Eye for eye – God’s demand for justice
Scripture Readings
- 2Corinthians 5:11-6:2
- Deuteronomy 19:15-21
Introduction
Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot. (Deuteronomy 19:21, NIV)
It took me many years to work out what “brotherly love” meant. Our household, like many others I suppose, represented your typical family where brothers got stuck into one another – and it did not always portray love between brothers. Later in life I worked it out that sin was part of our daily life – but we still loved one another. And it is almost if I can still hear Mom’s rebuke, that was when things got a bit hot, “Do not repay evil with evil!”
Even a word from the Bible sometimes did not help when you knew that you had a case against your brother. You just felt you wanted justice.
Then one day I read this passage in the Bible: “eye for and eye, hand for hand, foot for foot.” I had my verse. I had grounds for retaliation and revenge!
But is this the meaning of the verse?
In preparation for this sermon I read quite a few commentaries. When it comes to this particular verse some of them just skip it. There was one who argued that this verse, and the other places in the Bible where it is mentioned, is the most embarrassing in the Bible and should be removed, or not referred to at all.
I beg to differ. It is my clear conviction that this verse underlies the reason for the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. Whilst reading this verse in Exodus 21:23-24, I wrote a comment:
This principle, I believe, lies behind the cross of Christ. He bore the punishment of God on all harm and injustice in his Person to satisfy the righteousness of God.
Justice, not retaliation
Study the paragraph of Deuteronomy, and you will know that the setting is that of disputes in a court of law. There is no hint of personal retaliation or vindictiveness.
I am the Lord your God
Above and over all the regulations and case laws that Moses gave to the people of the Lord, stood the Ten Commandments. The top line reads, “I am the Lord your God.” No less than 76 times do we read this in the first five books of the Bible. God has a claim on his people, and his people were different, living under a different law, and were saved from slavery to be the possession of the Lord, their God.
When it comes to the second table it speaks about the love for the neighbour: God’s people was driven by the first table, which is the love for God and God’s love for them. All relationships between the people of God stood under the overarching principle of love. One would honour your father and mother because God loves them, gave them to you, they love Him and you love Him. One would not murder another person, because God loves him, he loves God and you love him. The same applies to adultery, stealing, and lying in court: God loves me, I love Him; He loves my neighbour and I should love my neighbour.
Sin distorts justice
So when we go back to Deuteronomy 19 these principles are assumed – but sinful nature gets in the way: people do lie, justice is perverted and retaliation becomes a reality. They needed priests, judges, a thorough investigation and a verdict.
Sin makes life difficult. We hate, lie, steal, and covet. We know the law, and yet we trespass; we need a judge, we need a verdict, we need justice,we need punishment. We need and eye for an eye – not driven by retaliation or vindication, but because we need justice.
In the presence of the Lord
Ever wondered where the custom to take an oath and be sworn in as witness in a court of Law comes from? Where does “So help me God” come from?
“our law (like that of most civilized nations) requires a witness to believe, not only that there is a God and a future state of rewards and punishments, but also that, by taking the oath, he imprecates upon himself, if his evidence is false” (Simon Greenleaf)
Witnesses, even in the day of Moses, had to understand that truth is universal, because God is omnipresent. That’s why the witnesses of Deuteronomy stood “in the presence of the Lord.” The priests and judges also sat in the presence of the Lord and had to measure out justice as God determined: they could only take the side of truth, not of the circumstance or the person.
Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot. (Deuteronomy 19:21, NIV)
To stem the possibility of retaliation, and only seek justice, any person who felt that he was dealt with unjustly, could approach the judges and priests. Then, even the quality and quantity of the witnesses were tested: two or three who were there when the alleged injustice took place; their statements had to be tested as the truth. And if it is proved that the witness is corrupt, what he wanted to be done to the person charged, would be done to him.
Punishment fits the Crime
Until very recently this was a principle accepted by the courts. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot and life for life. Justice demands that the penalty for a crime should not inflict harsher punishment than the crime called for. We know of no case in the Scripture where this law demanded an actual eye, foot, or teeth, but the compensation sought by a person for injustice against him could be measured out only in as far as he received injustice.
Justice good for the people of God
“You must purge the evil from among you. The rest of the people will hear of this and be afraid. and never again will such an evil thing be done among you.” (Deuteronomy 19:20)
Much can be said about punishment dished out be courts in our days, but fact is many law-breakers do not fear the law, and citizens in general have not much respect for the law, purely because the penalty does not fit the crime. It is wrong to try to get rid of a cat by putting it in a rubbish bin, but if you did and you get caught it, your punishment could be harsher that someone who raped and elderly person, or even killed a partner. We do not even mention injustices which might be legal, but still horribly wrong: think of abortions!
God instituted the law of eye for eye, foot for foot, tooth for tooth and life for life to be an example of justice; it was meant to be a deterrent. It was not “correctional” as we have it these days; it was exemplary punishment.
God’s righteousness demands justice
Whoever thought this verse in the Bible is an embarrassment, or thought it gives every individual to exercise personal retaliation, has it wrong. The only principle laid down here is that of justice. Fact is, God’s righteousness demands justice. This principle helps us to understand the cross and death of our Lord, Jesus Christ.
God’s righteousness and the cross
We are all sinners
The Bible is clear about our position before God: “we all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23)
Listen to Isaiah 59:
But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that He will not hear. For your hands are stained with blood, your fingers with guilt. Your lips have spoken falsely, and your tongue mutters wicked things. No one calls for justice; no one pleads a case with integrity. They rely on empty arguments, they utter lies; they conceive trouble and give birth to evil. They hatch the eggs of vipers and spin a spider’s web. Whoever eats their eggs will die, and when one is broken, an adder is hatched. Their cobwebs are useless for clothing; they cannot cover themselves with what they make. Their deeds are evil deeds, and acts of violence are in their hands. Their feet rush into sin; they are swift to shed innocent blood. They pursue evil schemes; acts of violence mark their ways. The way of peace they do not know; there is no justice in their paths. They have turned them into crooked roads; no one who walks along them will know peace. So justice is far from us, and righteousness does not reach us. We look for light, but all is darkness; for brightness, but we walk in deep shadows. Like the blind we grope along the wall, feeling our way like people without eyes. At midday we stumble as if it were twilight; among the strong, we are like the dead. (Isaiah 59:2–10, NIV)
All the sins mentioned here goes back to the Law of God, and as such, to the paragraph in Deuteronomy: hands are stained with blood (guilty!); false lips (guilty!); no justice (guilty!); utter lies (guilty!); evil deeds (guilty!); violence (guilty!); evil schemes (guilty!). The result? Justice is far from us. We are like dead!
This is the picture Paul paints in his letter to the Ephesians:
As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. (Ephesians 2:1–3, NIV)
God cannot turn a blind eye on sin
There is a principle in the Bible which may crush every sinner if it is not read in the full context of the cross of Christ. It reads:
‘The Lord is slow to anger, abounding in love and forgiving sin and rebellion. Yet He does not leave the guilty unpunished; He punishes the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.’ In accordance with your great love, forgive the sin of these people, just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now.” (Numbers 14:18–19, NIV)
God is merciful and abounding in love and forgiving sin, yet He does not leave the guilty unpunished. It seems contradictory: He forgives in love, but does not leave the guilty unpunished!
This is true of the Bible message from the beginning to end. Anyone who wanted to approach the Lord on his own terms would be crushed. Yes, God is merciful and forgiving, but He demanded that a sacrifice be brought: the blood of lambs and bulls satisfied God’s judgment on sin in the Old Testament; without that there was no forgiveness.
God does not turn a blind eye to sin
Point is, God does not turn a blind eye to sin. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, life for life. We demand justice, but we need justice. How can we demand justice if we are born in sin, and utterly corrupted by sin? How can we ask for forgiveness if we are unforgiving? Can God just say, “I forgive you”, without penalty on sin? Would He still be holy if He did so? Would He still be righteous if He let the unrighteousness off the hook without repentance and punishment? Such a God I don’t want to worship.
Eye for eye, life for life
God solved our problem, not because we deserved it, and not because He just forgives or overlooks sin. He solved our problem by being just. He punished in righteousness, not compromising his holiness. He gave his Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord to be our mediator.
When Jesus walked this earth He constantly referred to the fact that He would be handed over in the hands of sinners. When He was brought before them, all rules of justice went out the window: no proper witnesses, no truth in the allegations; lies conjured up by people off the street; an illegal court meeting in the middle of the night; bribes paid to witnesses. They let robbers free to have Him crucified. They had Him flogged even though they found no reason to do so. Even those who followed Him, lied about Him (Peter) and others deserted Him (the disciples).
When they nailed Him to the cross, He prayed to the Father that He would forgive them. Then, He faced the righteousness of the Father: justice called for eye for eye, tooth for tooth and life for life. He cried out, “Why have Thou forsaken Me?”
Paul understood the cross and the Saviour and writes:
All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:18, 21) NIV)
In Christ the righteousness of God is met: He paid for our big sins, the small ones and every one in between – eye for eye. We might think it is not a big sin, but all our sins are an offence to the holiness of God and demands his righteous justice. When Christ died in our place, the punishment fitted the crime, though He did not deserve it; if He did not do it, we needed to do it – and the consequence would have been disastrous, because we are God’s enemies.
Conclusion
My dear friend in the Lord, Christ’s death on the cross is your vindication; those who do not trust in Him for forgiveness will find the justice of God’s righteousness calling for retaliation: eye for eye, life for life.
Make sure that your life is save in Christ who took God’s judgement and became your righteousness. When He returns He will vindicated those who suffered under unbelieving and oppressing regimes; and his enemy will be punished. All because of justice. Eye for eye, and life for life. Amen.
Sermon preached by Rev D Rudi Schwartz on Sunday 13 April 2014
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