"Justice" in the Bible and a problem in translation if we read it with our American worldview

The NIV Bible has a word count of 127 for the word "justice". The idea and theme is spoken about a lot more... Does the American church have the right idea when speaking about "justice"? What does the Bible mean when it speaks of ""justice"?

According to the Old Testament, God’s justice means to share food, shelter, and other basic resources with those who have fewer of them (Is 58:6-10.) Injustice happens when people are barred from fair wages and therefore from the same goods and opportunities afforded others. (Lev 19:13, Jer 22:13.)

In Proverbs 3:27-28 it says:
"Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it. Do not say to your neighbor, Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it--when you have it with you."

When you take your time, effort, money, skills - when it is in your power to fill the need of your neighbor, you are doing justice. This is the Biblical understanding of the word.

The Bible says to do good is to use what is in your "power" to do. The skills, time, money, and education that was GIVEN to you by God is this "power". Others have not been given the same "power" as you. You are commanded to give to them what is in their right to have. That is how you do "good". The Christian is in a sense commanded to ask and act on the question: What do I have that enables others to flourish? If we fail we fail on doing justice.

It is worded this way in another translation: "Don't withhold good from them which is their right."

Modern Americans have an incredibly individualistic approach to everything, if we are successful then we think that are success is the product of our individual choices... but let's think this through to the end. In reality, who you are is mainly the product of your community, your family, etc. A number of factors that are outside of our control (If you disagree, the first retort that comes to my mind is to have you think about how far your hard work would take you if you were born on the mountains of Tibet or the streets of southeast Fresno or Anacostia in D.C.... The reality is that a number of things have already gone our way in order for any of our hard work to pay off).

When modern Americans think of justice, they almost exclusively think of it in terms of individual rights. The idea is the opposite of the Biblical understanding of the word. It is the idea of removing individuals from networks so that they can do whatever they want to do. It's actually unraveling people from each other - "you have a right to do whatever you want; you should not worry about family commitments, you should not worry about anyone else, you have to worry about you want to do".

The biblical understanding of justice is that we OWE one another what we have. If I have been given by God education, money, and skills, I then owe it to my community to spread it around. If I hold it in I am actually tearing the very fabric of my community. It is the right of those that do not have that I do this. That is what Proverbs is saying here.

An American might object, 'I worked for my money! I have worked for what I have got! What do you mean it is their right?! Let them work for it, let them do what they want to do! People choose to be poor!'

An American MIGHT have some sense in saying this, but the church does not. We need to stop acting like Americans and start acting like Christians because the reality of the situation is this: (here is one example of reality) millions of kids around the world are stuck in neighborhoods and schools that are absolutely incompetent. By the time that they are in, say, High School they are illiterate, they have no kinds of skills that could make them any decent money in our economy and basically their lives are in a lot of trouble... Why are they in this condition? The answer is argued about by liberals and conservatives, but no one ever blames it on the kid! The truth is that my children will have an infinite amount more of a chance to succeed then these. The world is FULL of these inequitable distributions of resources. That is a fact and it is not the kids' fault! Some may argue that it is the families' or others that it is systematic racism within the city, but it is never the kid's fault. They never have a chance to choose the life they have! The never had a chance to "earn" another life! And if I don't use my "power" to plow into my neighbors (which is of course not meant as a geographical neighbor as we see in the Good Samaritan story) that are without, which is their right according to Proverbs, and say they can pull themselves up by their bootstraps... then I will be faced with the sobering reality that I did not pull myself up by my bootstraps. I worked very hard with what I HAD! I got so much and they got so very little. Americans are the last people in the world to see this... and Christians should be the first to see this. Because Christ came down and invested and plowed Himself into us. If we really believe that we are sinners saved by grace, then we will see how God knew that we could not pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. As Christians we have to identify with the poor because Jesus came down to identify Himself with us while we were poor, while we were lacking. If we don't see this, that all we have is an incredible gift and nothing of it was earned, then we don't have a saving faith (1 John 3:16-17; James 1-2), and we can just go about as all Americans do, fighting for our individual causes of "justice".

A failure in all of this is not just a lack of compassion, not just stinginess, it is a lack of justice. And the Lord of justice will judge with justice in the end...
A parable from Jesus (Matthew 18:23-34) describing the kingdom of God ends with - "Then his master summoned him and said to him, You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you? And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt."

We are called to follow the lead of the one only who was fully just, the one who invested everything in us through His death, that gained Him nothing, except for the opportunity to bring us back to Himself...