Although not expressly stated in God’s Law, rights result from the duties set out in the Law. If you have a duty to love your neighbour, then you will automatically respect his right to, for example, privacy or free speech or to hold property. The same argument provides the right to trial by jury or judgment by your peers. If you were on trial, who would you trust to get at the truth, your peers or a paid state lackey in the form of a judge who is paid extra for putting you in prison? If you would choose trial by jury, then why would you deny it to your neighbour? Your neighbour though has no right to your love. It is therefore clear that a duty takes precedent over a right. No one of course has rights over God.
Since your rights are part of the Law of God, they are ‘God–given’. That which is given by God cannot be taken away by the lower authority of man. The Law is the expression of the spiritual teaching common to just about all creeds and religions to obey God and carry out His will through unconditional love (although all too often forgotten by so-called advocates or followers):
And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said: ‘All that the LORD hath said will we do, and be obedient’. Exodus 24:7
The staff shall not depart from Yehuda, nor the sceptre from between his feet, until Shiloh comes, and the obedience of the people be his. Alternative Jewish translation from Bereshit or Genesis 49:10
Rebellion against tyrants is obedience to God. US Founding Father, Thomas Jefferson
Since this commandment is common to decent human beings across the world, it isalso known as Common Law — but should not be confused with judge-led rulings created in medieval England known as ‘common law’ — or Natural Law [9].
The Common Law is the law of common sense. Who other than a psychopath or sociopath would:
- actively set out to harm the rights of a fellow man?
- fail to consider how his actions or lack of them might harm the rights of others?
- continue his action in the full knowledge that he was infringing the rights of another man?
[9] Some – mainly atheists and anti-Messianic Zionists — have claimed that the latter is the dog-eat-dog law of the jungle