Black Lives Matter demands justice

Black Lives Matter wants respect and justice; the white church generally neglects biblical justice and thereby the love of God.  I recommend that my fellow white Christians read two books on biblical justice.  A new 2016 book titled The Justice Calling by two women who practice what they preach.  Also an older 1974 book titled Marx and the Bible by a Spanish speaking Catholic priest; this book should have been more accurately titled Justice and Injustice in the Bible.

This review will focus on the book by Jose Miranda.  Writing from a Latin American perspective, Miranda notes that Latin Christianity is "an effective ally of so many structures of economic, social, and political oppression."  Blacks and Native Americans would say much the same about American Christianity.  Miranda adds: "The philosophy of oppression, perfected and refined through civilization as a true culture of injustice, does not achieve its greatest triumph when its propagandists knowingly inculcate it; rather the triumph is achieved when this philosophy has become so deeply rooted in the spirits of the oppressors themselves and their ideologies that they are not even aware of their guilt."  In other words, their systems of oppression seem natural, normal, even right; this is true of most white Americans.

Miranda writes about the biblical limits of private land ownership.  "The right of all men to USE the goods of the earth for their sustenance [comes] prior to the right of ownership."  He refers to the church father Jerome who said, "for all riches come from injustice."  Luke 6:24 and 16:9 go together:  "Woe to the rich. . . . and the money of injustice."

Miranda's book Marx and the Bible was originally written in Spanish and then translated into English.  Therefore, as one reads Romans you find many more references to justice and injustice:  Roman 1:18ff  "the injustices of men who by their injustice are suppressing the truth." In a typical English translation of the Bible, one might find justice 125-135 times whereas in a Spanish or Latin translation around 400 times.

Miranda comments:  "But frankly I do not see how there can be an authentic compassion for the oppressed without there being at the same time indignation against the oppressor."  "A God who is accessible only in the act of justice."  "First justice, then worship."

From I John:  "Everyone who does justice is born of him." 2:29.  "Everyone who loves is born of God." 4:7.

Miranda:  "One of the most disastrous errors in the history of Christianity is to have tried---under the influence of Greek definitions---to differentiate between love and justice.  Love is not love without a passion for justice."  "Love without justice is only charity and often paternalism."

Miranda prefers that dikaiosyne be translated as justice, not righteousness.  A justice that gives priority to the oppressed, the poor, the widow, the orphan.

The action of fair and just judgments produce justice for the oppressed poor--the result.  Or justice actions save from oppression.  What is judgment?  "to save the world from the oppression of the unjust."

"The New Testament  understands the entire Law and the Prophets as pure and implacable; love your neighbor automatically includes justice."

I have only scratched the surface of a treasure trove of the biblical teaching on justice.  Please read Miranda.