the strain they impose upon the poor who are those mostly in need of help from the law. The law is a source of help in need and must not become a burden. Nobody in society is in a better position to ensure this than the judges.
Emphasis on the letter of the law rather than the principles
Yet another observation full of relevance is the way in which legal systems apply the letter of the law rigidly, but lose sight of the larger principles behind the law, such as justice and mercy and honesty. (Matthew 23:23) They make a great pretence of following the rituals and formalities of the law, but do not apply its essential principles. Jesus condemns such people in the strongest language, describing them as hypocrites.
It is important for judges in all jurisdictions to review their work in the light of the deeper principles lying behind the law, rather than to concentrate narrowly on the letter of the law. The words of Jesus are a powerful reminder of this duty. The science of linguistics has thrown much light on the multiplicity of meanings which the same word can carry. The letter of the law is not like a mathematical equation, for every word grows cloudy at the edges. It is the principles of justice lying behind it that need attention from judges. These words of Jesus resound with relevance even to the legal systems of today.
One of the factors that have led to the entrenchment of the literal approach to the law, as opposed to an observance of principles behind the law, is legal positivism which achieved great importance especially in the 19th century and still governs much judicial thinking today. Legal positivism greatly promoted the separation of law from morality, and it is well to remember in this connection the words of Pope Pius XII, in his Christmas message of 1942, when he said,
“Judicial positivism… invests purely human laws with a majesty to which they have no title, opening the way to a fatal dissociation of law from morality.”
Lack of concern with the problems of the poor
Jesus described also how lawyers often fleece the widow and the poor and do not even lift a little finger to help them (Matthew 23:4). Even more specifically we read in Luke (11:45-52) that Jesus said “Woe to you lawyers as well! For you weigh men down with burdens hard to bear, while you yourselves will not even touch the burdens with one of your fingers.” In the context of today, legal systems often place loads on the backs of the poor, whose sufferings pass unnoticed by the rich.
With all the knowledge, power and wealth available in the 21st century, a substantial proportion of the world’s population are homeless and unable even to feed themselves and their families. This is a matter to which those practising or administering legal systems often give little or no attention. As custodians of the law they need to make this their concern, whether through legal aid or through committees of lawyers who look into these matters, and to bring them to the notice of the relevant authorities. Judges themselves have many opportunities of drawing attention to this need in the course of their judicial work. In other words, what Jesus is telling us is that legal professions cannot shut their eyes to major social problems.
Delaying the administration of justice
There is a well-known passage in the scriptures (Luke chapter 18) recording Christ’s condemnation of a judge who kept delaying and postponing a plea by a poor widow for what was rightfully due to her. The judge finally attended to her plea not because he wanted to help the widow, but to relieve himself of her continual pleas for help.
Jesus, in recounting this incident to his disciples, described the judge as a corrupt judge who neither feared God nor respected man.
This is a strong condemnation of judicial delay, which is relevant to this day. Such delay, in the words of Jesus himself, shows lack of respect for both religious duty and social obligation. It emphasises the twofold aspect of the dedication of judicial work to heavenly values and earthly service.
Assistance to those in distress
The parable of the Good Samaritan is also an illustration given by Jesus regarding the duties of all members of society to help those in distress. It underlines the fact that while the person in distress was not helped by people of his own group, it was a total outsider who came to his assistance. This emphasises our duty to assist those in distress across all racial and geographical boundaries. This is indeed a powerful message to the world community of the future.
It is a strange phenomenon of our time that a law-abiding citizen could pass by an infant drowning in a puddle of water without offering it any assistance. He is a good citizen minding his own business and is not violating any legal duty. This situation needs to be corrected and Jesus sought to draw attention to this through this powerful parable.
This shows how the bridges between the law and morality have broken down over the generations. The bridges need to be rebuilt and legal professions can play an important role in rebuilding these bridges so that the law itself reflects the duty to assist those in distress, where one can do so without damage to oneself. Judges could play an important role in this process by seeking to bring legal duties closer to moral obligations.
This applies to all who see others in distress, and Christ’s teaching is that everyone who sees another in distress, and is in a position to help, should do all he can to be of assistance.This principle applies with special force to the judiciary. No one is better able than the judges to give assistance to those who are unfairly treated. Indeed, the judge is particularly charged with this duty because it is those who are in distress through unfair treatment who come before the court for relief.
Spreading knowledge of the law
Another aspect to which Christ drew attention was that lawyers have the key to the door of the house of knowledge. Yet, not only do they not use it themselves, but they do not give the key to others (Luke 11:52). This is a wonderful reminder that legal professions and the judiciary in several countries often form themselves into an elitist group and get further and further removed from the people they should serve and the problems they should solve. All of these teachings have deep relevance to our time, and every one of the items referred to above is intimately related to the judicial function.
The law tends increasingly to distance itself from the people it serves and to become an exclusive body of knowledge in the hands of the elitist group of lawyers. This needs to be changed and the law brought closer to the public it serves. There should be a better understanding of it among the general public through instruction in schools and through attempts to raise public awareness in this field of knowledge which is close to them.
Lawyers have the key to this knowledge in this house of knowledge, and what Jesus asks of them is that they open this door and not keep this house of knowledge as their select reserve.
When the great American jurist Roscoe Pound delivered his landmark address to the American Bar Association in 1906, the topic he chose for his lecture was “Causes of Popular Dissatisfaction with the Administration of Justice”. One of the causes he mentioned was the way in which lawyers and judges were becoming an elitist group more and more distant from the problems of the public. Jesus warned us precisely against this danger twenty centuries ago.
The key to the house of legal knowledge is not the exclusive property of the legal profession. There should be an effort by the legal fraternity to make the general public at all levels better aware of their rights and duties under the law.
Judges themselves should lend their assistance to this process and encourage the legal profession to do what it can to show the general public that the law is their friend and not an imposition from above.
Universality of the duty to act justly
The magnitude of the judicial obligation to act justly will be seen in proper perspective when we realise that religion tells us that the duty to act justly is imposed on every citizen and not merely on judges. The bible lays down the obligation on everybody to “Do justice, love mercy, walk humbly” (Micah 6:8)
If it is the obligation of every citizen to do justice, the intensity of the obligation to act justly multiplies several-fold in the case of judges. They are the members of the community specially charged with the administration of justice. The duty to act justly lying on every citizen is therefore magnified immeasurably when we consider this duty in the context of the judicial obligation.
The other references in this scriptural message — the duty of loving mercy and walking humbly — also apply a fortiori to the judges. They need not only to administer law but should be as merciful as they can and their high office does not take away their duty to walk humbly.
Settlement of disputes
Christ attached great value to the settlement of disputes before they go to court for a formal resolution. Such settlements avoid the bitterness felt by the defeated party and the expenses and delays of court proceedings.
This was graphically illustrated when he said, “Make friends quickly with your opponent at law while you are with him on the way, so that your opponent may not hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and you be thrown into prison.” (Matthew 5:25) The idea of making friends with your opponent rather than going to Court was uppermost in Christ’s teaching regarding the handling of disputes.
Such teaching should inspire lawyers to realise that modern justice tends to be far too formal and expensive, as compared with informal dispute resolution procedures. Many legal systems in various countries are seeking to make dispute resolution more freely available through such mechanisms as Alternative Dispute Resolution and Civil Liberties Commissioners. Tens of thousands of disputes are thus being settled annually, many of which would otherwise have gone to court and left a trail of bitterness behind.
This teaching of Christ gives modern judicial systems much to reflect on.
Conclusion
Christian teaching is thus full of guidelines to the judiciary.
Christian philosophers have expanded on these teachings and sought to make the law a true instrument of justice. Justice is one of the supreme values taught by Christianity. Indeed, Christianity looks upon justice as the very foundation of government. One of the most authoritative early church writers, St Augustine, put this so strongly as to say ‘In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery?’(The City of God, book 4)
A society without justice enables the ruler to exploit the poor and the powerful to oppress the weak.
The judge is the embodiment of justice in the state and the custodian of a sacred trust. That is why St Augustine used such strong language. No more telling description can be given of the culpability of all state acts which are not based on justice.
In the words of an outstanding philosopher, Blaise Pascal, “Justice and power must be brought together, so that whatever is just may be powerful, and whatever is powerful may be just.”
The judge, as the person in society entrusted with the power to transform the principles of justice into reality, is in a unique position to achieve this combination. When justice and power come together, a brighter future will dawn for all humanity.