Hashem’s Laws as Social Justice

There are many contemporary definitions of the term “social justice”. Initially, it focused on dealing only with poverty. In our day, social justice has expanded to focus on diversity and equality. Further refinement of its focus depends on which group of people you ascribe to. 

One group rejects God. It embraces social media, licentiousness, heathenism, injustice, lies, elitism, lawlessness, and addiction to anything that hides the pain people feel from the void in their hearts.  Most people are in this group. 

The other group embraces Hashem and His Torah. It’s filled with joy, meaning in life, and with the ever-conscious message that “I am Hashem”. In His world, there is right and wrong. What is right? Fulfilling His will by doing His mitzvot. What is wrong? Everything else. Few people are in this group.  

As much as the first group peddles its version of “social justice” as the path to true equality, genuine equality in the world can be found only where man acknowledges Hashem and follows His Torah. 

Divinely Mandated Equality 

Those who recognize Hashem and His Torah are living the very diversity, equality, and social justice that the first group ascribes to. Here are some characteristics of Hashem’s mandate:  

Everybody has a mission  

For some reason, if you are a racist, republican, or remarkable, you are going in the wrong direction. If you are white, your mission is one of evil. For them, the only people who can do something valuable with their lives are brown, yellow, poor or those who pretend to like them.  

In the first group, whites, republicans, or those who are remarkable in any way are going in the wrong direction. Only those people who are brown, yellow, or poor can do something valuable with their lives and live with a sense of mission. 

In contrast, every person in Hashem’s group has both a national and personal mission.  

The national mission is to serve Hashem by following either the seven Noahide laws or 613 commandments in His Torah. In addition, each person has a personal mission. It could be to improve a specific character trait, or to fix something that went wrong in a former life. It could be to endure a difficult situation with emunah and simcha and in doing so, redeem the world.  

In Hashem’s group, everybody has something important to do every minute of their existence. Hashem watches us with an eye that sees. He hears us with an ear that hears, and He writes everything we do into our personal “book”.  

We are rewarded according to effort 

If we were to be rewarded only for results, it wouldn’t be fair. A billionaire could give a tenth of his money to charity and thereby surpass donations from people with far less. For example, George Soros could donate 1% of the interest of his wealth to a yeshiva. His one-time donation would far exceed all donations from those with less income but who donate yearly. If the reward is according to results, then Soros would be rewarded far more than those who donated less money but more often from lesser funds.  

That’s not justice. Should those who have less not be rewarded for what they gave simply because they started out humbly? Why should those who have less not be rewarded for what they give in proportion to their effort? For example, someone who has $10 to his name and donates $1 makes a greater effort than someone who has $10 million to his name and gives $500,000.  

In Hashem’s group, regardless of race, color, social status, financial status, social status, gender, level of intelligence, or physical-mental handicaps, everyone can stand close with Hashem.  

Minorities, the poor, and the disadvantaged at the bottom of the social ladder all struggle in everything that they do. They can perform the same mitzvot as the rich and famous, but they do mitzvot with greater effort. Every commandment they follow is rewarded with greater merit.  

The elite look down on those who have less . . . as if less is really less. In the world of Truth, less is more.  

Nothing is forever 

What’s the end goal of any group of people forcing its way to the top of the political, financial, and social pyramid? To stay at the top forever.  

Labeling white people as “racist”, religious people as “parasite”, and people who love their country as “fascist” is a way to maintain power at the top by denigrating others. They think they will be superior forever.  

That’s what the monarchies and nobles felt all throughout Europe for a thousand years. After two world wars, everything changed.  

At the end of your life, everything changes.  

Nothing is forever except for the commandments from God that we follow.  

At the end of our lives, Hashem checks our personal “book” and tallies our service to Him. Those who did well will ascend. Those who didn’t, or even worse – those who tried to get other people to abandon Hashem’s ways, God forbid – will go to the bottom.  

The Gemara is very clear about this: Those who appear to be on top in this world are at the bottom in the Next World, and those who appear to be on the bottom in this world are at the very top in the Next World.  

This is true justice. Hashem gives us clear rules that have remained unchanged for over 3,335 years. Those who follow them with all their heart and all their energy will ascend, regardless of their physical and economic status. Those that don’t follow His mitzvot will fall.  

Hashem’s mitzvot provide the absolute justice that social movements have been looking for since the beginning of time.  

Baruch Hashem, anyone who follows Him.  

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David Ben Horin lives in Afula with his family, millions of sunflowers, and Matilda, our local camel. David‘s Israeli startup, Center Stage Marketing, is a lean marketing agency for startups and small businesses that creates and promotes SEO optimized ROI-driven to the right audience on LinkedIn to make your business the star of the show.