Spiritual roots of restorative justice- A Jewish perspective

Source: (2000) In Spiritual roots of restorative justice: A collection of faith community perspectives, 30-32. Ontario, Canada: Ontario Multifaith Council on Spiritual & Religious Care.

Rabbi Ronald Weiss focuses on themes in Jewish tradition that bear upon restorative justice. In Jewish tradition, God’s primary attribute of action is justice, and humankind was created to participate in God’s work of establishing justice in the world. Yet, the Jewish understanding of justice is different from Greek or Western notions of justice. In Greek or Western conceptions, justice is distributive or retributive. In Judaism, justice is substantive – what human life ought to be like. Against this background, Weiss looks at Jewish perspectives on several ethical issues: the connection between means and ends; fulfilling one’s obligations to God and to people; repentance and atonement; and penitence, compensation, forgiveness, and restoration.