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Justice & Divine Vengeance Pursuing Crime by Pierre-Paul Prud'hon, 1805

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Justice & Divine Vengeance Pursuing Crime by Pierre-Paul Prud'hon, 1805 Justice & Divine Vengeance Pursuing Crime by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon, 1805 – 1806. A murderer flees with his victim’s belongings in his arms. Above him, Divine Vengeance illuminates the villain as Divine Justice, sword in hand, pursues him. Prud’hon made this study for a monumental painting destined to hang behind the judges’ bench in the criminal courtroom of the Palace of Justice in Paris. Source: J. Paul Getty Museum. 4 Providence_spring16_final_pages.indd 4 5/31/16 7:25 PM FEATURE THE MORAL UNDERPINNINGS OF JUST RETRIBUTION: JUSTICE & CHARITY IN SYMBIOSIS J. DaryL CHarLes hree generations ago Dorothy Sayers chided the Chris- Ttian church for its indifference toward theological foundations. The result of this deficiency, she lamented, was a church devoid of substance. Ethically, as she saw it, this dearth ended up paring “the claws of the Lion of Judah.”1 It is difficult to understate Sayers’ burden, by professional (religious) ethicists as well as for if the church’s condition in her day was at the popular level. unhealthy, in our own it may well be anemic. But this essay concerns itself neither with This opposition, of course, is by no means ecclesiology nor formal theology per se. Its confined to religious thought. The notion of burden, rather, is to identify a key deficiency retribution or punishment,2 which is foun- in the way that much of the Christian commu- dational to any construal of justice, has long nity thinks about ethics and ethical issues. It been the scourge of social science. For several is concerned to address the perceived opposi- generations, social scientists (including not tion between—when not the outright divorce a few criminologists) have viewed punish- of—justice and charity. This perceived tension ment in general as detrimental to human can be measured both in the literature written beings. Alas, it was only a matter of time 5 Providence_spring16_final_pages.indd 5 5/31/16 7:25 PM before religious ethicists and theologians responsible social policy. Thus, we may speak began imbibing this prejudice and promoting of punishment or moral retribution, properly it—in both academic and popular discourse. construed, as that which is just and not at odds with charity, properly construed. Part of the task, then, of serious Christian thinkers, for whom culture and the common I begin with an argument for the unity and social good are to be taken seriously, is to symbiosis of justice and charity on the basis of develop the distinction between retribution— theological and moral-philosophical assump- which is an intrinsically moral entity and tions rooted in the historic Christian tradition which is lodged at the heart of justice—and and natural law. Against this proposal, I ex- revenge or retaliation. We shall develop this amine influential voices that have contribut- important distinction later in the essay, but ed in substantial ways to posing opposition suffice it to say that a failure to understand between justice and charity. Following this, I the fundamental difference between the two identify representative voices within the wider is a failure to exercise moral discernment. Christian tradition that agree with my thesis. And in the end it manifests itself in a failure I conclude with reflections on the significance at the policy level, where the consequences of the harmony of justice and charity as it of bad ideas are magnified exponentially. concerns preserving the common good and undergirding responsible policy. Logically, three possibilities present them- selves for our consideration: JUSTICE & CHARITY IN CONCORD: THE CASE FOR JUST (I.E., MORAL) 1. Retribution (i.e., punishment) and Christian love are one and the same RETRIBUTION and indistinguishable. At its third annual ethics symposium, con- 2. Retribution and Christian love are vened in 2012 at the Command and General polar opposites and unrelated. Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, the U.S. Army brought together both military 3. Retribution and Christian love co-ex- and civilian ethicists, historians, political ist and are able to merge in an ethically philosophers, and chaplains to reflect cor- qualified way. porately on the ethics of coercive force in the contemporary geopolitical setting. One of the speakers addressed assembled attendees I reject option #1, and few people (in their (Majors and Lt. Colonels) on the moral-philo- right minds) would affirm it. There seems to sophical underpinnings of what consensually be a case for #2, based on several factors. One has been understood as the mainstream of might be a bad social environment in which the just-war tradition, a rich tradition of (fre- one grows up—for example, father-absence or quently Christian) moral reflection stretching having an abusive parent. Another might be from Ambrose and Augustine to Aquinas to the aforementioned philosophical opposition, Vitoria, Suárez, and Grotius to modern-day whereby it is assumed that punishment is theorists such as Paul Ramsey, James Turner harmful. Yet another factor might be theo- Johnson, and Jean Bethke Elshtain. The ti- logical opposition, several forms of which are tle of his address was instructive: “Justice, identified further on. Neighbor-Love, and the Permanent in Just- War Thinking.” Notwithstanding the force of arguments made on behalf of option #2, I shall reject these and The essence of his remarks was that the argue for #3. When justice and charity are symbiosis of justice and charity undergirds wed, unified, and working in symbiosis (rath- and informs the tradition and doctrine of er than separated or viewed as conflicting), “just war,” properly understood. To divorce humans perform their moral duty, dignify the these two virtues, therefore, would be to image of God in one another, and promote do irreparable damage to the character of 6 Providence_spring16_final_pages.indd 6 5/31/16 7:25 PM both justice and charity as well as to alter divine action is to be understood not as a the very moral foundation upon which just- setting aside or “negating” of various attri- war thinking rests. Both justice and charity, butes but rather as a different expression he reminded his audience, are non-fluid in or form of the same attributes. To be sure, character; as quintessential human virtues, from the human standpoint, the qualities of they are deemed universally binding, and divine mercy and compassion would appear hence, are “owed” to all people. As evidence opposites of divine judgment and wrath. And of this universality, he noted, a trans-cultural yet, historic Christian confession calls us to “Golden Rule” ethic surfaces in the teaching reject this “opposition” and affirm that these of both Plato and Jesus. And in the Christian are but different manifestations of the same moral tradition, this ethic, wherein justice attributes. The divine nature, after all, does and charity embrace, gives embodiment to not change. the natural law and finds powerful expression in the parable of the “Good Samaritan.” The ethical upshot of this doctrinal position requires reiterating. Divine justice and love Theological Considerations may not be severed or viewed as standing It has been a confession of Christian theology in tension (or opposition). And because through the ages that the nature and character Christians are “called” to imitate the divine of the trinitarian God are marked inter alia by nature, they are prohibited from divorcing incommunicable attributes such as eternality, justice and charity as these “cardinal vir- infinity, omnipotence, omniscience, transcen- tues” impact persons and people-groups. It dence, immutability, invisibility, sovereignty, is in this way—namely, creation and divine and self-sufficiency. A related attribute, which image-bearing—that the human moral im- tends not to receive much attention, is that pulse is to be understood. Christian theology of indivisibility. This doctrine counters the posits that humans are created in the image notion—whether implicit or explicit—that of God; hence, we are to bear his likeness by the divine nature is constituted by separate mirroring the imago Dei through our lives parts. A God whose being is understood or and our actions. assumed to be composite, thus, is assumed ultimately to be more creaturely than otherly A fundamental part of this image-bearing and transcendent in nature.3 Divine attri- is to manifest and work for justice in the butes are not to be understood as additions, context of human relations. Motivation for elements, trappings, or supplements—i.e., this work is summarized by the so-called qualities that are “added” or in need of being “Golden Rule” ethic that surfaces in the “balanced.” They do not exist in a certain teaching of both Plato and Jesus: we do to “combination.” At bottom, the Christian God others as we would want others to do to us. is not a deity of parts or divisions,4 nor does This entails advancing standards of moral he “develop” or “emanate.” Rather, his actions good and resisting or countering evil. For are an expression of his perfection, unity, and Thomas Aquinas, precisely this—doing good timelessness. We might even argue that God and avoiding evil—constitutes the heart of does not have attributes; he is his attributes. the natural moral law, the “first principles And for our purposes here, I am assuming of practical reason.”6 In his brief but richly that his love is his justice, that his judgments discerning essay “The Humanitarian Theory are his mercy, and vice versa, even when of Punishment,” C.S. Lewis argues that it they manifest themselves in differing (and is precisely because of the image of God in seemingly irreconcilable) ways.5 others, not in spite of it, that we hold fellow human beings accountable for their actions. The ethical implications of the doctrine of To hold them accountable, Lewis insists, is divine indivisibility become readily apparent.
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