Between 1999 and 2015, more than 900 sub-postmasters in Britain were prosecuted for theft and false accounting. Many went to prison. Some lost their homes, their marriages and their good names. The money had never been stolen. A faulty computer system called Horizon had invented the shortfalls.
al-ʿAdl means Justice: not just a just judge, but justice itself, the One who never wrongs anyone by even an atom's weight. This episode looks at the best justice we know, and how far it still falls short.
Start with what we know
Then take away everything it needs. What is left is not a bigger version of us. It is the Name.
Episode 1
In us
It took the sub-postmasters more than twenty years to be heard. A group led by Alan Bates, a former sub-postmaster from Llandudno, took the Post Office to court and won in 2019. In 2024 Parliament passed a law quashing the convictions of hundreds of them at once, an act almost without precedent (Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry; GOV.UK). It is a powerful example of a justice system eventually correcting itself. But ‘eventually’ is the word. Some of those wrongly convicted died before they were cleared. Human justice can be put right; it cannot give back the years.
Episode 2
In nature
Vampire bats must feed on blood almost every night; a bat that misses two or three meals in a row can starve. Bats that have fed well will regurgitate blood to hungry roost-mates, and studies found they share most with bats that have shared with them before (Wilkinson, Nature, 1984; Carter and Wilkinson, 2013). It is a kind of fairness: give and take, kept in balance. But it is a ledger. Bats that never share tend to receive less. Nature's justice keeps score, and those who cannot pay are left out.
Episode 3
At our best
Physics has the most perfect balance sheet we know. In every experiment ever done, energy is neither created nor destroyed, only changed from one form to another. In 1918 the mathematician Emmy Noether showed why: conservation laws follow from deep symmetries in nature itself (Noether, 1918). Nothing in the universe cheats the books. Yet physics balances only quantities, not wrongs. The same energy flows through a healing hand and a striking fist. The laws of nature are impartial, but they are not just: they have no concern for the victim.
Episode 4
The Break
Take away the twenty years, the death before the verdict, the ledger that leaves out those who cannot repay, the impartial law that does not care. Every justice we know is late, partial, or blind to the person. al-ʿAdl is justice that wrongs no one, sees every person and every deed, and comes in full. “We shall set up the scales of justice on the Day of Resurrection, so that no soul will be wronged in the least. Even if it is the weight of a mustard seed, We will bring it” (Qur'an 21:47, our rendering).
From the tradition: Hadith qudsi: 'O My servants, I have forbidden oppression for Myself and have made it forbidden amongst you' (Muslim 2577; API 6572). Deut 32:4 'all of whose ways are just'
On screen
In the novel, a good man loses to an unjust jury. al-ʿAdl never loses a case to injustice, because He has forbidden it for Himself.
Beyond: majesty: what He is not, and how far beyond.
In the Qur'an: cf. 16:90 (He commands justice); 6:115 (not in the Qur'an verbatim)
The verses that defended a Jewish neighbour
Commentators on the Qur'an tell this story about Qur'an 4:105-113. In Medina, a Muslim man stole a coat of armour from a neighbour. When suspicion grew, he hid the armour in the house of a Jewish man and let it be found there.
His clan came to the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) to defend him. They were persuasive, and they were his own people; the Jewish man was an outsider. For a moment, it seemed the case might go the thief's way.
Then revelation came: “We have sent down the Book to you with the truth, so that you may judge between people by what God has shown you. Do not be an advocate for those who betray trust” (4:105). The verses go on to condemn anyone who commits a wrong and then “throws it on an innocent person” (4:112).
The Jewish man was cleared, and the Muslim thief exposed. Versions of the story differ in some details. But Muslim scholars have always taken its point: justice does not take sides by faith or tribe. Elsewhere the Qur'an says: “Stand firm for justice, as witnesses for God, even if it is against yourselves, your parents or your relatives” (4:135).
In a saying Muslims believe comes from God Himself, He says: “My servants, I have forbidden injustice for Myself, and I have made it forbidden among you; so do not wrong one another” (Muslim 2577).
What each faith says
Judaism
“But let justice well up as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.”
The Torah describes God as the Rock “all of whose ways are justice” (Deuteronomy 32:4), and commands human judges to pursue justice, repeating the word twice for emphasis. The prophets turned justice into a river.
Jewish teaching links tzedek, justice, with tzedakah, the giving that puts things right for the poor: charity is not a favour but a duty of justice.
Christianity
“you have left undone the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faith. But you ought to have done these, and not to have left the other undone.”
Jesus (peace be upon him) criticised religious people who were careful about small rules but neglected “the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faith”. Christians believe God is perfectly just, and that His justice and mercy meet in Christ.
Churches in Britain have campaigned for justice from the abolition of slavery to debt relief, inspired by the prophets' call that Jesus (peace be upon him) took up.
Islam
“God commands justice, doing good, and giving to relatives; and He forbids indecency, wrongdoing and oppression.”
al-ʿAdl appears in the traditional lists of the 99 Names, but not word for word as a Name in the Qur'an; some scholars, such as the modern Saudi scholar Ibn ʿUthaymīn, held that it should not be counted among the Names for that reason. The quality, though, is everywhere: God commands justice (16:90), wrongs no one by an atom's weight (4:40), and His word is complete “in truth and justice” (6:115).
For Muslims, justice is owed to everyone, friend or enemy: “Do not let hatred of a people lead you to be unjust. Be just: that is nearer to God-consciousness” (5:8).
Same and different
Justice is one of the deepest common threads in the three faiths. The Torah's ‘justice, justice’, Amos's river, Jesus (peace be upon him)' ‘weightier matters’ and the Qur'an's ‘stand firm for justice, even against yourselves’ all ask people to be fair even to outsiders and enemies. They differ on how God's justice and mercy fit together: Christianity sees them meet in the cross; Judaism and Islam see them held together by God directly. All three say God Himself never wrongs anyone.
A moment to reflect
Have you ever been treated unfairly and never had it put right? How do you carry that?
Is it harder to be fair to people you dislike, or to people you love?
What injustice near you could you help put right?
Watch
Watch on YouTube ↗ · plays here on the live site; YouTube without tracking until you press play
NOVA on vampire bats who share blood with their friends: the ‘In nature’ rung.
Watch on YouTube ↗ · plays here on the live site; YouTube without tracking until you press play
Khan Academy on conservation of energy: the ‘At our best’ rung.
Do it together
families / schoolsThe mustard seed
Look at a single mustard seed (from any supermarket spice rack) on a white plate. Read Qur'an 21:47. Talk about the smallest kind thing and the smallest unfair thing anyone did today, and whether they matter.
faith groups / neighboursJustice reading group
Read Amos 5:21-24, Matthew 23:23 and Qur'an 4:135 together. Pick one local injustice (an unfair rule, a neglected group) and decide on one practical thing the group can do about it.
Episode 1
