This question was posed to me this week after a study of Parashat Mishpatim, (Ex. 21:1-24:18). I thought it to be an excellent topic for another post. So, here is my answer to this question.
It depends on your definition of “fairness.” As we discussed in our study, what is “fair” to man is often not the same as God’s Justice. Here’s a thought. If we believe Yeshua is the Son of God, and we believe in his Divinity and sinless nature, while he was tempted, he sinned not… then is it “fair” that he took on all of the punishment of humanity’s guilt and paid for it with his life when He, himself was guiltless? Is it fair that God sent His own Son to die for the evil committed against his Father that He was not responsible for?
And what of evil? Is it fair that God gave free will to mankind and yet man chose to turn his back on God? Yet without that evil and sin that existed, Yeshua’s sacrifice would have been of no value. Without evil, we have no salvation. In other words, what Judas did by betraying Yeshua was evil. The Crucifixion was evil done to an innocent man, yet without that evil committed to Yeshua, you and I could not be saved, and we’d be eternally separated from God.
So, is God fair? What do you think?
It is very important to know "how” we look at this question from a biblical perspective. Many things like this are what we call a paradox. God commands mankind not to murder, but without Yeshua’s murder and bloodshed, we have no salvation. There’s a paradox.
Here’s a good article from a Bible Dictionary:
Justice of God—that perfection of his nature whereby
he is infinitely righteous in himself and in all he does, the righteousness of
the divine nature exercised in his moral government. At first, God imposes
righteous laws on his creatures and executes them righteously. Justice is not
an optional product of his will, but an unchangeable principle of his very
nature. His legislative justice is his requiring of his rational creatures
conformity in all respects to the moral law. His rectoral or distributive justice
is his dealing with his accountable creatures according to the requirements of
the law in rewarding or punishing them (Ps. 89:14). In remunerative justice he
distributes rewards (James 1:12; 2 Tim. 4:8); in vindictive or punitive justice
he inflicts punishment on account of transgression (2 Thess. 1:6). He cannot,
as being infinitely righteous, do otherwise than regard and hate sin as
intrinsically hateful and deserving of punishment. “He cannot deny himself” (2
Tim. 2:13). His essential and eternal righteousness immutably determines him to
visit every sin as such with merited punishment.[1]
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Eric
[1] Easton, M. G. 1893. In Illustrated Bible
Dictionary and Treasury of Biblical History, Biography, Geography, Doctrine,
and Literature, 401. New York: Harper & Brothers.
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