What is True Justice?
The concept of injustice is one that is misunderstood by much of the world. Many people mistake any hindrance of their own desires as an injustice done to them. What these same people often fail to realize is that their desires are not the best thing for them or for the people around them. Because it is so prevalent in society, this misunderstanding often winds its way into literature. In many works, a character’s understanding of what justice is may be skewed or misshapen to the point that even the reader fails to understand what that character really desires. Fortunately, in most instances, a deeper level of truth is soon presented to the character, and her concept of injustice is rewritten. Orual, the primary character in the novel Till We Have Faces undergoes this transition. Her concept of justice is intertwined with a level of selfishness that blinds her from the
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She spends her life pursuing revenge for her jealousy and hatred of the gods. Her hatred is cloaked with a false sense of duty, but it is hatred none the same. Through Orual’s misunderstanding of injustice, C.S. Lewis is able to show the misunderstanding of injustice by humanity. The world owes a person nothing. When that person does not receive what she thinks she deserves, it is not an injustice. Justice has nothing to do with what one wants, but instead involves what that person and those around that person need most. The people of Glome needed more than a temporary end to their suffering, and through her pain Orual was able to supply what they needed. When Orual looks back at her life, she realizes that the gods did no injustice to her; they were helping her craft a useful life. In the end, Orual finally is able to decipher the difference between jealousy and hatred, and true injustice. Only after this realization does Orual see the true face of justice, a face that few have