With Envy and Justice for All

Ancient Faith Ministries ^ | April 15, 2019 | Fr. Stephen Freeman

[Carpe Cerevisi]

We use many words and concepts in our daily lives without bothering to consider their true content. In my experience, few words are less examined than “justice.” It is a word that is foundational in the modern world with deep roots in religious tradition. Most people would agree that the desire for justice is virtually innate in human beings. However, it has a dark side of which very few seem to be aware.

In the religious tradition, justice is usually grounded within God Himself. Some associate this justice with God’s demand for right conduct from His creation. There is also the sense that justice has a way of “balancing the scales.” An evil done brings an evil reward (punishment) while good brings blessings. In theory, at least, justice plays a role in the legal systems of almost all cultures. We desire to make things right.

Or so we tell ourselves.

There is a darker desire that masks itself as justice – and I would contend that it is this desire that most people experience when they speak of justice. It’s name is envy.

[Carpe Cerevisi]

Good way to remember the differences between envy, covetousness and justice.

[aquila48]

Justice has come to mean equality of outcomes regardless of effort. Envy is at the root of it.

[FormerLib]

As Dr. Jordan Peterson recently commented about the slaughter of the kulaks in the Soviet Union:

"You have this little strata at the bottom of people who are ne'er-do-wells and on the more psychopathic end of things and they are bitter and resentful and waiting for their bloody opportunity. And then the communist intellectuals come into town and say 'You know those people that are doing well? They actually... everything they've got is ill-gotten and they... they stole it. And they stole it from you. From you! And look how badly you're doing. The reason you're doing badly is because these people who are lording it over you and have all this creature comfort. They took that from you! It's yours by right!' So then all that resentment and jealousy and hatred and rage, alcohol-fueled as you might well imagine, has this moral reason to go with pitchforks and in a mob and surround those houses and to strip them of everything they have."