Justice (5) - Declaration of Truth

The first step is for the judge to discover the truth about the incident that occurred. This may require a process of investigation and include the hearing of witnesses. This process concludes with a declaration. The judge declares the truth about what happened.

Declarations of truth reflect the judgment of the judge about what happened. Human judges are not perfect, so their judgements will not always be correct. Only God has perfect knowledge, so only his judgments are always true.

Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, for true and just are his judgments (Rev 19:1-2).

God’s justice always gets to the truth. Human judges aim for the truth, but they will sometimes fall short. The best protection against judges missing the truth is to have a good process of appeal.

The ruling of the judge includes a judgement about the truth of the claims of the victim. If the victim’s case is proved to be true, they are vindicated. One meaning of the Hebrew word “tsedeq” is vindication. When justice is done, the victim of the injustice is vindicated. Their claim about the situation they found themselves in upheld.

The other side of the judgement is a declaration about the actions of the person accused. If they are declared to be innocent, they are vindicated. On the other hand, if the claims of the accuser are upheld, the guilty party is convicted of committing an injustice.

The role of the judge is to assess and event and make a judgement about what happened. Therefore, judges must pursue the truth without fear or favour to anyone.

Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly (Lev 19:15).

A judge who refuses to accept the truth, because he favours one of the parties to the case is dangerous. Justice is lost.

The full series can be found here.