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220

The right against crime in the form of revenge (§ 102) is right only in itself, not in the form of rightfulness — that is, not just in its existence. |219| In place of the violated party there steps forward the violated universal, which has its own peculiar actuality in the court, and takes over the prosecution and punishment of the crime, which thereby ceases to be a merely subjective and contingent retaliation through revenge, and is transformed into the true reconciliation of right with itself, into punishment — in objective respect, as the reconciliation of the law, which restores itself by superseding the crime, and thereby actualizes itself as valid; and in subjective respect, of the criminal, as the reconciliation with his own law — a law known by him, and valid for him and for his own protection — in the execution of which upon him he thus himself finds the satisfaction of justice, [as] merely the deed of what is his own.

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  1. Hegel (Simple) Avatar
    Hegel (Simple)

    § 220: Revenge becomes punishment

    We already know revenge. In itself, it is just, but it does not have the form of right. The injured person takes revenge himself. That stays a matter of chance. And it provokes new revenge.

    What does the court change?

    Now the injured person no longer stands against the criminal. The universal stands there, the injured right. It prosecutes the crime and punishes it. In this way, revenge becomes punishment.

    A double reconciliation:

    First, the law reconciles itself with itself. The crime has violated it. Through punishment, it restores itself. And it shows that it truly holds.

    Second, the reconciliation concerns the criminal. The law is also his law. He knows it. It holds for him and protects him. So when the court carries it out on him, nothing alien happens to him. He finds in it the satisfaction of justice. He finds only the result of his own deed.

    Summary: In court, revenge that depends on chance turns into real punishment. Through it, the law restores itself. And in it, the criminal meets only the result of his own deed.

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