“You shall appoint judges and officers in all your towns that the LORD your God is giving you, according to your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment. You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality, and you shall not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of the righteous. Justice, and only justice, you shall follow, that you may live and inherit the land that the LORD your God is giving you. (Deuteronomy 16:18-20)
The first judge who was ever appointed on the earth from a biblical viewpoint, whether you believe in the story literally or as an archetype, was Adam. He was given a number of instructions, but when placed in the Garden of Eden, it was in order to “work it” and to “guard it”. The word to “work” in Hebrew is “eved” עֲבֹ֖ד – it can also be translated as “cultivate”. The other element “guard” in Hebrew is “shamar” שָׁמְרָֽ. Both of these words indicate to us that even when we are placed into an idyllic context, there is still work to do and that it is our responsibility to engage in the work; we cannot passively guard or cultivate anything, except perhaps an unhealthy personality. It requires good and sound judgment to cultivate and guard things correctly. As children we are meant to learn this from our parents, teachers and the society that we exist in. The difficulty arises when those elements are in some way bent on an agenda that focuses not on the well-being of the individual within system/society, but upon the individual only existing to benefit the system regardless of the individual; essentially a depiction of Orwell’s 1984.
So what does it mean to “judge”. We are called upon each day and in many ways almost every moment of each day to make judgments of one sort or another. Some of these can seem to be trivial at the time that we do not even give them a second thought, but that is not actually applying sound judgment, in that we also need to assess whether that moment is the first step along a pathway that will lead to harm or whether it is a step toward the good and wellbeing of ourselves, others and our environment (consider this on three levels, personal, local and global). If we go back to the Edenic principle, then we are speaking in terms of guarding and cultivating “good judgment”. The moment by moment judgment can create a cumulative effect that effects our behaviour, opinions and even our physical being. This can be both for the good and for the bad.
Within the daily prayers we recite the following:
Restore our judges as at first, and our counsellors as at the beginning, and remove from us sorrow and sighing.
May You alone, LORD, reign over us soon with loving-kindness and compassion, with righteousness and justice.
Blessed are you, LORD, the King who loves righteousness and justice.
The impression given is that this is something that we are waiting for in the future and when it comes to earthly authorities, it is definitely something that we yearn for today as see those in “authority” over us acting more and more corruptly. But our Master Yeshua told us that the Kingdom of Heaven is now!!
This then begs the question about the “judgement” that we apply to ourselves and whether we discern correctly and without bias or do we favour our own ends over others?
Here are a couple of verses that illustrate the point.
Here I am; testify against me before the LORD and before his anointed. Whose ox have I taken? Or whose donkey have I taken? Or whom have I defrauded? Whom have I oppressed? Or from whose hand have I taken a bribe to blind my eyes with it? Testify against me and I will restore it to you.” (1 Samuel 12:3)
A bribe is like a magic stone in the eyes of the one who gives it; wherever he turns he prospers.(Proverbs 17:8)
The wicked accepts a bribe in secret to pervert the ways of justice. (Proverbs 17:23)
The point of this illustration is that we are all susceptible to incorrect actions and mis-judgments and I would say that in 99% of those cases it is because there is a bias that we apply in our favour. It is in fact the ultimate expression of freewill. But the point of this discussion is to recognise that those over us, even though they may be of a greater intellect, do not necessarily act or judge in the best way because of their own personal bias.
We are in a time when we are daily being challenged about what is the best and right course of action, not based in truth and righteous judgement, but political correctness, group think or even just sheer greed.
The follower of the Master Yeshua is called to operate in the righteousness of the Father and this is also to be done, without bias or self-seeking; it may be hard but it is possible!!!
MBM UK Family 