Shakespeare in `The Merchant of Venice'. A pound of flesh— Law and justice!
(With market rallying and we all making money Abdul Samadi I thought this will interest you.)
Governments are good at law; they often fall short when it comes to justice. The incident that was reported by my father showed this basic flaw. The law sometime fails to provide justice.
Perhaps the most expressive example of the distinction in literature is provided by Shakespeare in `The Merchant of Venice'. Antonio, the Merchant, borrows money from the money- lender Shylock. So certain is Antonio of imminent wealth that, `in merry sport', he signs a bond to repay the money, or surrender a pound of his flesh. When misfortune strikes, and he cannot repay the loan, Shylock demands his pound of flesh. The demand is unjust, grotesque, out of all proportion; but the law is on his side. Even Portia, Antonio's beloved, disguised as a lawyer, has to concede this: `the Venetian law cannot impugn you as you proceed'. A contract is a contract. `There is no power in Venice can alter a decree established.' The only way in which Portia can save Antonio from the surgeon's knife, is to take the law literally, and have Shylock's legal claim rebound on him. `A pound of that same Merchant's flesh is thine', Portia declares, but `This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood: The words expressly are `a pound of flesh'... But, in the cutting it, if thou does shed One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods Are, by the laws of Venice, confiscate.' Shylock is confounded; Antonio is spared; the letter of the law prevails and justice is done.
<< Look at drunk driving, the punishment is to revoke the driver license. How many time you heard that a drunk driver was involved in a deadly accident while his/her license was under suspension. How many time you here about a repeat rapist, pedophile, offender, thief and so on.>>
Revoking a drivers license after a drunk driving offence is a balanced punishment. Which is not the same as gorging out of eye from its socket using professional help who trained to fix it at the first place. I am not against due punishment or sentences to people who offend if a balanced is maintained. Exclusion of criminals from society without parole is one such acceptable option.
I would use pound of flesh argument purely if ‘eye for any eye’ has to become reality. In my opinion justice demands that acid should have been given in the hand of the victim and judge should have asked the victim to burn the perpetrator exactly in a manner in which he had burnt the vicitm. Not an inch or ounce more not a inch or ounce less. If he could not he should have accepted the offer of compensation. The justice would have been done.
I am against barbaric mutilations aimed at ‘creation of terror’ to eliminate crime. Human body is a god’s gift no one has to right to mutilate it for sake of punishment, in France even vasectomy is prohibited as it is considered an attempt to mutilate human body. (IHT 21st Aug, 2000 has an article on this)
I do not defend the rights of the offenders. I fervently believe in the assumption that human beings can change. Although I believe that retribution should be meted out to those who commit crimes, what occurred in Saudi Arabia was nothing short of barbarism of the highest order. Basic teachings of every religion advocate the power of forgiveness. If barbaric punishments would have prevented crimes than why do Saudi Arabia have one of the highest rates of executions in the world?
No, I am not pleading to exonerate the criminals completely from their wrongful act, but how can we be sure that an ‘eye for an eye’ punishment will deter others from committing the same crimes again? As Juli has correctly pointed out, severe punishments isn’t the answer as by now we would be living in a crime-free utopia if that was the case.
The sad truth is there is no short term solution and no easy way out. To eradicate crime, we must fight it at its roots. Poverty, illiteracy, broken homes, lost moral values all contribute to crime and unless we fight them, crime will prevail whether we like it or not.
When you suggest a return to past when dealing with crime do you seriously mean that we should start mutilating offenders so as to ensure they do not re-offend. If the modern world has failed so miserably in this respect why is that so many people leave the Arab countries? Also let us not forget that Arab countries still have high crime rate despite having barbaric punishments. Every drug peddler caught is executed in a public, unfortunately number of executions every year have increased, the risk of losing life have not deter the peddlers. The problem of drugs in any society is a demand side problem, instead of punishing the drug abusers by executing the peddlers the Saudis policy has helped new peddlers ready to take the risk for greater returns.
Saudi Arabia has one of the highest rates of executions in the world. At least 103 people were executed in 1999, as recorded by Amnesty International. In the past 20 years 1,163 people are known to have been executed. The true figure is probably much higher.
Now I rest my case with the question: Why is Saudi Arabia still not the crime free state it intends to be? Why have the murders not ceased? After all is not the consequences of a severe punishment enough to prevent the high rate of murders it already has?
And yes when I stand before God, I can proudly say I never advocated the mutilation of any body part of any human being because to do so would be playing God!
P.S. This was researched and written on Sunday, today I saw the note that we are by traditions of the thread restricted to continue non-market discussions on week days, after looking at some of the messages I thought my research should not go waste. I am sorry dad. Zain
Credits..
Colin Swatridge <<WHAT is the difference between law and justice? This is a
standard question in political philosophy. In stock phrases like
the Justice Department, the European Court of Justice, Law
Courts, International Law, Justices of the Peace, the words law
and justice seem to be more or less interchangeable. If we were
asked to define the difference between them, we might say that
law is laid down by the government of the day, whilst justice is
the hoped-for outcome in the courts, where the law is interpreted
in individual cases. Law is the same for everybody, and is top-
down, whereas justice is bottom-up and may require defendants to
be treated differently. >> |
