Distributive Justice – The Law of God and Public Policy: Justice (7)

Distributive Justice

The Law of God and Public Policy: Justice (7)

We must care for those who cannot care for themselves.

“For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land.’” Deuteronomy 15:11

The Bible does not teach a preference for the poor, as though merely being poor were some virtue in itself. Indeed, some may be poor because they are simply unwilling to work. The Apostle Paul explained that such people deserve the fruit of their lethargy and are not to be cared for by the community (2 Thess. 3:10). All who are able are expected to work, not just so that they can provide for themselves, but so that they may have wealth and possessions to share with those who are truly in need (Eph. 4:28). Thus we see in the New Testament the continuation in the Kingdom of God of the final facet of Biblical justice.

The final facet of the Biblical teaching on justice is what we may call distributive justice. It is the responsibility of a local community to distribute freely of its goods to those who are in need among them. Whether such people have become poor through some unforeseeable exigency, or whether they are immigrants or disabled, justice requires that they be provided for, according to their need, by the community in which they live.

The statutes requiring landowners not to harvest all their produce—to leave grain and dropped bundles of harvest, as well as grapes on the vine and olives in the tree—allowed the poor to have something to glean and thus, through honest labor, to provide for their needs. The land, after all, belonged to the Lord, as did all the harvest He provided.

The practice of caring for the poor was the responsibilities of families (Deut. 15:7, 8) and the communities in which poor people lived. Distributive justice is thus, in the first instance, a concern of local government.

Distributive justice extends to religious workers as well. Priests and Levites, who did not own property in ancient Israel, and whose working life was devoted not to creating material wealth but to nurturing spiritual health and well-being, did not have the time to provide for their own needs. This was the responsibility of the community served by such people, through their tithes and offerings. It is not hard to see how such benefit could be extended to other public servants in a wide range of occupations.

Distributive justice also worked to make sure that inheritances were kept intact and could be passed on to legitimate heirs without interference or loss. Wages were determined on the basis of distributive justice, as Jesus demonstrated in the parable of the workers (Matt. 20:1-16). Workers and employers are expected to reach agreement on compensation, worker by worker. And employers were expected to distribute those wages in a fair and timely manner.

The five facets of justice are all addressed in the Law of God, and we shall see how, working together, the commandments, statutes, precepts, and rules of God’s Law can help us in our day to see our way through to sustaining a more just, peaceable, dignified, and productive society.

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T.M. Moore, editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001, 2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.