It being the Christmas season, I find myself moved once more to muse upon matters philosophical, examining the Eight Virtues of the Ultima series and comparing these against real-world philosophy and theology. This year, I’d like to focus on the Virtue of Justice, which I don’t think I’ve given much attention to in years past.

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While I had initially thought that I would bring this series of Byte-Sized Virtue episodes to a close at Christmas, it only took a bit of reflection to realize that there was a particularly strong point to be made — especially about a virtue such as Justice — by continuing on to what is called Epiphany in the Catholic liturgical calendar. This feast day is officially observed on January 6th, although most North American parishes will opt to observe it on the preceding Sunday.

So: what is the Epiphany?

Well, if you take a look at the readings from Scripture that are used for it, you’ll notice quickly enough that there’s a common theme to it. “Nations shall walk by your light, and kings by your shining radiance,” proclaims the reading from Isaiah; “dromedaries from Midian and Ephah; all from Sheba shall come.” “Lord, every nation on earth will adore you,” proclaims the psalm. The reading from Paul’s epistle notes that “the Gentiles are coheirs, members of the same body, and copartners in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” And, of course, the reading from the Gospels tells the story of the wise men, the magi, who arrived in Jerusalem from the east and inquired: “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star at its rising and have come to do him homage.” And upon finding the baby in the manger in Bethlemen, “They prostrated themselves and did him homage. Then they opened their treasures and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.” This despite being non-Jews from (probably) Babylon.

Fun fact: We don’t actually know how many magi there were, nor does Scripture state a number. We traditionally speak of the three wise men, the three kings (although they were probably not earthly kings; the kingship they bear is somewhat more metaphorical), because of the three gifts: gold, fraknincense, and myrrh, which in turn represent the royalty, divinity, and death of Jesus.

But I digress. The point of the Epiphany is that Christ isn’t just for the Jews, and His promise of salvation is not limited to that one demographic group. He has come for the Jews and the Gentiles alike; through Christ, salvation and truth are universal.

And this is why I decided to carry on the discussion of Justice through to this feast day, because that’s really a very important and profound idea…one which we should also bear in mind when discussing the idea of Justice.

What’s the definition of Justice we’ve been relying on? Okay, it hasn’t been the Ultima one — the devotion to truth, tempered by love; the wisdom that perceives what is right and what is wrong in human action — specifically, but we’ll get to that in a moment as well. The definition of Justice we’ve been using, the real-world definition, is that Justice is about giving to each person what is their legitimate due. In its exercise, it confers good not only on the one who acts justly, but on those who are acted upon; good flows out of one unto a multitude.

And that isn’t something which is limited to any one demographic group; rather, it is universal. It doesn’t matter who you or I are, what our station in life is, or where we are in the world. It doesn’t even matter if you and I are not necessarily due the same thing(s); even if we are due different ends, even though we are different people, we are nevertheless due those things and should be free to pursue and obtain them.

There’s a reasonable caveat to draw out here, of course: what we are due isn’t necessarily a function of our internal desires. We aren’t due the fruits of what is immoral or unethical; we are due the goods and rights, powers and property that are the natural ends that proceed from our humanity.

Our human nature is made for truth…indeed, for Truth. It can be difficult to explain Truth, and more difficult to defend it as any sort of absolute. But if we think about Truth as a kind of telos, an end or a goal or a reason, we can ask what becomes of us when we lose that telos. And really, it’s not a good outcome; thought has no object, activity has no object…it’s just this sort of purposeless craziness, untethered from reason.

And likewise, our human nature is made for Love, in all its forms. Because unfortunately, in English, the term love is sort of over-broad; we use the same one term (unlike in some other languages, e.g. Greek) to name the romantic/erotic love that exists between spouses, and to name the fraternal love that exists between family members and friends. And we also use it to name a very different form of love, the highest form of love, which elsewhere in this podcast series I have called caritas. Unlike other forms of love, caritas is non-reciprocal; it is entirely directed outward from an individual; it is by its nature self-giving, with no expectation of or need for reciprocal affection.

Ideally, we should thus be pursuing both Truth and Love; if we don’t, we will tend to find that nature will in fact revolt against it in some way; consider the rampant social and technical anxiety of the modern world, which can only respond to that angst with the exhortation to remain busy. On the other hand, if we earnestly pursue Truth, and allow real Love to temper us, we become attentive to what is due to others in every circumstance…we become Just, and we can pour out the goods of Justice on others.