The other day I heard a rabbi being interviewed in the radio. He said he was tired of hearing people use the the biblical phrase “an eye for an eye” to justify retributive violence, and that as originally written, it referred to monetary transactions – nothing to do with exacting violent revenge.
Is this true?
http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/MESO/CODE.HTM
Sounds pretty literal to me.
This is how the passage is given in Leviticus (KJV)
Sounds pretty literal to me, too.
However, if you want to put a Christian spin on it, Jesus toned this down quite a bit in the Sermon on the Mount.
The quote I found was from Matthew 5:38-39 (Jesus speaking):
[sup]38[/sup]Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:
[sup]38[/sup]But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.
The verse indicates that Jesus wanted us to not exact equal revenge for anything evil done to the listeners. Monitary transactions, while trying, aren’t evil. So it sound like “eye for an eye” is about revenge, but Jesus was saying don’t do it.
AFAIK, the Jewish thinking on this was set by, IIRC, Maimonides and he was of the thought that the idea was figurative.
If you lost an eye, you would go down to the friendly slave trader and see what a healthy slave sold for. After that you would see what a one eyed slave sold for and the difference in the price is the compensation that you would have been due.
Searching again, I found the quotes in the Old Testament as well:
Exodus 21:23-26
[sup]23[/sup]And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life,
[sup]24[/sup]Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
[sup]25[/sup]Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
[sup]26[/sup]And if a man smite the eye of his servant, or the eye of his maid, that it perish; he shall let him go free for his eye’s sake.
The commentary I found for the OT site says, “The cases here mentioned give rules of justice then, and still in use, for deciding similar matters. We are taught by these laws, that we must be very careful to do no wrong, either directly or indirectly. If we have done wrong, we must be very willing to make it good, and be desirous that nobody may lose by us.”
The Old Testament is calling for revenge, but the New Testament is not.
Thanks, that was how I understood it too:
old testament: fire and brimstone, violent revenge
new testament: love thine enemy.
I don’t know why the rabbi was saying it was only ever meant to be figurative.
The idea is held to be figurative, not literal, in Judaism, back to at least the time of the Talmud. Cite. The Oral Law, or interpretations of the written Torah, says that “an eye for an eye” is meant to be figurative:
The Orthodox believe that the Oral Law was given to Moses on Sinai along with the Torah, so according to them, “an eye for an eye” was never meant to be taken literally.
I seem to recall something in the relevant Old Testament passages about “an eye for an eye” being a limit on vengeance. That is to say, if someone blinds you, you are not allowed to kill him in revenge, but only to carry out punishments up to and including equal retribution. But a lesser punishment would still be allowed. Is there any support for this view?
Yes, but I’m not the Jew to track it down.
Gfactor quoted the Code Of Hammurabi. Under those laws, we get things like ‘If a man kill another man’s son, then his own son shall be slain.’. This is clearly not fair to the innocent son who is killed for the crime of his father.
“An eye for an eye” is a call for just and fair punishment. If a man puts out my eye, I cannot claim both of his eyes and an ear. So, instead of people performing excessive acts of revenge and families being caught up in blood feuds, we have a system where the aggrieved party is entitled to fair compensation and no more. If somebody burns my house down, I am entitled to a fair price for my house and possessions. But, I can’t just go out and kill him.
BTW I’ve heard a similar interpretation on ‘Vengance is mine sayeth the Lord’. Many sages agree that the proper meaning is ‘I am G-d. Vengance is My right and Mine alone. If you are a human being, you have no right to it. So, quit it with the vengance.’
Bull. But the rabbi’s response is sorta bull, too.
The traditional rabbinical interpretation was that “eye for eye” is figurative, as the rabbi was trying to explain.
But according to traditional Judaism, all of the Tanach (Hebrew Bible) is to be taken figuratively. That includes the Torah, despite what others have said here. It is plain wrong to take the words literally. Any rabbi, no matter how ultra-orthodox, would agree. The level of orthodoxy is simply how strict/literal the words are interpreted, but they are always interpreted.
This idea of old testament=violence and new testament=love is something that some Christians love to propagate; it always seems to be the same Christians that give out the quotes like “G-d does not hear the prayer of a Jew”. I won’t comment any more than that.
I have studied Torah (and Tanach) with several rabbis. Most of them are fairly progressive, which means that they allow us all to make our own interpretations.
I think that “eye for eye” makes sense. Here’s my interpretation:
The passage has to be taken as a whole. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc. means that one must demand justice commeasurable with the offense. Losing an eye is pretty serious; losing a tooth is a minor inconvenience. Punishment has to be balanced. I don’t believe that the passage is meant to be taken literally; in fact, I don’t believe that G-d meant it to be taken literally.
The rabbi’s attitude that it’s meant to be taken figuratively is Jewish doctrine going back at least 2000 years. A Christian who believes that the Old Testament was meant to be taken literally is ignoring Jewish doctrine.
One last note: individual passages from Torah/Tanach should not be quoted out of context. Remember that the chapter/verse divisions were applied much later to the text; regardless of what you believe about the text’s origin, history clearly indicates that chapter and verse were undeniably applied by humans. Given that, you really have to read all the stuff before and after to get a good idea of the point, just as much as you have to read a quote from somebody in context.
The passages, believe it or not, have to do with holiness. I was taught that justice commeasurate to the transgression is a key part of holiness.
The full verse is “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, I will repay.” People don’t seem to quote the full verse very often.
Here are some articles on the interpretation of the phrase:
http://www.aishdas.org/toratemet/en_mishpatim.html
http://www.benisrael.org/articles/Eye%20for%20Eye_Tooth%20for%20Tooth.htm
http://www.hillel.org/hillel/newhille.nsf/0/E7CBAA9B9376C3CD85256B5F0077B592?OpenDocument
http://www.hir.org/torah/rabbi/5760/emor60.htm
http://www.koltorah.org/volume%2014/20%20Mishpatim.htm
http://www.ou.org/torah/frankel/5762/mishpatim62.htm
http://dolphin.upenn.edu/~dbh/parshas/mishpatim/96/
This may just be a result of my upbringing/outlook/temperment/whatever, but it sounds like these laws are more of a “If YOU take someone’s eye” rather than “If someone takes YOUR eye”. ie: Rules of reparation rather than retribution.