Justice, Anselm, and the Western Tradition Peter Judson Richards

Peter Judson Richards is Associ- It has by now become something of a a kind of litigation. During the course ate Professor of Theology and Law, commonplace to note the reciprocal infl u- of the controversy, the authority of the and serves as Director of the Center ences among the disciplines of politics church increasingly came to be seen as for Theology and Law at The Southern and law on the one hand, and theology juridical in nature. For better or worse, Baptist Theological Seminary. He has on the other. Even if, as we must admit, the church’s spiritual power of “binding taught and conducted research in the the infl uence has not always been whole- and loosing” amplifi ed to include dimen- areas of law, ethics, and political science some for either, it is perhaps inevitable on sions explicitly moral, legislative, and at the United States Air Force Academy, some level, since the theological content judicial.1 Harold J. Berman’s celebrated Regent University, and Emory University. of the gospel message as the proclama- account of the revolutionary impact of the He also practiced law for seven years in tion of God’s kingdom in Christ carries investiture controversy emphasizes the the United States Air Force Judge Advo- implications for the ordering and prior- seismic effect of splitting the world into cate General’s Corps. Dr. Richards is the ity of this-worldly political concerns. two competing jurisdictions. A “revolu- author of Extraordinary Justice: Military The gospel infuses new content into, tion in theology” accompanied the cor- Tribunals in Historical and International and delimits, political concepts such as responding “revolution in legal science” Context (New York Press, 2007). judgment, justice, authority, and law. The in a process whereby the “rationalization contributions of theological refl ection to and systematization of law and legal- the practices and institutions of the politi- ity” linked to the greater emphasis on cal order have sustained a long and fertile the incarnation as the defi ning event of tradition in the dominions marked by the human history and as “the central reality old boundaries of Western Christendom. of the universe.” Thus Anselm’s powerful Of great importance in this tradition account of God’s work of redemption as is the fi gure of Anselm of Canterbury, a legal transaction stood at the aperture whose teachings on the atonement have of a torrent of unprecedented, energetic been identifi ed as providing fuel to the legal activity, attending the development “revolution” that generated a distinc- of a sophisticated and systematic law of tive western legal tradition in late elev- crimes, of marriage, property and inheri- enth and early twelfth century Europe. tance, and of contract. Anselm’s theory of the atonement in his The sharp thrust of Anselm’s treatment most well-known work, the Cur Deus of the atonement in the Cur Deus Homo is Homo (“Why God became Man”) came frequently blunted through an emphasis to light against the backdrop of a virtu- on the social and political context of medi- ally simultaneous jurisdictional dispute eval feudalism, which characterized the between pope and emperor, the so-called social and political hierarchy of his day. “Investiture Controversy.” This dispute While this interpretation may provide was conducted in a decidedly legalistic some assistance in unwinding Anselm’s manner: through argumentation, through argument, it neglects what may actually the fi ling of briefs, and ultimately through be the more prominent theme of the work, 38 viewed in context, that is to say, the theme extended New Testament teaching regard- of justice, which surely was paramount ing the subject of civil government, that is, for Anselm, but which suffers neglect Paul’s series of exhortations in Romans 13. when all the weight of the interpretive Noteworthy for our purposes is the man- apparatus is placed on the side of the ner in which Paul summarizes that dis- “honor” motif. The emphasis on “honor” cussion with a restatement of the classical distances the work in a long-vanished maxim in verse 7: “Render therefore to all time, while “justice” brings to it a discom- their due: taxes to whom taxes are due, fi ting immediacy. customs to whom customs, fear to whom Part of the reason for the neglect of the fear, honor to whom honor.” As Thomas motif of “justice” in Anselm’s account can Schreiner notes, the immediate textual be attributed to a lack of understanding connection may point to the confrontation of the biblical emphasis on justice that recorded in all three synoptic gospels, in weaves the sinews of Anselm’s argument. which Jesus declares, “Render unto Cae- Part of it is traceable to a failure to see this sar that which is Caesar’s, and unto God theme resonating from within Anselm’s that which is God’s”4 (see below). Faith- discussion of honor itself. Further obscu- ful adherence to the Pauline instruction rity is generated through the isolation of requires an act of discernment as to who the Cur Deus Homo, at the expense of view- is to receive what, the implication being ing the work as forming only a portion of that while taxes are owed to some, fear Anselm’s overall project. In this article, I is what is owed to others, etc. It may be wish to trace these interpretive trajecto- that Paul’s expression in verse 7 simply ries in order to show that an emphasis refracts the variety of responses owed on the themes of justice and justifi cation to those in authority—perhaps taxes, actually matters for our understanding revenue, respect, and honor are all to be of Anselm’s project in general, and the rendered to the same person or persons.5 Cur Deus Homo in particular. Given the But the larger point is that Paul calls his signifi cance of his moment for the future readers to acknowledge and account for development of legal institutions in the the obligation to render “to all what is due west, it is important to get the right mea- them.” This corroborates John Murray’s sure of Anselm’s teaching.2 insight, to see the passage in continuity with, not just as an abrupt transition to, Three Biblical Texts on Justice the following section: i.e., Paul’s summa- Anselm closely adheres to the clas- tion of the entirety of the Old Testament sical formula “suum cuique tribuere” as Law (in vv. 8-10).6 After all, this section, it appears throughout the legal texts of which concludes with the recognition that antiquity as a fi rst order principle of natu- “love is the fulfi llment of the law” (v. 10), ral justice.3 The same classical defi nition opens with an exhortation to “owe no one lies in the background of several promi- anything,” (v. 8), i.e., an inside-out version nent biblical texts on the relationship of of the principle of justice articulated in the believer to the political “powers that verse 7, amplifi ed outward to embrace be.” I will briefl y consider three such texts, the world of all human contacts. If all in order to make the point. are given their due, there is no one left The first text comes from the most to whom a debt is still owed. The only 39 debt that remains, the debt that cannot passages indicates that both Paul and be eradicated, is love. The point is that Peter work from the presupposition that discernment of what love requires in any the demands of justice are evident and given circumstance will result in a proper direct—i.e., “natural,” or “written on the assessment of the true requirements of the heart,” in the phrase of Rom 2:14-15— and law, and thus, fulfi llment of the demands need no extended argument. Note also of justice. By this I do not mean to suggest that in both accounts, “honor” is one of Paul is simply engaging in a kind of clever the principal manifestations of fulfi lling word game, in which all the Christian the requirements of justice. Moreover, virtues collapse into one another, so that context is critical for understanding the justice = love = every other Christian biblical relationships between love and virtue. Rather, it is clear that Paul tethers justice. The imperative commands of Paul together justice and love as a restatement and Peter follow both authors’ prior pro- of the Dominical summation of the law, nouncement of the indicative character as fulfi lled in and through love of God of the believer’s justified standing “in and neighbor (Matt 22:37-40). Love is the Christ.” It is, thus, in Christ that loving- means by which the just demands of the kindness and truth, righteousness and law are fi nally realized; at the same time, peace “kiss,” in the words of the psalm- justice is fulfi lled in love; love provides the ist, and are reconciled (Ps 85:10). The completion, the fi nal realization of justice. paradoxical “equation” of love and justice In the memorable expression of Jonathan only comes to be understood, and fulfi lled Edwards, “heaven is a world of love.” at one point in time-space history, at the Paul’s re-articulation of the classical cross of Christ. notion of justice in the light of the gospel A similar presupposition seems to lie fi nds an echo in 1 Peter. The Apostle Peter behind Jesus’ own famous reply to the reiterates Paul’s legitimation of earthly Pharisees’ query as to the lawfulness rulers, enjoining submission to “the king of paying taxes to Caesar. In all three as supreme, or to governors, as to those synoptic accounts of the dialogue, which who are sent by him [the Lord] for the occurs late in Jesus’ earthly ministry, the punishment of evildoers” (1 Pet 2:13-14). simple command to “render … to Caesar Again, the emphasis is on a proper the things that are Caesar’s, and to God accounting of the various recipients of the things that are God’s” amounts to a just action, in order to render unto each devastating rhetorical move that leaves that which is his due: “Honor all people. Jesus’ interlocutors in speechless wonder Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor (Matt 22:15-22; cf. Mark 12:13-17; Luke the king” (v. 17). An implication is that 20:20-26). The crushing effectiveness of the the fear, reverence, and awe, which response appears to hinge on the unstated properly belongs to God alone, would be supposition that all participants in the inappropriate when extended to human brief dialogue are immediately capable of rulers. Distinctions are to be made: “all making the distinctions necessary to carry people” are to be given honor. Love is to out the Lord’s straightforward instruction. be extended to the special community of Here again, no new, hitherto undisclosed brothers and sisters in Christ. The simple moral duty is announced. Rather the uni- staccato sequence of imperatives in these versal requirement of justice—stated in 40 terms of rendering that which is due—is tion. Justice by defi nition requires the arrestingly recapitulated in such a way rendering unto each his due, as we have as to silence would-be equivocators. The seen. Thus, without giving the defi nition, unstated assumption is that that which merely assuming it, Anselm asserts “that is due is so immediately obvious as to the very defi nition of justice” demands require responsive moral action, not Phari- that God “reward the good with good and saical equivocation and clever casuistry. the bad with bad.” It then becomes neces- Moreover, the justice of God is juxtaposed sary to reconcile this with God’s decision to the justice of all subordinate, human to “give good things to the wicked.” The authorities. The perfect and holy justice resolution to the dilemma comes with the of God sets the standard for the justness consideration of God’s justice in the light of human moral action. The juxtaposition of his attributes of mercy and goodness. exposes the limits of the latter in a blind- Thus, after consideration of the manner ing light. As we shall now see, the biblical in which God is both impassible and mer- centrality of these themes of justice carries ciful, (in §8), Anselm goes on to consider over to the work of Anselm. the reconciliation of mercy and justice in §9, praying, “For even if it be diffi cult to Justice in the Works of Anselm understand how Your mercy is not apart Proslogion from your justice, it is, however, necessary In the second half of the Proslogion, to believe that it is not in any way opposed Anselm examines the attributes of God to justice, for it derives from goodness in terms of the fi nding of the fi rst portion which is naught apart from justice, which of the work, that God is, and is the being- indeed really coincides with justice.”9 This than-which-no-greater-can-be-thought. is a striking, perhaps counter-intuitive Thus justice becomes one of the attributes claim for Anselm to make, yet the under- manifesting God’s ontological perfection. lying classical conception of justice as the God is “perceptive, omnipotent, merciful, pinnacle and summation of the virtues and impassible, just as [He] is living, wise, assists in making sense of it: goodness good, blessed, eternal, and whatever it is derives from justice; it is justice that gener- better to be rather than not to be.”7 The ates the very quality of goodness as such, attribute of justice is noticeably absent and in a sense determines its limits. from this list.8 The explanation for this The inter-relation of God’s goodness, appears with the recognition that, in mercy and justice renders it necessary contrast to the preceding section on God’s to speak of any one of these attributes omnipotence, e.g., Anselm never considers in terms of the others: “Truly, if You are justice in isolation, but rather, from within merciful because You are supremely good, a matrix of other attributes, namely, God’s and if You are supremely good only in so impassibility, his goodness, his mercy, far as You are supremely just, truly then and his truth. The central discussion of You are merciful precisely because You the amalgam of justice-mercy-goodness are supremely just.” Thus, God’s mercy, covers the largest section of the second which is compatible with and must be part of the book, §9, and carries over to understood in terms of God’s impassibil- the succeeding sections. ity, is seen to fl ow from God’s goodness, The emphasis on justice raises a ques- the parameters of which itself are deter- 41 mined by the attribute of justice—for, as prism of divine impassibility. In so doing, we have seen, God’s goodness is “naught he fi nds the answer to the problem of apart from justice.” Similarly, Anselm reconciling humanly conceived attributes asks rhetorically, bringing to a close the and the divine character by focusing on argument of §9, “Is Your mercy not then the relational aspect to which the divine derived from Your justice?”10 The answer exercise of character attaches. Thus, “[I]n to the dilemma comes with the realization sparing the wicked You are just in rela- that God’s mercy and goodness emanate tion to Yourself and not in relation to us, in some sense from his justice. While even as You are merciful in relation to us it might be said that God’s mercy and and not in relation to Yourself.”12 As we goodness condition and give form to his have seen, in §9, Anselm had posed the justice—perhaps a more likely way of stat- question of the reconciliation of justice ing the relationship for moderns—Anselm and mercy by means of logical infer- chooses to put it the other way round, ences drawn from the classical defi nition i.e., it is God’s justice that determines and of justice. In §10, the connection with gives shape to his mercy and his goodness. divine impassibility is repeated, with the In this sense, justice can be said to be a acknowledgment: “You are merciful (in summation or a culmination of the other saving us whom You might with justice attributes. The point echoes Aristotle’s lose) not because You experience any emphasis on justice in Book V of the Nicho- feeling, but because we experience the machean Ethics, in which justice is described effect of Your mercy, so You are just not as “the highest of all virtues,” and as “the because You give us our due, but because practice of complete virtue.”11 You do what befi ts You as the supreme Of course, for Aristotle, the discussion good.”13 Divine impassibility provides a of justice as the summation of human key for accessing a proper understand- virtues considers it in its quality as the ing of the relational character of justice. completion of the harmonious, comple- Once again the discussion hinges upon mentary ordering of human relationships a proper application of the defi nition of among individuals and in the political justice. (This time, Anselm gives the defi - community of men—its character as “a nition without acknowledging it as such. relation to our fellow men.” Since justice The interchangeability of justice with its is classically understood as the interre- agreed defi nition can be assumed without lational virtue par excellence, Anselm’s argument.) own emphasis on the divine attribute Thus, the relational character of justice of justice opens him to the charge of requires special application with regard projecting immanent features of human to the Being-than-which-no-greater-can- relational justice onto the divine charac- be-thought. These features of the divine ter. “For what is more just than that the character are presented harmonious in good should receive good things and the scripture, as Anselm notes, with the jux- bad receive bad things? How then is it just taposition of Ps 24:10 and Ps 144:17, in §11. both that You punish the wicked and that Anselm understands the reconciliation of You spare the wicked?” Anselm confronts divine justice and mercy by identifying the problem of anthropomorphism by the quality of just order inhering in the considering divine justice through the dynamic relations within the Godhead 42 itself: “You are just not because You give It follows that “the same conclusion us our due, but because You do what applies to everything else that can be said befi ts You as the supreme good.”14 The in the same way of the supreme nature. classically derived defi nition of justice as Reason compels understanding to see the dynamic inter-relational summation this. All of these terms, then, indicate of virtues provides the assumed proposi- not a quality or quantity, but what the tion, from which a fuller understanding supreme nature is.” There follows a long of the things of God can be obtained, by list of divine attributes possessing the a proper linkage of logical connections same relation to the Divine Being: from the defi nitional point of departure. It is, therefore, supreme essence, The picture is rendered more complex supreme life, supreme reason, with the notion of justice, for this begin- supreme health, supreme justice, supreme wisdom, supreme truth, ning point is itself, by defi nition, a com- supreme goodness, supreme great- plex synthesis of other related virtues and ness, supreme beauty, supreme qualities—without understanding which, immortality, supreme incorruptibil- ity, supreme immutability, supreme the defi nitional starting point itself cannot happiness, supreme eternity, be properly understood. supreme power, supreme unity.17

Monologion Anselm does not impose a particular The brief discussion of justice in the order on this catalogue, which can be Monologion sheds light on the fuller treat- viewed as something of a prologue to ment given in Anselm’s subsequent work. the development of the second part of the (It is for this reason that I take the two Proslogion. It would be overstating the case works out of their proper chronological to make too much of Anselm’s selection of order.) As we have already observed, jus- justice as the singular example for making tice appears in the list of attributes attach- his larger point in this section of the work, ing to divine supremacy.15 Interestingly, but given what we have seen in his later in Anselm’s development of the nature treatment of justice in the Proslogion, it is of divine attributes and their relation to surely not mere arbitrariness that leads the being of God, it is justice that is taken to the choice. as the paradigmatic example for devel- opment in the following section. Thus, On Truth Anselm argues, “The supreme nature Anselm’s short treatise On Truth picks is what it is—good, great, existing— up on a question left dangling from the precisely through itself and nothing else. Monologion, the question, “What is truth?” So then, it is just through justice and it is In the course of the dialogue between just through itself. And if so, then what is Teacher and Student, the theme of jus- more necessarily and clearly the case than tice comes to occupy a central place in that the supreme nature is justice itself? the development of Anselm’s argument … And so if you ask ‘what is this supreme on the nature of truth, in the manner of nature we are talking about’, you may the earlier discussions we have traced answer ‘justice’.” So the supreme nature thus far. Thus, in §8 of the work, Anselm is “strictly said not to possess, but rather develops the contention that “the same to be justice.”16 action both ought to be and ought not to be under different conditions.” The 43 proposition amounts to a statement on the colloquy: relational character of justice, elaborated T: What then, if you consider the by means of an exposition of the retribu- nature of things, as when iron nails tive principle of justice: were driven into the body of the Lord, would you say that the fragile [I]insofar as the agent and the thing fl esh ought not to be penetrated or acted upon are subject to the same that when penetrated by the sharp or to contrary judgment, the action steel it ought not to feel pain? itself is judged to be the same or contrary. When therefore the one S: I would speak against nature. who strikes rightly strikes, and the one who is struck is rightly struck, T: Therefore it can happen that an as when a sinner is corrected by one action or passion ought to be accord- who has the right to do so, there is ing to nature which ought not to be right on both sides, because on both with respect to the agent or the one sides the blow ought to be struck. It acted upon, since the former ought is the opposite when the just man is not to act and the latter ought not struck by a bad man, since the one to suffer it.19 ought not to strike and the other ought not to be struck, so on both The principle explicates how it is that “the sides it is not right since on neither side ought the blow to be struck. Lord Jesus, who alone was innocent, ought But when the sinner is struck by not to suffer death, nor ought anyone to someone who has not the right have infl icted it on him, and yet he ought to do so, then the one ought to be struck but the other ought not to to have suffered it, because he wisely and strike, and the blow both ought to benignly and usefully wished to suffer be and ought not to be. Thus it can- 20 it.” Justice is reconciled with mercy at not be denied that it is both right and not right. But if we think of the the cross. The relational character of jus- judgment of the supreme Wisdom tice demonstrates that this reconciliation and Goodness that the blow ought not to be struck, whether from one is consonant with principles of reason alone or from both sides, namely of and logic. the agent and of the one being acted The argument continues with the asser- upon, who would dare deny that what is permitted by such Wisdom tion that “the highest truth is rectitude” and Goodness ought to be? 18 (§10). While other “rectitudes are such because they are in things which are or do The entire passage reads as a gloss on the what they ought,” it is different with the defi nition of justice considered and devel- “highest truth,” which “is not rectitude oped earlier. The right ordering of justice because it owes anything.” Anselm is requires the fi tness of the action rendered wrestling with the same question he had with respect to the one being acted upon, considered before in the Proslogion: given and requires, too, the fi tness of the actor to the relational character of the attribute of such action. As in the grammar of a Latin justice, its quality as a proper rendering of sentence, where properly infl ected subject what is due, how can it be understood of and predicate endings correspond to one God, who as First Cause of “all other truth another, inter-relational human actions, and rectitude” owes nothing to anything to be just and right, require agreement or anyone in the entire created order? “All with respect to the agent and recipient of other things owe him but he owes nothing human action. to another, nor is there any other reason The discussion turns to refl ect on the why he is than that he is.”21 nature of the atonement in the following 44 In the succeeding section that picks sake,” and not for some ulterior motive. up the thread of this examination into “Therefore there is no justice that is not “the highest truth,” (§12), the student, rectitude, nor is justice as such anything seconded by his teacher, acknowledges other than the rectitude of will. The rec- the identity of rectitude and justice: titude of action is called justice, but only when action comes about with a just will. S: Since you have taught me that all truth is rectitude, and it seems to Rectitude of will, even if it is impossible me that rectitude and justice are the that what we rightly will come about, does same, teach me to understand about not lose the name of justice.”26 The exercise justice as well. in clarifi cation is further rounded out with T: If justice does not differ from rec- the recognition that receiving, willing, titude you already have a defi nition of justice.22 having, and preserving rectitude of will is “that from which we receive justice,” The interrelational quality of the divine and that it is the simultaneous willing, attributes we have observed implicit in acquiring, and having that constitutes the argument of the second part of the justice. Proslogion, here made explicit, mirrors The extended discussion in §12 then the relational quality of the defi nition of closes with the application previously justice itself: “[T]ruth and rectitude and developed in the Proslogion, acknowl- justice mutually defi ne one another. He edging the adaptability of this defi nition who knows one of them knows the others of justice “to the highest justice.” The and can from the known go on to knowl- relational quality of justice—relational edge of the unknown.”23 both in consideration of its defi nition in The argument proceeds to further terms of other attributes such as truth, refi ne the understanding of justice, fi rst and of its character as a right ordering identifying it as “found only in the ratio- of the will—solves the anthropomorphic nal nature, which alone perceives the problem mentioned in connection with rectitude of which we speak.” It is further the Proslogion. The dialogue fi nishes in §13 articulated in terms of a rectitude “not with a technical but important articula- … of knowledge or action, but of will.”24 tion of this relational principle, this time The cases posited of the thief required borrowing from another category of rela- to return stolen goods, or the almsgiver tion, the human experience of time: “who feeds the poor out of vainglory” [W]e do not say the time of this or produce still further refi nement. What that thing because time is in those counts in the determination of rectitude things but because they are in time. And just as time considered in is both a proper willing in terms of the itself is not the time of something, objective of the will, and of its motive: although when we consider the “these two are necessary for justice in the things that are in it we speak of the time of this thing or of that, so the will, namely, to will what it ought and for highest truth subsists in itself and the reason it ought to”—and “for the sake belongs to no thing. But when some- of rectitude itself.”25 thing is in accord with it, we then speak of its truth and rectitude.27 The refined definition of justice or rectitude emerges in this exchange as, Thus the dialogue on truth comes to a “rectitude of will preserved for its own fi nish with the word rectitude, defi ned in 45 the concluding sections of the colloquy developed in the earlier work On Truth as “the highest truth” and as identical when he defi nes freedom of will as “the with justice. Rectitude, justice, classically power of preserving rectitude of will for considered as the quality more or less the sake of rectitude itself” (§13). Given inhering in human actions “in relation to what he had said in On Truth as to the our fellow men,” becomes, for Anselm, interchangeability of “truth and rectitude the aspect of self-subsistent divine essence and justice,” and the careful precision to which humans accord in their relations with which he develops his terminology with one another, to greater or lesser in these works, it follows that freedom of degree, as such relations partake of its will may be alternatively characterized intrinsically relational character as truth as “the power of preserving justice,” and and rectitude. injustice, as the willful failure of this exercise of preservative power. On Free Will Prior arguments as to rectitude as On the Fall of the Devil the right ordering of the will shape the This intuition that freedom of will is discussion in Anselm’s treatise On Free characterized for Anselm by the quality Will, where the “power of preserving of justice is borne out with the subsequent rectitude of will” is recognized as always work On the Fall of the Devil, in which the possessed by “a rational nature.” The suggestive connections of the treatise On discussants of the dialogue adopt “this Free Will tie back together with the asser- power of preserving rectitude of will” tion of the reality of justice in §15, where as a working defi nition of the “power of “that which when added to the will so free will in the fi rst man and the angel.” moderates it that it can only will what it The defi nition from the treatise On Truth, ought” is defi ned both as “something real” “the rectitude of will preserved for its own and as “nothing other than justice.”29 sake,” must now be considered in terms With this definitional apparatus in of human agency: “nor could rectitude of place, Anselm proceeds to address the will be taken away from them unless they topic under consideration, the fall of the willed it”—the historical circumstance devil, as the paradigmatic act of injustice. of the fall.28 Given what we have seen in In this central section of the work justice the argument already developed within is considered in a different sense, as a the prior works, “to will the preservation quantitative attribute, to be “received” of rectitude for its own sake is for it to as a gift, or “added” in to the mix of per- prevail” is another way of characterizing sonal characteristics of the rational being what Anselm describes as the human to whom it can be more or less ascribed. agent’s participation in justice. By the Receipt of the gift makes the recipient same token, “to will what it ought not indebted, while “the same justice aban- is for it to be conquered,” that is to say, doned would leave in it beautiful traces a turning toward injustice. Space does of itself.” As the discussion hones in to not permit us to trace the details of this a direct consideration of the fall of the argument in the treatise on free will, but angelic being, Anselm’s student remarks it is surely more than coincidence that that “a nature that received justice, if only Anselm builds here upon a formulation at one time, is shown to be more noble 46 and to bear the sign of always having a of the will of the recipient, the fi rst “it” or quasi absolute good than a nature that indirect object of the same sentence.31 never had or ought to have had it.” It is the The grammar is important for Anselm, possession of the gift of justice to greater author of a treatise on grammar; indeed, or lesser degree that renders its recipient what he is describing in these inter-lock- more or less deserving of moral approba- ing statements may best be characterized tion or blame: “[A]dd to this that the more as a kind of analytical grammar of justice. a nature has this good, and ought to have “The only thing I blame in it [i.e., the recip- it, it is praiseworthy, just as a person who ient] is the absence of justice, or not having ought to have it and does not is accounted justice.” Moral blame can be alternatively more blameworthy.” And it is the posses- summarized as the lack of justice. “For as sion of justice that bestows dignity and I already said, the worthiness adorns it, honor upon the recipient: “to have and to not having it [justice] demeans it, and the ought to have justice [sic] shows the natu- more the having adorns it the more not ral dignity of a nature, and not having it having demeans. Thus not having justice constitutes personal dishonour.”30 because of its own fault demeans the will Of course this statement is critical for only because being fi t to have it, thanks our consideration of the Cur Deus Homo, to the goodness of the giver, constitutes for it is the fi rst time in Anselm’s varied its dignity.”32 Moreover, as we previously treatments of the theme of justice in which noted in earlier contexts, the relational he connects it to the concept of honor, character of justice provides the frame- which assumes an important position work within which the allocation of moral in the argument of the later work. Thus, blame and praise occurs. Justice—moral bestowing the gift of justice is a grant rectitude—is the cumulative right order- of dignity, a vesting of worthiness, for ing of Creator-creature relations. In the which the recipient owes an obligation; individual soul formed in God’s image, the abandonment of the gift is the morally it is both the receptacle and substance of blameworthy act of will of the erstwhile human dignity. recipient. “For it was made worthy by him Anselm develops the argument con- [God] who gave it but it does not have it cerning the character of injustice, as because it abandons it. The obligation defi ned against the context of this defi - came from him who gave justice, the nitional matrix, by emphasizing, after not-having it from him who abandoned Augustine, its privative sense: “just as it. He is obliged because he received it, the absence of justice and not having he does not have it because he abandoned justice have no essence, so injustice and it.” Anselm does not here develop the being unjust have no being, and so are notion of obligation; he leaves for later nothing rather than something.”33 If it is the discussion of the character of the debt the absence of justice that is the source that is owed in consideration of the gift of of moral blameworthiness, Anselm justice. The impersonal pronoun serving addresses the question of how is it that the place of “the gift” in these sentences, “the same absence of justice is not called the direct object “it,” refers of course, to injustice before justice has been given”— justice. Its possession to greater or lesser before the grant of the gift. “The reason degree constitutes the worth and dignity is that the absence of justice is not blamed 47 where justice is not meant to be.” Certain comes from him; what is nothing, that is orderings of the creator-creature relation- evil, is caused by the guilty and comes ship are not meant to receive the added from him.”36 In this way, the privative gift of justice suitable for rational beings.34 sense of evil is made compatible with Once again, the point is illustrated in the recognition that created natures exist terms of disgrace and honor, an echo, per- “in which injustice is found” and which haps, of Paul’s statement in 1 Cor 11:2-16: therefore are “something evil.” (See also, “Just as not having a beard is no disgrace §§26 and 27, offering further explication in a man who does not yet have one, but on “the evil that is injustice.”) when he should have one it is disgraceful that he does not; so not having justice does On the Incarnation of the Word not deform a nature that ought not to have The same themes of injustice, the will- it, but debases one meant to have it.” ful abandonment of rectitude—justice— The donative relational character of and the absence of justice that informs justice is highlighted in the following the morally blameworthy will become a section addressing the proposition: “Why subject of discussion in the work on the the angel that abandons it cannot regain incarnation, in §10. Characteristically, justice.” For, “there is no way in which he Anselm approaches the incarnation in could acquire justice when he does not terms of modality. The explication of the have it, either before receiving it or after necessity of the incarnation of the Son, having abandoned it.” It must come from and not another person, gives rise to a an external source: “From him [God] they description the human predicament in receive both the having and the capacity terms of injustice—the abandonment of to keep or abandon it.” These arguments rectitude in the will, both in the devil and are summarized in the transactional, rela- in man. “A will subject to no one else’s is tional terminology of the preceding dis- one’s own. But possessing a will as one’s cussion: “Before receiving justice, in fact, own (i.e., a will subject to no will) belongs no one is just or unjust and, after having to God alone.” Injustice, the wrong order- received it, no one becomes unjust unless ing of the creator-creation relation, results, he willingly abandons justice.”35 now described as a robbery of dignity Again, restrictions of space and time and a deprivation of the excellence that is do not permit us to follow the succeed- God’s due as Supreme Authority: ing argument in greater detail, though Therefore, all who exercise their the notion of justice as the vital concep- will as their own strive to be like tual key for unlocking Anselm’s moral God by robbery and are guilty of theology becomes still more apparent in depriving God of the dignity proper to him and of his unique excellence, the subsequent explicit considerations insofar as it lies within their power on the fall of the devil. In §21, Anselm to do so. For if there is any other will that be not subject to anyone, God’s states, “Evil is injustice, which is only will will not be superior to all, nor evil and evil is nothing. But the nature in will it be the only will with no other 37 which injustice is found is something evil, superior to it. because it is something real and differs These statements serve as a kind of prole- from injustice which is evil and is nothing. gomenon to the following work, the Cur Therefore, what is real is made by God and Deus Homo, where the relational dynam- 48 ics of justice in Anselm’s grammar of the develop the argument along modal lines. divine plan of redemption receive fuller It may be just for man to be tormented, treatment. Here, the fittingness of the but “the devil himself [does not act] justly incarnation of the Son is expressed in the in tormenting him,” being impelled by familiar terminology of retribution: “malice” rather than “out of love of jus- tice,” the devil acts in accord with “God’s For no one more justly repels or punishes criminals, or more merci- incomprehensible wisdom, by which he fully pardons or intercedes for them, orders even bad things in a way that is than the one against whom injustice good.” Anselm repeats an earlier obser- is more particularly demonstrated. Nor is anything more appropriately vation we noted in connection with the opposed to falsity in order to repel discourse On Truth, that “it can happen it, or more apposite for healing, that one and the same thing is, from dif- than truth. For those presuming a false likeness to God seem to have ferent points of view, both just and unjust, sinned more particularly against and for this reason, is judged by people him whom we profess to be the true likeness of the Father.38 who are not considering the matter with care, to be entirely just or entirely unjust.” The incarnation is a corrective measure The illustration that follows, involving the for the restoration of justice and truth. just and unjust striking of a person—“it is just where the person receiving the Cur Deus Homo blow is concerned,” but not just from the Over the course of the foregoing sur- standpoint of the agent who is striking vey, it has become apparent that none the blow—similarly mirrors that earlier of Anselm’s works are self-contained. discussion. 41 Many times themes merely introduced The argument continues with a series in one work are taken up in a subsequent of questions that serve to hone in on the endeavor; a loose end never satisfacto- justness of the transaction of the atone- rily addressed at one stage is tied up at ment: another. It should come as no surprise But how will it possibly be proved then that the themes of justice and a just and rational thing that God injustice, of rectitude and abandonment treated, and allowed to be treated, return to the place of central focus in in this way, the man whom he called his beloved Son in whom he was the Cur Deus Homo. Anselm’s modal way well pleased? … For what justice is it of thinking causes him to take up the for the man who was of all the most just to be put to death for a sinner? … question of the necessity of the means of If God could not save sinners except divine redemption— given the plan to by condemning a just man, where redeem lost sinners, introduced, as we is his omnipotence? If on the other 39 hand he was capable of doing so, but have seen in the work on the Incarnation. did not will it, how shall we defend It is also understandable, given what we his wisdom and justice?42 have seen thus far, that Anselm should state the human predicament for which There follows a careful exegesis of Scrip- Christ’s atonement provides the remedy tural passages addressing these ques- in explicitly jurisdictional terms.40 tions, upon which, the participants to The argument for God’s jurisdic- the dialogue agree on a quest to ground tion rather than the devil’s, proceeds to the work of atonement related in the Scriptures on the footing of what is fi t- 49 ting, proper, and appropriate for God to that has informed much of Anselm’s work do, given the original creation of man for to this point—a grammar which modifi es blessedness, the real, universal, abiding the classical emphasis on the horizontal presence of sin, and the need for expiation character of justice as the virtue of men of sin.43 The conversation then turns in the among their fellows, to adjust for the verti- following direction: cal dimension introduced in acknowledg- ing the creator-creature distinction. Thus, A. If an angel or a man were always to render to God what he owes, he it follows that “if it is not fi tting for God to would never sin. do anything in an unjust and unregulated B. I cannot contradict this. manner, it does not belong to his freedom A. Then, to sin is nothing other than not to give God what is owed or benevolence or will to release unpun- to him. ished a sinner who has not repaid to God B. What is the debt which we owe what he has taken away from him.” More- to God? A. All the will of a rational creature over, “if there is nothing greater and noth- ought to be subject to the will of ing better than God, then there is nothing, God. B. Perfectly true. in the government of the universe, which A. This is the debt which an angel, the supreme justice, which is none other and likewise a man, owes to God. than God himself, preserves more justly No one sins through paying it, and 45 everyone who does not pay it, sins. than God’s honour.” This is righteousness or uprightness The necessity of God’s existence, of will. It makes individuals righ- argued in the Proslogion, determines the teous or upright in their heart, that is, their will. This is the sole honour, character of his government over the uni- the complete honour, which we owe verse, described here as the just preserva- to God and which God demands tion of the honor of “the supreme justice.” from us … Someone who does not render to God this honour due to In § 14, the vindication of God’s honor is him is taking away from God what described as a juridical action of replevin, is his, and dishonouring God, and 46 this is what it is to sin. a repossession action. This manner of stating the transaction of divine judgment Illustrations follow in the familiar lan- of the sinner naturally raises the ques- guage of retributive justice, including tion, how can the sinner take away God’s an extended discussion of the case of honor? The answer, again, is stated in restitution of stolen property.44 It should relational terms, as we have seen in prior be apparent by now that the entire works, terms by which God’s honor is, grounding for the ensuing discussion of “in relation to him, incorruptible.” When the atonement is being put forward here the rational created being does what is in the language and terms provided by right, i.e., acts with rectitude of will, he the classical defi nition of justice. Sin is honors God, “not because he is bestowing defi ned in terms of a failure of rendering anything upon God, but because he is vol- what is due. The debt of honor owed by untarily subordinating himself to his will the sinner is defi ned in terms of rectitude and governance, maintaining his own of will. The restoration of this debt of proper station in life within the natural honor is defi ned in terms of the retribu- universe, and, to the best of his ability, tive principle of restitution. All is stated maintaining the beauty of the universe in terms of the forensic grammar of justice itself.” This is the fulfi llment of justice, a 50 right ordering of the rational soul within scheme of human salvation, therefore, had the order of the universe itself, which to be one that would render ‘satisfaction’ attains to a kind of aesthetic excellence. to divine justice and leave the ‘rightness’ The failure of moral rectitude, on the other and moral order intact.”49 hand, works dishonor, and disorder—that Space and time, again, do not permit a is to say, injustice.47 fuller treatment of the manner of Anselm’s Setting Anselm’s terminology in the development of these arguments. But the context provided by the bourgeoning trajectory of the reasoning has become crescendo on justice in the works lead- abundantly clear by now. Anselm’s con- ing up to the Cur Deus Homo thus assists tinued appeals to the theme of justice keep in making sense of the central place of with his overall strategy for the use of what honor in this account. What appears as a Paul Helm identifi es as “procedural rea- curious appeal to aesthetics, resorted to as son.” That is, the universally recognized a means of squaring the circle and, thus, principle of justice and its defi nition as an explaining how rational creatures can inter-relational quality is taken as a given, somehow stain the honor of an almighty from which succeeding propositions natu- Creator—attains coherence when viewed rally and logically follow. “The prime func- as an acknowledgment of the just main- tion of procedural reason is to discriminate tenance of order in a universe governed the fact of logical connectedness, either by “the supreme justice”: “If the divine inductive or deductive.”50 As faith seeks Wisdom did not impose these forms of understanding, reason acts as a tool or set recompense in cases where wrongdoing of procedures operating upon propositions is endeavoring to upset the right order of known or reasonably believed. things, there would be in the universe, As we have seen, for Anselm, the given which God ought to be regulating, a cer- propositions of the classical account of tain ugliness, resulting from the violation justice provide the starting point for an of the beauty of order, and God would analysis that develops over succeeding appear to be failing in his governance.”48 works, and culminates in the Cur Deus Rather than functioning as an exercise of Homo. The modal argument for the neces- pure, arbitrary will, God’s justice fuses in sity of the atonement is grounded in an inseparable harmony with the other attri- account of justice that penetrates to the butes of his character. Thus, as Jaroslav limits of all human attempts at “render- Pelikan explains, rather than emphasize ing to each his due.” The method is dif- God’s wrath, which might lead to confu- ferent, but the trajectory and terminus of sion in the placement of divine impas- the argument aligns very closely to the sibility, “Anselm spoke of his justice: the tradition of Augustine, who famously justice of God had been violated by the argued in Book XIX of the City of God, failure of man to render to God what he that in the revealing light of God’s truth, owed him; the justice of God also made no true justice is to be found in the this- it impossible for God to forgive this sin worldly Cities of Men. This relativizes by mere fi at, for this would have been a human contrivances of law and politics, violation of the very order in the universe to be sure; though it does not render void that God had to uphold to be consistent such efforts. For “a people estranged from with himself and with his justice. Any God … must be wretched; yet even such 51 a people as this loves a peace of its own, It became the means of imposing peace which is not to be despised.”51 In a world and justice on part of authorities of the reeling from the fumes of a toxic political respective jurisdictions. (5) Perhaps theology, it is a salutary exercise to con- most signifi cantly, it became the means sider the theological sources of a Western by which the church sought to carry tradition of law and justice that now faces out its reformative mission. Histori- severe threats from within and without. cally, this change occurred alongside a Pundits who would lump together Chris- theological shift of focus away from the tian and Islamic traditions of thought on church’s eschatological vision, promi- justice, law, and politics as variant forms nent since the apostolic era, that says, of the same noxious “fundamentalism” “We are in the fi nal days”; and toward fail to make critical distinctions. For the a this-worldly focus on reform. Law tradition represented by Augustine and could be said to be the effi cient cause of Anselm, the reality of the incarnation of this transformation. Harold J. Berman, God in Christ exposed the radical inad- Law and Revolution (Cambridge, MA: equacy of all human political endeavors Harvard University, 1985), passim. for the attainment of justice. At the same 2For the sake of simplicity, all page refer- time, the added vertical dimension intro- ences to Anselm’s works in the text of this duced by biblical faith gave a fuller, richer article refer to the English one-volume account of justice than the classical pagan edition of his most important writings, (and modern!) formulations, for it gave Anselm of Canterbury: The Major Works scope to the relational quality of justice (Oxford: Oxford University, 1998). as a principle of order in the universe, as 3Cf. Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, 5.5; partaking of the very nature of the God- Justinian, Digest I.1.10; Institutes, 1.1.1; head, and as the element of God’s glorious Augustine, On the Free Will, 1.27.13; Aqui- redeeming work in Christ. nas ST II-II, 58.1. Of course, Aristotle, and the Christian tradition which followed, ENDNOTES articulated several different forms or 1If you are going to fi ght to acquire juris- modes of justice, among which the diction, you must be able to back up reciprocal principle of suum cuique fea- your claims by constructive use of the tured. For a helpful delineation of these power once obtained. Thus, law moved varying forms, see, Oliver O’Donovan, from being an unconscious and unprob- The Ways of Judgment (Grand Rapids: lematic refl ection of tribal culture, to Eerdmans, 2005), 31-40. become: (1) a self-conscious means of 4Thomas R. Schreiner, Romans (Baker exercising and consolidating political Exegetical Commentary on the New control, i.e., power. In this way the new Testament; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998), modern canon law system became the 685. fi rst modern legal system, developed in 5Ibid., 687. competition with the law of the impe- 6John Murray, The Epistle to the Romans (2 rial courts. (2) Law served to sustain the vols.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965), corporate identity of the clergy and gave 2:158. it legal status. (3) Law came to regulate 7Anselm, Works, 94. relations between the jurisdictions. (4) 8Note the difference with a similar list 52 Anselm provides in the Monologion, 17Ibid., 29-30. §§ 15 and 16, in which Anselm 18Ibid., 162. asserts as a “necessary conclusion” 19Ibid. emanating from the proposition 20Ibid., 161. of the supremacy of the Divine 21Ibid., 164. Essence, that “the supreme essence 22Ibid., 166. is alive, wise, powerful, all-power- 23Ibid. ful, true, just, happy, eternal … and 24Ibid., 167. what ever is likewise better without 25Ibid., 168-9. qualifi cation than not-whatever.” 26Ibid. Ibid, 28. See the discussion of these 27Ibid., 173-4. texts infra. 28Ibid., 181. 9Anselm, Works, 92. 29Ibid., 217. 10Ibid. 30Ibid., 218. 11Nicomachean Ethics, 5.1129b-1130a. 31Ibid. “Thus, this kind of justice is com- 32Ibid. plete virtue or excellence, not in an 33Ibid., 219. unqualifi ed sense, but in relation to 34Ibid. our fellow men. And for that reason 35Ibid., 220. justice is regarded as the highest of 36Ibid., 223. all virtues, more admirable than 37Ibid., 251-2. morning star and evening star, 38Ibid., 252. and as the proverb has it, ‘In justice 39Ibid., §5, 270. every virtue is summed up.’ It is 40Ibid., §7, 272. complete virtue and excellence in 41Ibid., 272-3. the fullest sense, because it is the 42Ibid., §8, 275. practice of complete virtue. It is 43Ibid., §10, 282. complete because he who possesses 44Ibid., 282-3. it can make use of his virtue not 45Ibid., 286. only by himself but also in his rela- 46Ibid., 287-8. tions with his fellow men; for there 47Ibid., 288. are many people who can make use 48Ibid., §15, 289. of their virtue in their own affairs, 49Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradi- but who are incapable of using it in tion, A History of the Development of their relation with others.” Book V Doctrine: The Growth of Medieval Theol- on justice, of course, follows Aris- ogy (600-1300) (Chicago: University of totle’s cataloguing of other virtues Chicago, 1978), 3:141. such as courage, self-control, gener- 50Paul Helm, Faith and Understanding, osity, etc., in Books III-IV. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 6. 12Anselm, Works, 93. 51Augustine, The City of God Against the 13Ibid. Pagans, (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer- 14Ibid., 94. sity, 1998), XIX.26, 962. 15Monologion, §15, Ibid., 28. 16Ibid., 29. 53