Ask your average Jew the name of Jesus's mother and you'll most likely get a "Mary." Ask him the name of Moses mother and you'll most likely get a blank stare. Despite the fact that we Jews are the people of the book, for many of us in the last couple generations, the books we know do not include our own.
What that amounts to is a very educated people which is very ignorant about its own heritage. And being that we're a small group, often living amongst many different types of people, it's not so uncommon for Jews to confuse their beliefs with those from other religions.
So, for example, despite the fact that both birth control and abortions are allowed at times within Jewish law, many Jews nowadays confuse Judaism with Catholicism and believe that Orthodox law prohibits both in all circumstances.
When it comes to "an eye for an eye," many Jews also misunderstand the Jewish view here and believe that this Torah verse is meant to be taken literally, much like it is within certain branches of Islam.
Which brings me to a case going on right now in Saudi Arabia where the Islamic court has sentenced a man to paralysis. The defendant was convicted of assaulting and paralyzing another man during a fight, and the court is searching for a sugreon who will agree to cut the defandant's spinal cord in retribution for his crime.
Such a scenario never has, nor ever would take place within the Jewish court system because according to the Talmud, if someone damages or destroys another person's eye, tooth, or any other bodily part, the punishment is not corporeal but rather monetary.
So if the Talmud rules that the punishment only involves money, why would the Torah use the language of one body part being equivalent for another? Because the Torah is trying to teach us that on some level an eye should be for an eye.
If a human being's eye is only worth dollars and cents, a person with a lot of dollars and cents could just go around gouging out eyes one moment and handing out money the next.
In practice we only sentence with a monetary retribution because a bodily punishment would be too barbaric according to Jewish thought. However, the deeper lesson here is that a monetary retribution is only sufficient if the perpetrator internalizes the severity of his crime - something that no one should be ignorant about.
thought provoking.
i (Catholic) was always told that “an eye for an eye” was meant to stop overkill in the form of retribution or revenge. it was about being even-handed when meting out justice or punishment.
Posted by Lark on September 3, 2010 at 7:25 am
Hi, interesting subject for a post. I just wanted to add that the monetary compensation is meant to be the equivalent of that person’s eye– which is why a photographer, for example, would get more compensation for losing his eyes than a philosopher, let’s say. Therefore, my understanding of why we don’t take it literally is not just because of it being barbaric, but because monetary compensation is actually more just than a literal “eye for an eye.” If a philosopher pokes out a photographer’s eyes, it’s not exactly even to punch out the philosopher’s eyes, and vice versa. If an 85 year old man with cataracts pokes out a 5 year old’s eyes or vice versa, it’s hardly even to take an “eye for an eye.”
Posted by Debi on September 7, 2010 at 6:43 am
aren’t Christians supposed to “turn the other cheek”?
Posted by Galit on September 8, 2010 at 4:20 pm
Interesting point, Galit. As I’ve said many times, I’m not an expert on Christianity, but my understanding is that “turn the other cheek” is what Jesus’s approach was as opposed to “an eye for an eye.” Meaning, he stressed pacificism instead of retribution.
Now while Jews are against corporeal retribution, we’re equally against pacificism. If someone wrongs another person we believe that they should be punished in some appropriate way (depending on the offence).
Posted by Allison on September 8, 2010 at 8:45 pm
When Jesus said “turn the other cheek” he meant it in terms of personal revenge, not in everything. Jesus was definitely not a pacifist as he himself said “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” The New Testament upholds such things like capital punishment (in Romans 13:4), for example.
Posted by Jacqueline on September 26, 2010 at 9:49 am
Thanks for your comment, Jacqueline. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not an expert on Christianity, but I did read some of the Christian Bible for some college classes.
I know you said that the Christian Bible upholds things like capital punishment, but how about the famous story where Jesus tells the rabbis who are about to carry out capital punishment on an adulterous woman that “He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone?”
A Christian site that I found on a random Google search said the following about this story:
“Jesus was not arguing with the judgment. Nor was Jesus arguing the law nor the woman’s guilt. Jesus was arguing with our right to execute the woman.”
Perhaps *this* is the place where Judaism and Christianity disagree. Jews believe that although capital punishment happens only in very, very rare circumstances (after a person has been warned that what he’s doing is wrong and is punishable by death and has had two unrelated witnesses see the act committed from two separate vantage points), people do have the right to carry out the death penalty.
Posted by Allison on September 27, 2010 at 10:34 pm