Exodus 23:1-9 You shall not raise a false report: put not your hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness. The illustrations adduced in these nine verses show the various ways in which men may be tempted to injustice in judicial procedure. Those who believe themselves wronged have to appeal to their fellow men to settle the matter so far as human capacity can settle it. Hence the positions indicated in this passage. We see plaintiffs, defendants, witnesses, judges, and supporters and sympathisers, and the great aim set before all of them is the attainment of just conclusions. Men feel nothing more bitterly than unjust treatment; and yet just treatment is one of the most difficult of all things to get. Even he who himself has been unjustly treated cannot be induced to treat others justly. Thus there are put before the individual Israelite here illustrations of all the ways in which it is possible for him either to help or to hinder justice. I. THE ISRAELITE IS CAUTIONED LEST BY YIELDING TO UNWORTHY MOTIVES, HE SHOULD HELP OTHERS TO GAIN VICTORIES OF UNRIGHTEOUSNESS. It is only too easy to send abroad an empty story which may end in the ruin of an innocent man. We may become afflicted with a spirit of partisanship which, even if it lead not to downright lying, may prompt to exaggerations and distortions, just as valuable for the attainment of malicious purposes, lie who would not deliberately fabricate a lie will nevertheless be well disposed to believe it when fabricated by another, and will then utter it for truth. We easily believe what we want to believe. It is so pleasant to be with the multitude; to go against it requires a great deal of courage, and a deep devotion to what is just, as the paramount thing to be considered in all judicial enquiries. Let us feel that justice is not a matter of majorities, but of great principles honestly and ably applied to particular cases, the nature of these cases being determined by evidence which has been carefully sifted and arranged so as to get at the truth. He who comes into a court of justice comes there in the simple and sufficient claims of his humanity; all considerations of popular applause, all sympathy with a poor man, merely as a poor man, are entirely out of place. We must guard against all cheap sentiment; we must be just before we are generous. Adroit appeals to the feelings of a jury are part of the stock-in-trade of a practised advocate; and witnesses themselves understand how to profit by the prejudices and weaknesses of sensitive minds. The poor, the sick, the maimed only too often think that they may gain by their poverty, their feebleness, their mutilation, what is not to be gained by the righteousness of their cause. Everyone, therefore, who has to do with a court of justice needs great circumspection to keep himself clear of all words and actions such as might lend themselves to injustice. The effort of one may not secure a just judgment, but each individual must do his part. Then the stain of injustice is not on his garments. II. AN INJURED PERSON MUST KEEP CLEAR OF PERSONAL ANIMOSITY IN THE PURSUIT OF HIS RIGHTS. An illustration is given from the misfortune which may happen to his enemy's ox or ass (vers. 4, 5). We must never forget that our enemy is also our neighbour. If a man wrongs us, it does not cancel that wrong to do him wrong in return. There is a certain appointed way of getting all such wrong put right, and if it cannot be put right in that way there is no other to be found, - no other at least so far as human aid avails. For a man to see his enemy in this position, with ox or ass gone astray or in any way needing help, is a capital chance for showing that no petty grudge actuates him in legal proceedings. He who is treated wrongly must seek for justice, but he will gladly hail the opportunity of showing that it is justice only that he seeks. It is often those who are most unyielding in the matter of right who are also most tender and assiduous in the matter of compassion. It is an easier thing through sentimental weakness to countenance a poor man in his cause than to take the trouble of driving home a lost ox or ass to its owner. The very same considerations of right which make a man feel that he cannot sit down tamely under injustice, should also make him feel that he cannot allow the property of others to go to ruin, when his timely intervention will save it. III. THERE ARE DIRECTIONS IN PARTICULAR FOR THOSE WHO HAVE TO JUDGE. The instructions in vers. 6-9 seem specially to concern the judge. Plaintiffs, defendants and witnesses are only occasionally in courts of justice, but the judge is always there. It is his daily work to settle right as between man and man. Those who have to come before him are instructed and cautioned to come in a just spirit; but inasmuch as many of them will not attend to the instructions, it is the business of the judge to neutralise as far as he can their unrighteous approaches; and it seems to be particularly implied that he must keep himself from all temptations such as come so fascinatingly through the rich and the powerful. He with whom judicial decisions rest will have many to tempt him if he shows himself at all open to temptation. Let the judge remember that his judgment, though it may gain a cause, does not effect a final settlement. Through prejudice or bribery he may justify the wicked; but that does not hold them justified. He must not say of anyone who comes before him, that he is only a poor man or a foreigner and therefore his interests cannot matter. It should be his joy to feel and his pride to say that no one went away from him with wrongs unredressed, so far as any searching of his could discover the doer of the wrong. A judge has great opportunities. Every upright, discerning and scrupulous judge does much in the circle of his own influence to keep a high standard of right and wrong before the minds of his fellow men. - Y. Parallel Verses KJV: Thou shalt not raise a false report: put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness. |
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