One of the extraordinary features of us human beings is how deep the desire for fairness goes. Parents often hear a cry from their children “It's not fair”. Parents sometimes reply “Well life isn’t fair”. Indeed it is not. But the point is that we feel it ought to be, and that we ought to try to make it as fair as possible. If a child at school is being punished unfairly, others in the class will protest. If someone is getting away with a wrong, we feel they ought to be caught and admonished. Those childhood feelings are no different from the moral realm we inhabit as adults. However unjust life is, we sense an obligation to do what we can to make it more just, and that includes bringing home to criminals and tyrants the terrible consequences of their deeds....

The great cry running through the Hebrew scriptures is that this world is grossly unjust but that that God will reveal a true justice at the end-so when, when, will God act in that way to put right all that is wrong? Jews, Christians and Muslims have never lost that hope of an ultimate justice.

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1. Hakkatan wrote: Sometimes the cry “That’s not fair” means “I don’t like what is happening.”  It may be fair, but simply disadvantageous to the crier because it is fair. October 26, 8:37 am | [comment link]

2. Archer_of_the_Forest wrote: Lord Harries of Pentregarth…what a truly great name. October 26, 10:05 am | [comment link]

3. clarin wrote: #2. & there endeth the greatness. October 26, 2:53 pm | [comment link]

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