Lewis B. Smedes Quotes
When you give up vengeance, make sure you are not giving up on justice. The line between the two is faint, unsteady, and fine...Vengeance is our own pleasure of seeing someone who hurt us getting it back and then some. Justice, on the other hand, is secure when someone pays a fair penalty for wronging another even if the injured person takes no pleasure in the transaction. Vengeance is personal satisfaction. Justice is moral accounting...Human forgiveness does not do away with human justice.
Smedes, Lewis B. Forgive and Forget: Healing the Hurts We Don't Deserve. Harper & Row, 1984.
After the FBI had been spying on him for years. He was convicted of mail fraud for allegedly defrauding one man of $25. He spend 2 years in Federal prison and then was pardoned by President Calvin Coolidge. When he was released, he was deported.
This proverb only makes sense in the light of understanding the Arab concept of revenge—“blood.” In a rural desert environment where little can be expected of government, the Arabs have developed a law enforcement and peace keeping mechanism which while primitive from modern standards, nevertheless worked to some degree. It is that revenge—“blood” is a moral necessity and obligation of all people, and revenge is not limited by time or to the individuals involved in the first incidence. The immediate family are the first to exact revenge, but the extended family follows and often the entire clan. Sometimes revenge is tribal or even national. Anyone who fails to revenge a member in his group is not only a disgrace, but is a clear and present danger to the group because then they can be attacked with impunity. So revenge is a strong obligation of the group members and blood must be paid with blood no matter how many generations it may take. The only thing that keeps me and my family safe, is the surety what whosoever kills one of us will themselves be killed or if they die a natural death we will take revenge on one of the evildoers relatives and no one is exempt. Crime must never pay!
In 2008 Pakistani Islamic terrorists, with the support of the Pakistani military, attacked Mumbai, India killing innocent civilians. Shoune was one of the Indian politicians who called for retaliation. The Indian government, however, restrained its forces and did not increase the cycle of violence.
Lewis Benedictus Smedes was a renowned Christian author, ethicist, and theologian in the Reformed tradition. He was a professor of theology and ethics for twenty-five years at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. His 15 books, including the popular Forgive and Forget: Healing the Hurts We Don't Deserve, covered some important issues including sexuality and forgiveness.
