Treatise to my Learned Friend, the Attorney at Law

Abstract

More often than not the law is usually argued to be a sworn commitment to the asset of absolute fixed ideas within rigidly narrow parameters. The letter of the law is often framed in absolutes, stated in black and white but very often served in shades of gray.

We are humans in our weakest moments and perhaps our noblest when we are indeed humans, that is why we tamper with those black and white absolutes with the aid of jurors (obuntu-bulamu system) in order to humanize our judicial system to render the system fair, compassionate, and imperfect.

Obuntu-Bulamu is Altruism (regard for and devotion to the interest of others). What it means to be fully human is to strive to live by ideals and not to measure one’s life by what you have attained in terms of your desires, but those small moments of integrity, compassion, rationality, and even self-sacrifice; because in the end, the only way we can measure the significance of own lives is by valuing the lives of others and whatever law we have should be the one that is willing to give up selfish interest in the welfare of others. In the end, I am because we are and for some reason, I can never be I am what I ought to be until you are what you are meant to be.

The best demonstration of Obuntu Bulamu in our daily lives is best captured in the adage, ” a pound of flesh” from William Shakespeare's play, Merchant of Venice. The character, Portia says this line on the instance of Shylock, the Jew, for the payment of Antonios flesh, which is a central point of the play. In Act IV, Scene 1, Portia concludes the conflict between Shylock and Antonio, by saying toShylock, "take thy bond, take thou, thy pound of flesh”.