Do religions of the world — Christianity, Judaism, Islam — define justice differently than the secular world?
There often are some differences, yes, though there is also some kinship. The relationship of mercy to justice is a perfectly legitimate, secular question as well as a religious question. Often, forgiveness has been said to be a strictly religious “something.” One of the reasons I wrote AN ETHIC FOR ENEMIES was in order to make forgiveness a socially important matter and a secularly important matter, too. But it’s certainly true that some religions, especially Christianity, have a stronger emphasis on forgiveness than some of the other religions. But both Judaism and Islam do have forgiveness in their theology. Every High Holiday, on Yom Kippur, Jews are supposed to confess their sins to each other and engage in forgiveness, especially if forgiveness is asked for. Q: But Judaism acknowledges the propriety of the death penalty. A: Some Jews do and some don’t. Many parts of the Hebrew Bible do that, and some of my Christian friends who champion capital punishment would say, “Well, it’s i
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