Requirement for Consent

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1. Etymologically, it appears that the root of ṣeḏāqâ, like that of its kindred noun yōšer, ‘uprightness’ (Dt. 9:5),

signifies ‘straightness’, in a physical sense (BDB, p. 841).

2. But already in the patriarchal age ṣeḏāqâ has the abstract meaning of conformity, by a given object or action, to an accepted standard of values, e.g. Jacob’s ‘honest’ living up to the terms of his sheep-contract with Laban (Gn. 30:33). Moses thus speaks of just balances, weights and measures (Lv. 19:36; Dt. 25:15) and insists that Israel’s *JUDGES pronounce ‘just (AV; righteous, RSV) judgment’ (Dt. 16:18, 20). Arguments that are actually questionable may seem, at first glance, to be ‘just’ (Pr. 18:17; RSV, ‘right’); and Christian masters are cautioned to treat their slaves ‘justly and fairly’ (Col. 4:1). Even inanimate objects may be described as ṣeḏeq, if they measure up to the appropriate standards. The phrase, ‘paths of ṣeḏeq’ (Ps. 23:3), for example, 3. Since life’s highest standard is derived from the character of deity, ‘justice’, from the time of Moses and onwards (cf. Dt. 32:4), comes to distinguish that which is God’s will and those activities which result from it. Heavenly choirs proclaim, ‘Just and true are thy ways’ (Rev. 15:3). Recognizing the ultimacy of the will of the Lord, Job therefore asks, ‘How can a man be just before God?’ (Jb. 9:2; cf. 4:17; 33:12). But even though God stands answerable to no man, still ‘to justice he doeth no violence’ (37:23, RVmg.); for the actions of the God who acts in harmony with his own standard are always perfect and right (Zp. 3:5; Ps. 89:14). ṣeḏāqâ may thus describe Yahweh’s preservation of both human and animal life (Ps. 36:6) or his dissociation from vain enterprise (Is. 45:19). In both of the latter verses the EVV translate ṣeḏāqâ as 4. By a natural transition, ‘justice’ then comes to identify that moral standard by which God measures human conduct (Is. 26:7). Men too must ‘do justice’ (Gn. 18:19) as they walk with deity (Gn. 6:9; Mt. 5:48); for not the hearers, but the doers of the law, are ‘just (AV; righteous, RSV) before God’ (Rom. 2:13). The attribute of justice is to be anticipated only in the hearts of those who fear God (Lk. 18:2), because justice in the biblical sense begins with holiness (Mi. 6:8; Mk. 6:20; 1 Thes. 2:10) and with sincere devotion (Lk. 2:25; Acts 10:22).Positively, however, the whole-hearted participation of the Gadites in the divinely ordered conquest of Canaan is described as ‘executing the just decrees of the Lord’ (Dt. 33:21; cf. S. R. Driver, ICC). The need for earnest conformity to the moral will of God lies especially incumbent upon kings (2 Sa. 8:15; Je. 22:15), princes (Pr. 8:15), and judges (Ec. 5:8); but every true believer is expected to ‘do justice’ (Ps. 119:121, AV; Pr. 1:3; cf. its personification in Is. 59:14). Justice constitutes the opposite of sin (Ec. 7:20) and serves as a marked characteristic of Jesus the Messiah (Is. 9:7; Zc. 9:9; Mt. 27:19; Acts 3:14). In the poetry of the OT there do arise affirmations of self-righteousness by men like David (‘Judge me according to my righteousness, and establish the just’, Ps. 7:8 – 9, AV; cf. 18:20 – 24) or Job (‘I am … just and blameless’ Jb. 12:4; cf. 1:1), that might appear incongruous when considered in the light of their acknowledged iniquity (cf. Jb. 7:21; 13:26). The poets’ aims, however, are either to exonerate themselves from particular crimes that enemies have laid to their charge (cf. Ps. 7:4) or to profess a genuine purity of purpose and single-hearted devotion to God (Ps. 17:1). ‘They breathe the spirit of simple faith and childlike trust, which throws itself unreservedly on God … and they disclaim all fellowship with the wicked, from whom they may expect to be distinguished in the course of His Providence’ (A. F. Kirkpatrick, The Book of Psalms, 1906, 1, p. lxxxvii). As Ezekiel described such a man, ‘He walks in my statutes … he is righteous (AV, just), he shall surely live, says the Lord God’ (Ezk. 18:9). 5. In reference to divine government, justice becomes descriptive in a particular way of punishment for moral infraction. Under the lash of heaven-sent plagues, Pharaoh confessed, ‘The Lord is ṣaddiq, and I and my people are wicked’ (Ex. 9:27; cf. Ne. 9:33); and the one thief cried to the other as they were crucified, ‘We indeed justly … ‘(Lk. 23:41). For God cannot remain indifferent to evil (Hab. 1:13; cf. Zp. 1:12), nor will the Almighty pervert justice (Jb. 8:3; cf. 8:4; 36:17). Even the pagans of Malta believed in a divine nemesis, so that when they saw Paul bitten by a viper they concluded, ‘This man is a murderer … justice has not allowed him to live’ (Acts 28:4). God’s punitive righteousness is as a consuming fire (Dt. 32:22; Heb. 12:29; *WRATH), and 6. From the time of the judges and onward, however, ṣeḏāqâ comes also to describe his deeds of vindication for the deserving, ‘the triumph of the Lord’ (Jdg. 5:11). Absalom thus promised a petitioner he ‘would give him justice’ (2 Sa. 15:4; cf. Ps. 82:3), and Solomon proclaimed that God ‘blesses the abode of the righteous (AV, just)’ (Pr. 3:33; cf. Ps. 94:15). Divine vindication became also the plea of Isaiah’s contemporaries, ‘They ask of me the ordinances of justice’ (Is. 58:2 – 3, AV); for though God’s intervention might have been delayed (Ec. 7:15; 8:14; cf. Is. 40:27), he yet ‘became jealous for his land, and had pity on his people’ (Joel 2:18). 7. Such words, however, introduce another aspect, in which divine justice ceases to constitute an expression of precise moral desert and partakes rather of divine pity, love and grace. This connotation appears first in David’s prayer for the forgiveness of his crimes over Bathsheba, when he implored, ‘Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of thy ṣeḏāqâ (deliverance)’ (Ps. 51:14). But what David sought was not vindication; for he had just acknowledged his heinous sin and, indeed, his depravity from birth (Ps. 51:5). His petition sought rather for undeserved pardon; and ṣeḏāqâ may be translated by simple repetition — O God of my salvation: my tongue shall sing of thy ‘salvation’. ṣeḏāqâ, in other words, has become redemptive; it is God’s fulfilling of his own graciously promised salvation, irrespective of the merits of men (cf. David’s same usage in Pss. 31:1; 103:17; 143:1). David’s counsellor Ethan thus moves, in the space of two verses, from a reference to God’s ‘justice [ṣeḏeq according to sense 4 above] and judgment’ (Ps. 89:14, AV) to the joyful testimony, ‘In thy ṣeḏāqâ [promised grace] shall Israel be designates walkable paths. ‘righteousness’; but it might with greater accuracy be rendered ‘regularity’ or ‘reliability’. condemnation is just (Rom. 3:8).

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