Justice

All human societies have, in one form or another, embraced the concept of man‑made justice—the idea that we create systems to ensure wrongs are righted through courts of law. Yet beneath the surface, strong passions often struggle to accept these rulings, and in some or  many cases people take the law into their own hands.

But what if justice herself took the law into her own hands? Of all the misunderstandings that shape human behavior, perhaps the greatest is our confusion about the nature of true justice. Many cultures hold a belief in divine justice—the notion that what humans fail to punish or set right on Earth, the universe or divine will correct. In ancient Egypt, for example, the judgment of the soul was weighed against the feather of Ma’at, with Ma’at’s own principle of truth and balance serving as the ultimate arbiter.

It is natural, however, to crave the punishment of wrongdoers. Courts of law—human justice itself—arose from the need to curb vengeance: to prevent killing, society insisted on controlled retribution. Yet the desire for justice remains primal, visceral.

Consider Lady Justice: standing beneath skies ablaze with fire. Though she is blindfolded,  the tip of her sword is bloodied, a stark sign that she has already acted violently to right a wrong. Perhaps she concluded that it was her duty to act directly, that the wrong was so great that she could not wait for others to intervene. The fiery skies hint at the consequences of a justice that refuses restraint—a willingness to let the world burn, if only to ensure that justice is served. For the idea that justice has not been done, or might never be done, is perhaps the most intolerable thought for humans. We would rather see everything consumed by fire than watch a wrongdoer get off free.