Society needs rules to operate properly. Without rules civilization would be a chaotic mess and an oxymoron. The symbol for Justice is a scale which signifies balancing different points of view and weighing one idea against another. The basic concept of balancing scales demonstrates the ambiguity and imperfection of laws and rules. If all the laws and rules were absolute and certain then Lady Justice would be holding digital scales or price computing scales. Life is not black and white and the laws we live by often have their intentions subverted.
Laws are made to serve those living under them. That is the idea anyway. A red light means stop and accidents and fatalities are avoided. Often rules become counter productive or take on a life of there own. A red light at 2:00 a.m. on an empty street still demands a driver to stop and wait, even if they are the only one on the road; it’s the law. There are places where you can get a parking ticket during certain hours on street cleaning days; which is fair enough. You can also receive a parking ticket during those hours even if the street cleaners are off that day for a holiday. Like all aspects of life, rules require balance, they are supposed to serve us, not us to serve them.
There is a tale of two Zen monks hiking down a path. They came from a monastery advocating celibacy. The rules were stringently enforced and required the devotees to avoid all contact with women. The two devotees arrived at a river and found a stunning and sexy woman in a fine silk dress at the waters edge. The bridge had been whisked away by the river. The woman was late for an important ceremony, but couldn’t find away across the river without destroying her ceremonial robes. Quick as an eye-blink one of the monks picked her up and carried her across the river. She thanked him for solving her problem and averting the shame that would have come if she failed to show up, or the disgrace of ruining the sacred robes she was wearing. The woman hurried down the path and the two monks continued their journey. They walked for several miles, the older monk enjoying the bird songs and the younger monk stewing in silence until the younger monk couldn’t hold back his agitation. “How could you pick that woman up and carry her across the river? It’s a violation of our devotional obligations?” The older devotee stopped and smiled. “Is that so?” he said. The younger devotee considered this for a moment. After a pause the older monk continued; “Anyway, I put her down on the other side of the river, but it seems you are still carrying her.”
If the older monk had obeyed the regulations exactly, he would have left the woman on the stranded on the wrong side of the river, failing his higher values to be of service in the world. Jesus once passed through a cornfield with his apostles on the Sabbath. They were hungry and ate some corn. When charged with breaking the Sabbath Jesus replied that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. The trials of Nuremburg hinged on the concept that rules, laws and orders are not to be blindly followed when they conflict with higher moral principals.
A lot of great leaders from many different institutions all try to remind us that rules and laws are meant to serve society, not the other way around.