Confessing and embodying compassionate justice – by Nico Koopman

The logic of the Confession of Belhar and of the Accra Confession entail that justice discourses take place in interwovenness with reconciliation and unity discourses.

1.The justice that is confessed in The Confession of Belhar 1986, and in the Accra Confession is rightly described as compassionate justice. In line with the biblical use of these concepts, both the sacrificial (tsedakah) and forensic (mishpat) dimensions of justice are being referred to. Both these meanings of justice are expressed in words like dikaiosune and other words with the dike root in the New Testament.

Forensic justice comes to expression in the justice of the courts and in the notion of justice as human rights. Through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ God declares us just. People who are justified by the grace of God are participating in the quest for justice in the world. Justified people, people who are made right by the Triune God, i.e. right humans, seek human rights in our broken world. For Christopher Marshall justification by faith is an expression of restorative justice (see C Marshall Beyond retribution. A New Testament vision for justice, crime and punishment – Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001, p. 59).

The notion of sacrifice has a second dimension. It also indicates that justice cannot be reached in this world when the willingness to sacrifice for the sake of the other is not present. A third aspect of the sacrificial dimension of justice is the fact that justice does not seek revenge, but it is merciful. It seeks the healing and restoration of both perpetrators and victims. In fact it seeks the healing of all broken relationships. Therefore this justice is called restorative justice. Marshall’s (See C Marshall, 2001, p. 35 – 93) analysis of the use of justice in the New Testament enables him to refer to justice as restorative or covenantal justice. This covenantal justice goes beyond retribution and punishment and seeks, like reconciliation, the healing of relationships. Like reconciliation, restorative and covenantal justice seeks embrace. It seeks the renewal of the covenant between God and humans, between humans themselves and between humans and the rest of creation, from the most local to the most global levels.

Palestinian theologian, Naim Stifan Ateek (see N Ateek, Justice and only justice. A Palestinian theology of liberation. New York: Orbis Books, 1989, p.142-143) argues that tsedaqah carries the meaning of kindness, compassion and mercy. God’s concern for social justice grows out of his compassion and mercy. Ateek is afraid that when the forensic and sacrificial dimensions of justice are separated, the situation of injustice and brokenness might deteriorate:

Since, as result of the Fall, the dichotomies lie within the fragmentation of the human being, people have a propensity to talk about justice in a strict sense, especially when they have fallen prey to injustice. The symbol of justice has become a blindfolded virgin carrying a scale in one hand and a sword in the other, rendering impartially to each person his or her due. In other words, justice is invoked as a totally uninvolved, independent, objective standard. Legally speaking, such a concept might satisfy human demands for justice, but it would leave much to be desired because there is a sense in which blind, impersonal, and exacting justice can easily become injustice. If strict justice were left to operate by itself, the line that separates it from injustice would be very thin indeed. It is, of course, quite understandable that humans who have been wronged usually demand that absolute justice be done. Absolute justice not only restores their rights but also has a way of condemning and humiliating the wrongdoer. Yet so often such an outcome leaves the persons, the human family, or the nation involved fragmented and lost. What we need in the Israel-Palestine conflict is a way in which justice can be exercised so that the ultimate result would be peace and reconciliation between and within each people and not the fragmentation and destruction of either or both. Our problem is that, while such positive results are innately naturally in God, they are alien in unredeemed humans (1989: 139).

2. Belhar confesses reconciliation as the work of the triune God. The Accra Confession affirms this, emphasizing reconciliation between peoples and between peoples and the earth. The reconciliation that is confessed reflects the two dimensions of reconciliation in Pauline thought. Reconciliation as hilasmos has to do with the expiation of wrongs and stumbling-blocks to atonement (at-one-ment). Reconciliation as katalassoo refers to harmony in the relationship with the other. This reconciliation has in mind the embrace that Miroslav Volfrefers to: the embrace of different races, tribes, nationalities, socio-economic groups, genders, sexual orientations, and age groups, “normal” and disabled people. The reconciliation of Belhar pleads for the removal of stumbling-blocks in the way of peaceful living, in the way of the embrace. Reconciliation therefore implies opposition to injustices like violence, war, racism, tribalism, xenophobia, classism, misogyny, homophobia, ageism, handicappism and ecocide (see M Volf, Exclusion and embrace. A theological exploration of identity, otherness and reconciliation  – Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996, p. 171).

Belhar’s thinking about reconciliation is informed by the teaching of the long Christian tradition on reconciliation. Reconciliation, therefore, is viewed as the redemptive work by the Triune God which is done for us in Jesus Christ (cf. Anselm’s objective theory of atonement); reconciliation refers to the transformation that the love of the Triune God brings about in our lives (cf. Abelard’s subjective theory of atonement); and reconciliation refers to the victory of Christ over the cosmic powers of evil and our consequent liberation from them (cf. Irenaeus’ theory of atonement). South African theologian, John de Gruchy, is of the opinion that the last-mentioned theory helps us to understand the social and cosmic dimensions of reconciliation. The Christian doctrine of reconciliation proclaims our liberation from contemporary evil powers that dehumanise God’s people and that commit ecocide (see J de Gruchy, Reconciliation. Restoring justice – London: SCM Press, 2002, p.58).

Another remark of importance regarding Belhar’s understanding of reconciliation is the fact that reconciliation has both vertical and horizontal dimensions. Belhar confirms, as suggested by the above-mentioned theories of atonement, that God reconciles us with Himself, but that He also reconciles us with each other. Donald Shriver aptly describes the horizontal (personal and political) dimension of reconciliation. According to him reconciliation and forgiveness imply the honest and truthful facing of past evils, opposition to revenge, empathy for victims and perpetrators of evil, and the commitment of victims to resume life alongside evildoers (see D Shriver, An ethic for enemies. Forgiveness in politics – Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 1995 p. 67. A second book by Shriver on reconciliation in the public sphere has been published recently, namely Honest patriots: Loving a country enough to remember its misdeeds Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).

Reconciliation, according to Belhar, aims at embrace through the expiation of wrongs and stumbling-blocks to that embrace. The Accra Confession sees justice, reconciliation and unity as interwoven and requisite one to another. Thereby the connectedness of reconciliation and justice is revealed.

3. Belhar describes unity as unity in proximity, and in the Accra, community is named as our goal and disunity is rejected. Unity implies that people are exposed to each other, that we encounter one another, that we share in each others’ lives, that we participate in the joys and sorrows of the other, that we develop social solidarity with each other. The confession of unity in proximity calls for the development of ecclesial practices that facilitate this nearness of a diversity of people, and of people who were estranged from each other and who still do not enjoy friendship. Where unity in proximity is dealt with in constructive ways unity in diversity is served, and joyful unity in freedom is actualised. And where this happens we make progress on the journey towards the actualisation of a life of dignity for all.

John Douglas Hall (DJ Hall, Confessing the one faith. Christian theology in a North American context – Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996, p.72 – 73) bases the unity of the church in the unity of the triune God. The unity of the church is a necessary consequence of the unity reflected in creation, redemption and consummation. All that is created is created by the one God. Humans and all other creatures are created by one substance, Adamah. This God is one. Polytheism is resisted by the Christian church. Monotheism is sustained, and therefore also the unbreakable ties with the parental faith of Israel.

Unity is also reflected in Christological faith. The Formula of Chalcedon rejects duality, division, separation and mixing within Christ. It confesses the unity of the one Christ, who is fully God and fully human.

The unity of the church also resides in pneumatological faith. The telos (inner aim) informing all creation, and the grace of the fulfilling eschatos (consummation),  that the Spirit actualizes, “is a reunification of all that is now divided, separated, and alienated, an ultimate harmonization of the whole that, without obscuring difference, overcomes the sting of difference under the conditions of sin and death (see DJ Hall, 1996, p.72)”.

Against the background of this Trinitarian basis of unity, Hall (see DJ Hall, 1996, p.73) reckons it would be highly extraordinary if we end up with an ecclesiology which fails to reflect it.

That community could hardly be regarded as the creation of the one triune God, living in discipleship vis-a-vis the “one Lord Jesus Christ,” and in its life anticipating the ultimate reconciliation of all creatures, thus restoring the intention of their Creator, were it to consider its own unity incidental or merely desirable.

This Trinitarian understanding of the unity of the church and of all God’s people is a unity of proximity, diversity and freedom.

The unity, perichoresis, inter-relatedness and interdependence, unity within the trinity is a unity in freedom. The Persons in the trinity are connected through the bond of love. The Holy Spirit of communion is this bond within the trinity and between the trinity and all of creation (cf 2 Corinthians 13: 13).

In freedom the triune God created, sustains, redeems and renews all of creation for the sake of joyful communion.

The brief outline above hopefully demonstrates the close resemblance between unity, justice and reconciliation. Together, i.e. in unity we grow in reconciliation and justice. Although justice and reconciliation are not identical, it is clear that, when we view justice as compassionate, covenantal and restorative justice (i.e. justice that seeks reparation and restitution through forensic means, and justice that seeks, through the grace of God, in a merciful way and in the willingness to sacrifice, the healing of relationships and the renewal of the covenant between God and his people and among people themselves), justice and reconciliation are both at the service of the dawning of embrace or, in the words of Nicholas Wolterstorff, the dawning of shalom, of a life of peace and joy, a life of inalienable dignity (seeN Wolterstorff, Until peace and justice embrace – Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983, p. 70).

Nico Koopman is Dean of the Faculty of Theology, Director of the Beyers Naude Centre for Public Theology and Professor of Systematic Theology at Stellenbosch University. He is also an ordained pastor of the Uniting Reformed church in Southern Africa. His research and publications focus upon Public Theology. From a Trinitarian perspective he reflects upon the public content, the public rationality and the public impact of Christian faith.