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Ohio Conference United Church of Christ |
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Rev.
Philip F. Kahal, PhD Different groups within the Christian community appeal to the bible for support for or against the death penalty. One major group, sometimes called conservatives, interprets the Bible from a literal/legalistic perspective. They tend to see the Bible as a law or codebook. Selected verses are interpreted as though they stand on their own without reference to history or the biblical narrative as a whole. This method of interpreting scripture in order to make a case is known as “prooftexting.” This group generally supports the death penalty. Another major group, sometimes called the liberals, interpret scripture from a literary/historical perspective. In this approach, the biblical author’s purpose, the nature of the passage in which a verse is found, i.e., its genre, and the historical context of the verse or passage under consideration, are all important. This group generally is opposed to the death penalty. In this paper, I will try to compare and contrast the two approaches by focusing on key passages that the two groups use in their attempt to support their positions on the death penalty. First, we will look at the Older Testament and then move on to the Newer. THE OLDER TESTAMENT Genesis
9:6. “Whoever sheds
the blood of a human, This verse is a favorite of the death penalty supporters, asserting that it prescribes the use of the death penalty. But let’s take a closer look. There are two problems with a legalistic interpretation of this verse. First, is this verse descriptive or prescriptive? Some interpreters take this to be a statute that requires the state to impose the death penalty. Listen to one biblical commentator: “Here God gives mankind judicial authority to exercise his wrath for the sin of murder, and establishes the death penalty as punishment for that crime.”[2] Now this is quite an interpretive stretch, to go from these very old lines that say nothing about the state as we know it to the death chamber in Lucasville, Ohio. If this isn’t bad enough, the county prosecutor in the Andrea Yates case applies these same lines in the pursuit of the death penalty: “In terms of biblical assurance I begin with the premise that the Bible teaches that Jesus is God…So, when God made his covenant with Noah in Genesis 9:6 Jesus was there and a part of the Devine (sic) half of that agreement…I do have an obligation to uphold the law. I have an obligation to the five victims whose lives were snuffed out by Andrea Yates…Furthermore, it offends my religious beliefs to force my beliefs on others.”[3] Mr. Rosenthal certainly doesn’t mind imposing his beliefs on Andrea Yates. Furthermore, if these lines really require the imposition of the death penalty, then the literal/legalistic interpreter must ignore Genesis 4 where God did not require the life of Cain for murdering his brother Abel. Instead, God ordered banishment from the community, a version of life without parole. Actually, these lines are descriptive. They constitute a proverb in the wisdom tradition having to do with the fairness of random violence in the community. They are of a similar category as the proverbial expression, “Violence begets violence,” and also Jesus’ saying in the garden of Gethsemane, “He who lives by the sword shall die by the sword” (Matt. 26:52), neither saying of which we would think authorizes the state to kill anyone. If a question of justice is involved in this verse at all, then it has to be poetic justice. It is a piece of Hebrew poetry with symmetry in the first two lines of the Hebrew together with a play on words. The Hebrew word for blood is dam, and the word for human is adam; thus, the rhythm of the first two lines: dam…adam…adam…dam. Humans indeed kill one another. Finally, the literal/legalistic interpreters seldom, if ever, quote the third line: “For in his own image God made humankind.” The line, of course, is a repetition of the words in Genesis 1:26 where God creates humankind in his own image. In the scriptures, humankind is a special creation, different from the rest of creation. God establishes the sanctity of human life and tells us that we are accountable to God for one another. All human life, then, is inviolable, for God is sovereign over life and death. Set within the larger context of primeval history of the Creation, the Fall, Cain and Abel, this verse is a warning against the killing of brothers and sisters, for we are all related as children of God. So, instead of prescribing the death penalty, this verse constitutes a warning to us all to preserve life. The Mosaic Code Let’s now take a look at the Mosaic Code. Here is where we find the real legal statutes that authorize the taking of life. It’s rather odd that some Christian interpreters who support the death penalty seem to prefer Genesis 9:6 as their primary biblical support rather than the Mosaic Code. Let’s look at this code and try to see why this is the case. In Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy, there are about 15 crimes for which the death penalty is prescribed. The following list is not necessarily ranked in order of importance:
Murder (Ex. 21:12) |
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All these offenders, in the words of the Older Testament, were to be “put to death.” Today, few of even the most ardent death penalty advocates would approve of the execution of all of these offenders. But there are exceptions like the one in the following account. A gay clergyman named Mel White, serving as Dean of the Cathedral of Hope in Dallas, Texas, tells of his experience on a talk show in the Pacific northwest where he was a guest. A listener phoned in and pointed out that the Mosaic law, Lev. 20:13, specifies that homosexuality is a capital offense. Therefore, he said, all homosexuals like him should be put to death.[4] We thank God that there has been an evolution of the standards of decency. Strange, indeed, is the fact that most literal/legalists today single out only one statute from this code to enforce, murder, when the Hebrew community considered many of these statutes equally heinous. The reason for the preference of Genesis 9:6 probably rests with the principle of consistency: On what grounds can one look at the Mosaic Code, single out just one offense for the application of the death penalty and not the others? This is an example of the kind of trouble one can get into if we treat the Bible today primarily as a legal textbook. Another important question for our purpose of comparing and contrasting the two ways of interpreting scripture is how the Hebrew people and especially the Jewish court, the Sanhedrin, dealt with these statutes. Were these prescriptions for capital punishment actually carried out? We don’t know for sure. But let’s look at the rules of evidence and the procedural rules required by these same scriptures that were intended to safeguard human life; then, we may draw our own conclusion. First, at least two witnesses, presumably eyewitnesses, were required for conviction (Deut. 17:6, 19:15, Num. 35:30). Compare this requirement with the Byrd case where John Byrd was convicted mainly on the testimony, not of a witness to the murder, but of a prison informant. Based on this biblical standard, the charge of murder against Byrd would not have made it to the court of the Sanhedrin, for this was a high standard to meet, indeed. Second, the witnesses to a capital crime were required to initiate the execution of the convicted offender (Deut. 13:9, 17:7). The conviction and the sentence of death did not end in the courtroom. The accusers had to get bloodied. A third requirement was related to the penalty for bearing false witness. In the case of a capital offense, the penalty for perjury was death. Witnesses were held to a very high standard for their testimony (Ex. 20:16, Deut. 5:20). This gives new meaning to the commandment, “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.” By these very ancient standards there would be few, if any, death penalty cases on the dockets of the courts in Ohio. That also appears to have been the case in old Israel as well. Finally, in the Talmud, c. 200 CE, the rabbis talk about the rare application of the death penalty imposed by the Sanhedrin. One rabbi complained about a particular Sanhedrin that imposed the death penalty only once in seven years. He called that Sanhedrin “destructive.” Another rabbi wrote that the imposition of the death penalty once in 70 years was too many. Others wrote that if they were members of the Sanhedrin, the death penalty would never be imposed – a real moratorium (Talmud: Makkoth 7a), not abolition, for the biblical principle still remained in force. In summary, the Mosaic Code does prescribe the death penalty. However, the rare application of those prescriptions is stunning, leading the scholar, Gerald Blidstein, to write: “Jewish law abolished capital punishment in fact not by denying it conceptual validity but rather by allowing ONLY this conceptual validity.” [5] The Lex Talionis – Law of Retribution “If any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe” (Ex. 21:23-24). These verses are found within the Mosaic Code. Death penalty proponents look to them for major support. They quote a part of this saying with a certain finality as though the case for the death penalty is settled: “The Bible says, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’” Their “legal” case would even be stronger if they quoted verse 23, which calls for a ”life for life.” There is a serious problem for the administration of justice with this law of retribution. If taken literally, the “law” might work well with crimes having to do with bodily harm if bodily harm were the only offenses perpetrated, but how would it be carried out in practice by the Hebrew community when extended to other offenses? Was the mutual destruction of bodily parts really the way justice was served? Practical guidance on this point is as lacking as guidance for a literal reading of Matthew 5:29: “If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.” When we consider other offenses, such as rape, lying, stealing, or bearing false witness, how would the community handle the administration of justice? How would equivalence be decided? Certainly not a rape for a rape, a lie for a lie! The Talion, more likely, intended to place a strong emphasis on the principle of proportional justice within the community. In actual practice, material or monetary conpensation probably was the punishment; although, there are no records of how justice was carried out. The Hebrew community obviously endued proportional justice with extremly high value. Why was this? Most scholars are in agreement that the purpose of the Talion was to restrain retaliation, not to set a new absolute standard. The background for the law is found in the “blood feud,” ancient clan behavior akin to the legendary feud between the Hatfields and the McCoys. Lamech’s boast provides the scriptural background: “…I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me. If Cain is avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold” (Gen. 4:23-24). The law was designed to prevent excessive retaliation, the imposition of a greater harm than the original offense. Thus, the meaning of the law is read better this way: “No more than a life for a life, no more than an eye for an eye, no more than a tooth for a tooth.” Clearly standards of behavior were evolving. Unfortunately, excessive retaliation is still with us. A few weeks ago, I was surfing the TV looking for some news. I happened upon a program entitled “The O’Reilly Factor,” a program I had not seen before. That day O’Reilly had Robert Schuler, the pastor of the Crystal Cathedral in California, as his guest. They were talking about the death penalty. O’Reilly asked Schuler if he supported the death penalty. Schuler replied that he had been in favor of it until he had read O’Reilly’s book. O’Reilly looked surprised. Schuler said, he now was against the death penalty. He said he agreed with O’Reilley’s position in the book that the death penalty “was too cheap and easy.” Now there’s a statement of the desire for excessive retribution. One can see, then, why Jesus repudiated the Talion (Matt. 5:38-42).The Talion itself does not reflect the higher righteousness of God Jesus speaks about in the Newer Testament, a love grounded on love, mercy, and forgiveness. The Talion, it turns out, is a flimsy basis for support of the death penalty. Finally, we now enter a mysterious world of God’s doings in both Testaments. God sometimes uses the evil of murder for higher purposes. Moses murdered an Egyptian, and God appointed him to lead his people. David was responsible for Uriah’s death, and he became the leader of a nation. Mary, Jesus’ mother, came under the capital crime statute, but God had another plan for her. God may have a redemptive plan for some on death row today. Karla Faye Tucker was potentially such a person. She was a Texas woman who killed two people with a pickax. Later she was “born again” and then executed for her crimes. “Rich Cizek, policy analyst for the National Association of Evangelicals, said, ‘It’s no secret that evangelicals have been stalwarts behind the death penalty.’ But Tucker’s execution, he said, produced a ‘moral revulsion’ among evangelicals ‘because she is a woman of such obvious spiritual change.’ This change led Pat Robertson and other conservative leaders to plead her case.”[6] Of course, we cannot know beforehand who is a chosen one. In summary, an overview of the Older Testament and its community of faith reveals a God who created a human family in God’s own image. Violence of any kind is a violation of God’s will. Over time we can see a continual movement away from violence, legal and extra-legal, toward a genuine awareness of the sanctity of human life and the restoration of relationships when they break down. It gradually recognizes a God who is the source of human life and God’s perpetual concern for and absolute power over it. The national agencies of the “mainline churches” have long-standing declarations against the death penalty. Evangelical churches are re-thinking their positions. Both have come to understand that today the cry for justice is a cry for vengeance, “payback,” and it is so hard to justify vengeance on Christian grounds. THE NEWER TESTAMENT The pickings within the Newer Testament for support of the death penalty are much leaner. There is no direct reference to the death penalty in the Newer Testament. There is a good reason for this: the early Christian community did not support the death penalty. Romans 13: 1-7 Death penalty supporters appeal to Romans 13: 1-7 to make their case for the death penalty. In this passage, Paul calls the state an institution of God, an order of creation, accountable to God for the welfare of the people. He goes on to say, “…for it (the government) is God’s servant for your good. But if you do what is wrong, you should be afraid, for the authority does not bear the sword in vain!” The first thing to notice here is that the death penalty is not explicitly mentioned; so, Paul’s approval must be inferred. Paul says two things about the state that death penalty supporters claim refer to the death penalty. First, Paul speaks of obedience to the state, which is instituted by God, to maintain order. Supporters conclude that maintaining order includes the use of the death penalty. Secondly, Paul uses the metaphor of the “sword” that the state wields. This is read as referring to the death penalty. Everything hangs on the meaning of the word “sword.” Imagine, the authorization of the death penalty today rests upon a biblical word whose meaning is in dispute. In order to reach their conclusion, death penalty supporters must ignore the evolution in both Testaments of the elimination of all forms of violence. Also ignored is the historical situation of the church at Rome at the time. The church struggled for survival in the face of Roman religious cleansing. Rome had launched a pogrom against the Jews that could easily spread to the church. Also, there were antinomians in the church, those who thought they were under no law. Paul had to address both problems. His call for obedience to the state does not mean that he or the church approved of capital punishment. The term “sword” can be a symbol for capital punishment, but it also has several other possible meanings as well. It can refer to police powers or to those who enforce taxation; it could be a designation for the civil guards or a symbol of judicial authority. The point is we just don’t know for sure what Paul had in mind when he used the word “sword.” If Paul did have the death penalty in mind, it probably was in connection with Rome’s power to intimidate through the threat of execution. He wanted to keep Christians at Rome from being killed by the state. How could Paul hold to the death penalty when he had chiseled into his memory the the killing of the one he called Lord by that same Roman government. Surely the church at Rome could not or would not justify killing people based on this passage. Extra-biblical writing, furthermore, shows a revulsion by the early Christian church for the killing of anyone even by the state. In his Plea (ca. 176 CE), when the church was accused of cannibalism and murder with reference to the Lord’s Supper, Athenagoras, a Christian philosopher in Athens, writes: “Since they know that we cannot endure to see a man being put to death even justly, who of them would charge us with cannibalism or murder?”[7] According to Athenagoras, even the church’s accusers knew well the position of the church regarding the taking of life. Revelation 13 The literal/legalists try to pack a lot into Romans 13 and then to absolutize it so that it prescribes the death penalty. But there is another chapter 13 with a view of the state different from Paul’s, Revelation 13. In this chapter John was not quite so generous in his regard for Rome. His metaphor of the “beast” brings out most clearly, perhaps inevitably, the demonic character of the state. His picture sharply contrasts with the one described by Paul. Which is it, the holy state or the demonic state? Where Paul tried to insure the survival of the church, John condemns the state because the state at that time was killing Christians. Politics was tough even in the first century. Where Paul’s teaching has at times been invoked to justify any sort of oppressive and inhumane government, John provides the needed balance. We remember the Nazi regime, Stalinist Russia, apartheid South Africa, Pol Pot, and today the Taliban. The United States itself was formed by the rejection of the authority of the British government. The Civil Rights movement in the United States rejected the authority of the Jim Crow Laws. All these are examples of the sometimes demonic character of the state. John 8: 2-11 The last passage of scripture we will consider is John 8: 2-11, the story of the woman taken in adultery. This passage is a favorite of death penalty abolitionists, appealing to Jesus’s words: “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.” There are problems accompanying this text as well. For one thing, its canonical status is in doubt. This story is not found in the earliest accounts, but it still has solid status within the oral tradition and reflects a spirit of Jesus we find throughout the Newer Testament. For another thing, the seemingly obvious rejection of the death penalty in this passage is challenged by some death penalty supporters. They claim that Jesus affirmed the death penalty in this passage. “How can this be?” you might ask since Jesus stops the execution. One commentator opines that Jesus was stopping the stoning because the male adulterous partner was not present for stoning as well. The Older Testament explicitly states that both are to be stoned (Lev. 20:10). Therefore, he concludes, Jesus was not passing judgment on the death penalty itself but only on the legality of the proposed execution. You see, in this case you must assume beforehand that Jesus approved the death penalty so that one can make the case that he didn’t oppose execution in principle.[8] These legal gymnastics can drive us crazy. There are other competing interpretations as well.[9] So where does this brief look at scripture leave us as Christians? One may hold to the practice of the death penalty, but it can’t be done on biblical grounds. The religious concept of the sanctity of life and the evolution of standards of behavior among God’s children reject any kind of violence in favor of love, mercy, justice, redemption, and forgiveness. Other Christian literature, noted above, testifies to the spirit of the early church which rejected killing either legal or extra-legal THE JESUS OF HISTORY AND FAITH Our examination of scripture leads us away from a literal, legalistic, non-historical interpretation of scripture and places us just where we ought to be – face to face with the Jesus of history and the Jesus of faith attested to by these same scriptures. The Jesus of HistoryJesus was arrested, tortured, and sentenced to death by the Roman government by order of a second-rate governor, Pontius Pilate. The specific charge, especially the suggestion by the Jewish authorities that Jesus was undermining the Pax Romana (Mark 14-15 and parallels) was probably sedition. Pontius Pilate obviously wanted to avoid civil unrest; so, he was a politician who easily gave in to the mob. Crucifixion was an ignominious form of death. Roman soldiers were left to their own devices regarding the treatment of the condemned. The humiliation deepened when the victims contemplated their end following a lingering death: being eaten by dogs.[10] “Crucifixion was aggravated further by the fact that quite often its victims were never buried. It was a stereotyped picture that the crucified victim served as food for wild beasts and birds of prey.”[11] From this picture painted by Crossan, we gain a deeper appreciation for the story of Joseph of Arimathea who claimed the body of Jesus for burial. Given the horrifying practice of crucifixion it is extremely difficult, even impossible, to believe that Jesus or his disciples could contemplate support of the death penalty. It is for these same reasons, that it would be difficult to believe that in Romans 13 Paul lends support to the death penalty. The state execution of Jesus, as well as the well-documented accounts of mass executions by Rome, functions as the state’s claim of sovereignty over our lives with its power to intimidate us and to impose its absolute will. When it feels itself threatened, the state increases the categories of crime subject to capital punishment.[12] For Christians in the first century executions were wrong; they are wrong now. Theologically, for people of faith, only God is sovereign over our lives, never the state. An encounter with the Jesus of history forces us to make a choice. Paul made his choice, for over against the claim of the state for absolute loyalty, Paul writes that in coming before the church, he promised, “To know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). The Jesus of FaithChristian people believe that Jesus’ death on the cross was more than an example of human and state injustice. We believe that his life and death were redemptive. We preach about a God full of grace, love, and forgiveness, which were reflected in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. His life constituted an atonement for the way we ignore God and treat one another. John summed up Jesus’ life with these words: “…and he is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world” (I John 2:2). For us Christians the supreme power in the universe is an atoning God. My spouse’s sister-in-law is a Jewish woman. One evening during conversation she put this question to me, “How can Christians support the death penalty; they are supposed to believe in love, mercy, and forgiveness?” I responded by picking up the Bible, turned to Genesis 9:6, and handed it to her. She read it and responded, “Oh, that!” Her own religious sensitivity told her that Christians should be against the death penalty. And so we should. To place limits on the Christ’s redemptive act symbolized by the cross strikes at the very heart of Christian theology. If the death of Christ was not efficacious for all sinners, then how can we be sure that Christ died for our sins, yours and mine? We must not destroy those for whom Christ died, nor should we shut off the path to redemption for the offender. The literal/legalistic search for biblical support for the death penalty constitutes a denial of the “good news,” handed down to us by past generations of believers. Walter Rauchenbush, many year ago, put it quite succinctly: “To use forensic (legal) terms to describe our relationship to God ends up in wiping out the love and mercy of God, our most essential Christian conviction.”[13] This Christian asked himself not so long ago, “Does God will the death of Jay D. Scott or John Byrd or any of the other 201 men on death row in Ohio?” Looking to Jesus, I had to answer, “No!” A “Yes” answer would mean my denial of God’s gospel of grace. For these same reasons our General Synod has called for the abolition of the death penalty. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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| Central Southeast Association Spirit Team to Abolish the Death Penalty in Ohio | |
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Demonstrate (State House, Governor's Mansion, Penitentiary, Other?) Take Political Action (Write letters/e-mail/phone calls to Governor, Legislature, Newspapers) Inform Others (Help to organize discussion, information groups at church, civic organizations) Provide Financial Support (Church, OTSE, Southern Poverty Law Center, Amnesty Int'l, etc) Receive Information (Join a mailing or e-mailing list to receive information) Inform Yourself (Newspapers, magazines, books, movies) And in all things, pray.....for personal guidance, for decision makers, for victims.....
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