Three Orders of Magistrate

Comenius and the Neighborhood Helper

By John Taylor; 2009 Mar 18, 'Ala 17, 165 BE

I have often thought that we need a profession like the Chinese "neighborhood helper." In the West we tend to either neglect people, especially those living alone, or intervene with a clumsy, heavy, violent hand. We need a Socratic dialectician, a trained expert who would act as a go-between among government and other agencies, and individuals, between officials, corporations, private persons and other groups. This would perhaps be a female-dominated profession, a cross between a cop and a social worker, somebody to talk to before you call in the government or the police. To my great surprise, when I read the Panorthosia I found that Comenius had centuries ago proposed something very similar.

His idea, based on the Roman model, was for justice to be divided among three kinds or "orders" of magistrates.

"The world will be more orderly if every political system, or state or city has magistrates who are devoted to piety, peace and order." (Panorthosia, Ch. 24, para 1, p. 110)

The first order of judge (concerned with piety) would be consuls who would give general advice to everybody, attempting to solve public and private difficulties before they become severe. They must "make themselves fully available to all men at stated times and give advice on all kinds of business for the purpose of smoothing out any public or private difficulties." These, he stipulated, must be wise and good teachers, able to explain the law in clear terms and to convince both officials and the general public of its fairness.

A second magisterial profession (concerned with peace) would be judges trained to settle disputes and lawsuits that slip past the consuls. These should be righteous themselves, yet unwilling to use force and compulsion. Three, there would be ephors or censors (concerned with order), who see that everything is done in proper order. They must "have a most observant eye" and be willing to assert authority over the first two orders of judge.

These magistrates would not be judges, the passive listeners we are familiar with in English speaking countries. Rather he or she must be a good planner and executive, possessed of sound knowledge, a decisive will and be ever active in good works. For all three orders of magistrate, they must be just first, before they impose law on others.

"Their main qualification is that they should all have the knowledge, the will and the ability to do good works."
 Comenius made this proposal before there were professions in the modern, scientific sense. There were police (called "watchmen" in England at the time) lawyers and judges, but their methods were hardly up to modern standards. At the same time, we have lost much of the good in old ways. For example the apprenticeship system had local youths chosen journeymen to learn their trade on the job, thus avoiding the huge debt that burdens students of today. But still, I think in coming years we should take this proposal very seriously as we implement a just world government.


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John Taylor

email: badijet@gmail.com
blog: http://badiblog.blogspot.com/

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