20I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. 21I do not set aside the grace of God. For if righteousness comes through the law, Christ died for nothing.
The law. It is produced by men and women to control the acts and behaviour of men and women. It is the product of thousands of years of the need to control people's acts and behaviour, to facilitate the smooth operation of society, to coerce those who wish to depart from the greater good to remain part of the greater good.
In Viking times if I killed your brother then you could take me to court and I would have to pay weregild or 'blood money' to atone for the death of your brother. That is a direct recompense in terms of the victims family being compensated for their loss in terms of money. The crime is linked to the victims family, they are seen to be victims and must be given something to assuage their grief. In our more enlightened times the family stopped holding any place in law. It is only a recent innovation that the victim provides a "victim statement" to explain how they have been affected by the crime. That statement helps the court to determine the level of punishment that must be meted out to the offender.
The offender will be punished with only the merest modicum of compensation being paid to the victim or the victim's family. The state is seen to be the injured party, the actions of the offender have offended the state. The state is not acting as an intermediary, its court is not there to determine the crime and the compensation that must be paid, directly for that crime, to the victim, if the state determines that a crime has been committed it punishes the guilty.
What is the state? The state is an entity that has evolved, it is an entity that sees itself as the true representation of the people's will. In democratic societies the political aspect of the state is the government of the people by an elected body, its term of office is limited to the next election. In non-democratic societies the ruling body is self-perpetuating.
The legal aspect of the state can be a corollary of its political life. For example in the US the ruling power chooses the judiciary. In communist China the single party, the party, chooses the judiciary. In the UK the judiciary elects its own representatives, the judges. The corrupt elect the corrupt.
It is men, and to a lesser extent, women, choosing men and women to dispense justice. The justice is the product of evolution, and the men and women who are in the position of being paid ample sums for their interpretation of that written law, enact it as their whims and foibles see fit. Often the law, that is the product of a thousand years of testing is as close to perfect as may be obtained on earth, however the law has to have the intermediary of the judges that will place the correct law upon the crime that has been committed and then place the correct interpretation upon that law so that, if guilty, the offender will receive an appropriate punishment and, if innocent, they will go free.
Clearly it is at the point of judge that the system all too easily breaks down. Bias and favour must enter into the equation, it is impossible for one person to have exactly the same beliefs as the next. Nobody is able to act independently of their belief system. Perhaps the bias is overcome with a jury system? Introduce a number of people into the decision so that they will all cancel out each others biases? It is certainly better than a single judge except for the single judge presiding over the jury will still be in a position to apply influence. To lead the uninitiated towards the correct interpretation of the law as the judge sees fit.
This is the law of men and women. It is law the law of people.
What is God's law?
(to be cont'd)
2 Thess 1: Christ's Coming
5 6God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you 7and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. …
NIV
... and does God reveal to us the deep knowledge. Did I see the stars of love or of hate?
"“It means,” said Aslan, “that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know. Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and the darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor’s stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward. And now—”
https://www.openbible.info/labs/cross-references/search?q=1+Corinthians+2%3A9
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