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An eye for an eye

Sep 20, 2004
Faith, Selected ancient posts

I was listening to the radio a while ago and they were talking about David Starkey’s recent likening of the Americans to the Jews, in seeking vengeance on the 9/11 attackers. There was a discussion about the appropriatness of his comments, and people were responding to them. Someone mentioned the Jewish scripture “An eye for an eye” (Exodus 21:24, Leviticus 24:20, Deuteronomy 19:21), and then said that that scripture was about limiting vengeance.

This part of scripture has always bothered me somewhat, if I’m honest — it seems so harsh. Ghandi said something along the lines of “An eye for an eye, and the world will soon be blind” and to be honest I’ve always been inclined to agree with him. But hearing the scripture in this light was like a breath of fresh air! The point of the scripture is not about taking out all your grievances on the person who sinned against you, but is about upholding justice, and making sure you don’t go overboard. It seems it’s saying “if you must have vengeance, be fair about it”, that revenge is a sort of last resort. I’m beginning to see more of the “Justice is good, but Mercy is better” stance of the Old Testament that people claim is there.

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1 Comment

  1. Don  •  Feb 25, 2008 @8:37 am

    How true! The thing that troubles me about the response to 9/11 is that the focus of the anti-terror effort has been more on Iraq and Saddam Husein. While it’s true that Saddam has perpetrated much evil and probably should have been brought down long ago for justice’ sake, it seems to me that going after him after 9/11 was at the very least a misguided endeavor (George Bush claims to be a Christian). You can’t help but wonder if there wasn’t some other ulterior motive for making Iraq the center of the war on terror. There seems to be a lot of evidence that there was. I won’t go into that!

    It’s true that Saddam supported terrorism indirectly, but he didn’t much like the terrorist groups (i.e. the Taliban and Al’ Quada), and the terrorists considered him a communist. It seems to me that if you’re going to fight a war in the name of justice, you should focus all of your efforts on the known enemy. In this case Al’ Quada (am i spelling this right?) and the Taliban. Of course there are other groups, but by going after a country that had nothing (or very little) to do with it, the United States and her allies actually strengthened rather than weakened the ideology and cause of these groups.

    I too have always struggled with issues of mercy and justice. On the one hand, in an imperfect world, you have to have such things as police and courts and miltiary and law; and on the other hand (being an idealist at heart) as a once famous American put it, “Can’t we all just get along?”.

    Ideally I would prefer anarchy (in the tribalism sense) to power seeking big governments, but realistically it can’t happen that way because of technology and particularly the existance of weapons of mass destruction. Policing the world appears to be a necissary evil. But when policing the world begins to look more like a means for the powerful to profit then I must question whether justice is really being served. Unlike the American Revolutionary War, some wars are justified, but in the case of Iraq, I can’t help but think that someone went overboard.

    I’m not saying that the United States should have turned the other cheek after 9/11. Sometimes justice serves the cause of mercy in the case of the victims (remember World War II?). I have no problem with the death penalty for someone like Saddam Husein as long as it can be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt (not just reasonable doubt) that he committed the crimes that he is accused of. Still, before he is executed he should be given the opportunity to make peace with God.

    Here’s a thought provoking question for a Christian. Does God love Saddam Husein?