Leo Tolstoy

“ The apostle Paul says, while fully aware of the just judgment of God, men act unjustly themselves, and they teach others to do the same; therefore the man who judges another cannot be justified. Such is the opinion I find in the epistles of the apostles in reference to courts of law. We all know that, during the whole course of their lives, human courts of law could never have been considered by them as anything but evil – a trial that was to be endured with firmness and submission to the will of God. ”

“ To say nothing of the class of society that I belong to – military men, judges, administrators, whose whole lives are passed in resisting evil – there is not a single private individual, be he ever so insignificant, who has not had to choose between serving God by fulfilling His commandments, or serving the ‘toga’ in the government institutions of his country. ”

“ To show how far I formerly was from the true interpretation of these words, I may here mention a foolish saying of mine, of which I am now heartily ashamed. Even after having become a believer, and having recognized the divinity of the gospel, I used to say, jokingly, on meeting with a friend who was an attorney or a judge, ‘So, you go on judging, and yet isn’t it said, “Do not judge, and you shall not be judged”?’ I was so firmly convinced that these words had no other meaning than that we were not to speak ill of one another, that I did not see the blasphemy of my own words. ”

“ I tried to discover how the first followers of Christ, His disciples, considered human courts of law, and whether they approved of them.
In chapter 4, verses 11 and 12, the disciple James says, ‘Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of his brother, and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law, and judges the law; but if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law, but a judge. There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. ”

“ For he who has shown no mercy shall have judgment without mercy; mercy triumphs over the law.’ (The last words, ‘mercy triumphs over the law,’ have often been translated as, ‘Mercy is extolled in judgment,’ and are cited as meaning that the existence of human judgment may be admitted, provided that it is merciful.)
James exhorts his brethren to make no difference between men. If you make any difference, then you διαεκρίνετε, become partial, and are like judges with evil thoughts. You judge the beggar as being less worthy than the rich man. On the contrary, the rich man is the less worthy one. ”

“ All of us, when reflecting on the destiny of man, have been struck with terror at the sufferings and evils that our human criminal laws have brought into our lives – evils both for those who judge and for those who are judged, from the executions of Tshingis-Han in the second half of the 12th century and the revolutions to those of the present day. ”

“ There can be no doubt that Christ meant the human courts of law, which were to condemn Him and His disciples; which have always condemned, and still continue to condemn, millions of men. Christ must have seen this evil, for He distinctly points it out. In the case of the adulteress He positively rejects human justice and proves that, on account of each man’s own sinful nature, he has no right to judge another. We find the same doctrine repeated several times, as when He says, for instance, that the one who has a beam in his own eye cannot see the mote in his neighbor’s eye ”

“ The doctrine of Christ, which teaches love, humility, and self-denial, had always attracted me. But I found a contrary law, both in the history of the past and in the present organization of our lives – a law repugnant to my heart, my conscience, and my reason, but one that flattered my animal instincts. I knew that if I accepted the doctrine of Christ, I should be forsaken, miserable, persecuted, and sorrowing, as Christ tells us His followers will be. I knew that if I accepted that law of man, I should have the approbation of my fellow-men; I should be at peace and in safety; ”

“ Indeed, we find that Christ speaks more than once of tribunals as being an evil. He tells His disciples that they will have to be cited before the tribunals, and teaches them how they are to behave in courts of law. He says that He Himself will be condemned, and sets us all an example of the way in which we are to treat the laws of man. ”

“ To affirm that the Christian doctrine refers only to personal salvation and has no bearing upon state affairs is a great error. To say so is but to assert an audacious, groundless, most evident untruth, which a moment’s serious reflection suffices to destroy. ‘Well,’ I say to myself, ‘I will not resist evil; as a private man, I will let myself be struck ”

“ I shall give a circumstantial account of the way in which all my doubts as to the real sense of these words were dispersed, and how it became evident to me that Christ forbids all human institutions of justice, and that He could mean nothing else.
The first point that struck me, when I understood the commandment, ‘Do not resist evil,’ in its true meaning, was that human courts were not only contrary to this commandment, but in direct opposition to the whole doctrine of Christ, and that therefore He must certainly have forbidden them. ”

“ No man of feeling has escaped the impression of horror and doubt concerning ‘good,’ produced by the recital, if not by the sight, of men executing their fellow-men by rods, the guillotine, or the gallows. ”

“ But you have despised the poor. Don’t rich men oppress you, and draw you before the judgment seat? Don’t they blaspheme that worthy name by which you are called? If you fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Lev.19:18) , you do well. But if you have respect to persons, you commit sin, and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. ”

“ But if you have respect of persons, and make a distinction between rich and poor, you are transgressors of the law of mercy. James, bearing in mind the case of the adulteress who was brought before Christ to be stoned, or perhaps speaking of adultery in general, says that he who punishes an adulteress with death is guilty of murder, and transgresses the eternal law, because the same eternal law that forbids adultery also forbids murder. He says, ‘And act like men who are judged by the law of liberty ”