Texts in Conversation
Exodus says the penalty for serious injury is a life for a life. A parable in 1 Kings 20 echoes that legal formula, warning that a guard who loses his prisoner answers with his own life, which traps Ahab into sentencing himself.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Exodus 21:23
Hebrew Bible
22 “If men fight and hit a pregnant woman and her child is born prematurely, but there is no serious injury, the one who hit her will surely be punished in accordance with what the woman’s husband demands of him, and he will pay what the court decides. 23 But if there is serious injury, then you will give a life for a life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
1 Kings 20:39
Hebrew Bible
38 The prophet then went and stood by the road, waiting for the king. He also disguised himself by putting a bandage down over his eyes. 39 When the king passed by, he called out to the king, “Your servant went out into the heat of the battle, and then a man turned aside and brought me a prisoner. He told me, ‘Guard this prisoner. If he ends up missing for any reason, you will pay with your life or with a talent of silver.’ 40 Well, it just so happened that while your servant was doing this and that, he disappeared.” The king of Israel said to him, “Your punishment is already determined by your own testimony.”
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Notes and References
... For those who say that the Covenant Code’s talion law should be understood literally, the wording of 1 Kings 20:39 is decisive: ‘your life will be for his life, or you shall weigh out a talent of silver.’ But observe that this passage does not use the verb ‘to give’ or the Covenant Code’s broader idiom. The verb is also missing in 2 Kings 10:24, ‘the person that escapes from the people that I am putting into your power, his life will be for his life’; note also the use of pronominal suffixes in these cases. The wording ‘you shall give life for life’ is actually an awkward way of describing a punishment for a perpetrator; if taken literally, nothing indicates that he should give his own life (compare Isaiah 43:3–4). ...
Wright, David P.
Inventing God's Law: How the Covenant Code of the Bible Used and Revised the Laws of Hammurabi
(p. 438) Oxford University Press, 2009
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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