Journey Toward Justice

Author NICHOLAS P. WOLTERSTORF

Publisher BAKER ACADEMIC

ISBN 978-0-8010-4845-6


Yes although Baker Academic publishes this, do not be put off from getting and reading it.  It is one of a series being written under the title of “Turning South, Christian Scholars in an Age of World Christianity.”   It all sounds rather highbrow but this book is thoroughly readable and its topic of great importance.  The author is a Christian philosopher who teaches in Yale University but his encounters with Christianity in various countries of the world has both shaped and influenced his views on the subject of justice.  In particular, he traces his experience of South Africa in the days before apartheid came to an end and became involved to a degree with what was taking place.  First hand he saw what he calls ‘benevolent love’ becoming something actually unjust.   

Even the so-called Christian benevolence of the Afrikaners vitiated against the blacks and the colored people receiving true justice.  The other place he speaks of in these pages is Honduras.  Again, the things he saw challenged his thinking profoundly. So, here we have a book that is mildly philosophical, more particularly theological and Biblical and yet personal also.  An enriching read will be the result to any who get it.  He encountered suffering people having already made a particular study of justice.  I think this book reveals particularly clear thinking based on Biblical revelation.  At bottom he believes that we should, in all our living, be seeking the ‘shalom,’ the wholeness that God intended for every human being and the whole of His creation.  This will not be achieved without a profound realization of the intrinsic worth of every person.  To give due honor to each because made in God’s image.  There are sections to be found here on beauty, hope and justice, his writing is reflective and this note comes in his argumentation too.  He leads the reader through inexorably to a place of agreement with his conclusions.  I particularly appreciated his examination of the words in the group usually translated as ‘righteousness’ and his observations will enlarge the whole dimension of that most central of Biblical matters.  So, here is a book to heartily recommend.

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