Distributive Justice – The Rule of Law: Justice (7)

Distributive Justice

The Rule of Law: Justice (7)

We are our brothers’ keepers.

“For six years you shall sow your land and gather in its yield, but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, that the poor of your people may eat; and what they leave behind the beasts of the field may eat. You shall do likewise with your vineyard, and with your orchard.” Exodus 23:10, 11

The final side of the pentagon of Biblical justice is distributive justice. This requires that members of a community take into consideration the needs of their neighbors and be willing to distribute of their own property in order to meet those needs.

The poor will always be with us, and, in certain ways, it will always be our responsibility to provide for them. In Scripture the seventh-year Sabbath and the gleaning laws made it possible for the poor to care for their needs by taking responsibility to gather from what their neighbors had provided for them.

The people of Israel also were to provide from their resources for the needs of the local clergy. Because priests and Levites were busy attending to the spiritual needs of the community, and owned no land of their own, they required contributions from the people, in the form of tithes, to meet their daily needs.

Other kinds of distributions included allowing travellers to pluck grain or fruit from one’s fields as they journeyed (but they must not fill their bags); allowing farm animals to eat part of what they were trampling or grinding; and leaving food and producers of offspring for wild beasts.

This form of justice demonstrates the overflowing love of God, Who gives freely and abundantly to those who deserve only His wrath, and Who seeks the well-being and edification of even the most downcast and despised of men.

For a practical guide to the role of God’s Law in the life of faith, get The Ground for Christian Ethics from our online store.

–

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.