Justice (A Poem)

"With the merciful you show yourself merciful;
   with the blameless man you show yourself blameless;
with the purified you show yourself pure;
   and with the crooked you make yourself seem tortuous.
For you save a humble people,
   but the haughty eyes you bring down." ~Psalm 18:25-27

Justice

By Truth wrapped in mortality
The Deceiver was deceived, and bold
To kill God's Son

But missing the Divinity,
Death swallowed what it could not hold
And was undone.


Some of the early Church Fathers sometimes referred to the Incarnation as a means whereby God, in His perfect justice, "deceived" the Deceiver, and so brought about his ruin: In the same way that a fish is tempted by tasty bait and, biting it, is transfixed by the hidden hook, so the Devil, tempted by Christ's mortality, thought that he could actually kill God the Son -- but in "biting down" upon Him in the crucifixion found that he had pulled Life Eternal into the grave, and the grave could not hold Him. And so, thus "transfixed upon the hook of Christ's divinity," death itself died, Satan lost his power, and the grave, in being overfilled and disgorging Christ, lost forever its ultimate ability to hold any other souls in separation from their life-giving God. It is only another analogy for a reality that is far beyond words, but I find it very powerful, a wonderful way of saying it, and a fitting meditation for Lent.

(I hope to possibly add to this poem in the future.)