“An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” We know this saying not only from the Bible but also in our school days, in history class. In the East there was a set of rules, called the Code of Hammurabi. This collection goes to (18th Century BC) Hammurabi who was the sixth king of the first Babylonian Dynasty. Rules such as “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” originates from this collection. But such rules were there even in ancient Rome (450BC): In the 'Twelve Tables laws' we read: “If a person has maimed another's limb, let there be retaliation in kind, unless he agrees to make compensation with him." (Lex talionis) (VIII, 2) (http://www.csun.edu/~hcfll004/12tables.html )That was the 'justice' at that time. Today we have a different opinion. Justice is not only “to repay the same with the same” for us. It also has to observer the laws on human rights too.
With this background, we call the old laws brutal now....
--Thomas Kalathil7th Sunday in Ordinarytime A – Mt 5, 38-48_Lev 19, 1-2.17-18
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