Justice of Martyrdom

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Gospel is not a mere esotericism but an ethical mandate emanating the stench of the margins. More than comforting the discomforted it discomforts the comforted. The uncompromised requisite of the Gospel is an altruistic life at the threshold of death. Such is the kingdom of God; a kingdom where the coronation is marked by a crown of thorns rather than the crown of jewels. Justice forms the dictate of love.  Since Gospel is a public affair it is of prime importance how love of Christ is evinced especially in public. Cornel West states; “Justice is what love looks like in public.” Justice without love is anemic while love without justice is sentimental. Dominc Crossan remarks; “Justice without love may end in brutality, but love without justice must end in banality. Love empowers justice, and justice embodies love. Keep both, or get neither.”

Justice lies at the heart of the Gospel. The entire Gospel could be summarized in the Nazareth Manifesto (Luke 4: 16- 21) – The Mission Statement of Jesus. The kernel of the manifesto is expressed in vv. 18 and 19;

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.
For instance, what could be the good news to the poor than for the fact that the poor will no longer be poor or to rephrase it the poor will no longer be impoverished by the dominant? Thus any act that renders people poor or reinstates poverty is antithetical to the Mission Statement of Christ and Christians need to dissent vociferously. Silence before the face of injustice is the greatest heresy and thus complicit. Metropolitan Gennadios makes it plain;

In the struggle for justice, the Lord sides with the victimized and the oppressed. He condemns the tyrannous; he throws down the mighty. He exalts the lowly; he judges the rich who set their hearts on their wealth and multiply their possessions at the expense of the exploited. The fact that the poor will always be with us, as Jesus said, does not give human beings permission to be callous and indifferent to the needs of their fellow creatures. The fact that perfect justice will be established only in the kingdom to come does not exempt human beings from establishing justice now, to the extent possible. On the contrary, it compels them to do so.[1]
In the pursuit of justice it is important how comprehensively we appropriate justice. Justice is never to be perceived retributively. Spilling of blood for whatsoever reason can never be glorified. Justice should always be conceptualized as distributive. I solicit your attention to ethicist John Rawls’ Theory of Justice. Rawls described justice as “fairness”. He made a transition from equality to justice. Equality is not always justice. Rawls concept of justice is based on the principle of moral good which aims to maximize liberty (opportunities) and minimise inequalities (differences, disadvantages). Rawls proposes two principles of justice. They are;

1. Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all.
2. Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both:
a. to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged, consistent with the just savings principle, and
b. attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity.[2]
Justice perceived in the distributive sense is more viable and attunes to the framework of Jesus.  

The greatest form of justice is to lay down our life for others. Thus the Orthodox Church considers Martyrdom as a paradigm of justice. Today the Orthodox Church commemorates the memory of the 40 Martyrs of Sebaste.

Martyrdom is not an opiate craving for death but the word martyr derives from the Greek word marturia which essentially means “to witness”. Martyrdom teaches us that witnessing Christ is of paramount importance and in the process of witnessing if death becomes an inevitability for the emancipation of the commons then justice is in embracing death. The jihadists or suicide bombers who die in the process of killing others can never be considered martyrs. A martyr sacrifices his/her life so that the other does not get killed.    

Maxmilian Kolbe’s story exemplifies the shift in emphasis from martyrdom as simply enduring death by professing the faith to martyrdom as an act of love and justice for others that expresses faith in God. Father Kolbe, a Polish Franciscan priest, imprisoned in Auschwitz during World War II, offered to take the place of a married man with a family who was sentenced to death with nine others in retaliation for one prisoner who had escaped. When Pope Paul VI beatified Kolbe on October 17,1971, he numbered him among the confessors, and not as a martyr, even though the Nazis executed him. When Pope John Paul II moved the process toward canonizing Kolbe, Polish and German bishops asked the Pope to canonize Blessed Maximilian as a martyr rather than as a confessor of the Catholic faith. They argued that Kolbe was executed because of Nazi hatred of the faith, citing this dialogue between the Nazi commandant and Father Kolbe;

Commandant: “Why do wish to take another's place?”
Kolbe: “I am an old man, sir, and good for nothing. My life is no longer of use to anyone.”
Commandant: “In whose place do you wish to die?”
Kolbe: “For the one with the wife and children,” pointing to Francis Gajowniczek.
Commandant: “Who are you?”
Kolbe: “I am a Catholic priest.”
The commandant, having no use for priests, readily allowed the switch, and Kolbe was subsequently starved to near-death and then given a lethal injection.[3]

Lent is a time to meditate on the purpose of our lives. The greatest purpose of a Christian life is to witness Jesus to the extent of sacrificing our life for others. In a world where blood calls for blood martyrdom may be considered foolish but let us be fools for the sake of Christ. Martyrs continue to live even after they die and thus the Orthodox Church believes in the intercession of the martyrs. I conclude with one of the morning prayers of today (Saphro Dshabtho) of the Syrian Orthodox Church;

O you martyrs, why did you despise this passing world, which all men love? Because we saw that it is deceitful in its pleasures and that it has hated from the beginning to the end those who love it. The martyrs saw Christ hanging on the cross and his side pierced with a lance and blood and water flowing from it and they hastened to encourage one another saying: come, let us die for the sake of our Lord, as he died for us. Amen
Prayers
Dn. Basil Paul


[1] Metropolitan Gennadios of Sassima, “God of Life, Lead us to Justice and Peace: An Ecumenical Process for Transformation”, The Ecumenical Review 65/2, 2013, 217.
[2]http://www.qcc.cuny.edu/SocialSciences/ppecorino/INTRO_TEXT/Chapter%208%20Ethics/Justice_as_Fairness.htm
[3] Thomas L. Schubeck, “Salvadoran Martyrs: A Love that does Justice”, Horizons 28/1, 2001, 14-15.

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