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Liberals reveal their appalling hypocrisy when they proudly claim to oppose the influence of religion on politics, and then try to cite the Bible to argue against the death penalty..
In one typical expression of sentiment, just today I spotted a bumper-sticker declaring, “The Last Time They Mixed Religion and Politics They Burned People at the Stake.”
Nevertheless, opponents of capital punishment frequently resort to scriptural citations or faith-based arguments to try to make their case. The same “progressives” who react with horror at Christian, pro-life arguments when it comes to the issue of abortion, seem to welcome misguided Christian arguments against capital punishment.
This point came home to me with unusual force during synagogue services this last Saturday. The weekly portion of the Bible which was read out loud this week by all Jews, everywhere, included verses (Deuteronomy 19: 11-13) that leave little doubt as to the Old Testament’s insistence on the death penalty. Scripture declares that “if there be a man who hates his fellow, and ambushes him mortally, and he dies” then the killer cannot escape to one of the established “Cities of Refuge” intended for perpetrators of accidental death. With a pre-mediated murder, the Bible says: “Your eye shall not pity him; you shall remove the innocent blood from Israel; and it shall be good for you.”
Concerning this passage, the authoritative Twelfth Century sage, Maimonides, offers an explanation with haunting contemporary resonance: “The verse concludes that by executing the murderer, the nation will insure that it shall be good for you, because compassion for a murderer breeds further bloodshed, since it frees him from death and sets an example for others, who may be tempted to follow his example.”
In other words, misplaced compassion for a pre-meditated murderer brings cruel consequences for future innocent victims – as recent academic studies of the death penalty and its powerful deterrent impact very clearly indicate.
In response to the Old Testament’s direct (and frequently repeated) authorization of capital punishment, Christian opponents of the death penalty claim that Jesus replaced the harsh Mosaic law of justice with a new Gospel of forgiveness and mercy. They cite the famous Gospel injunction to “turn the other cheek” or the suggestion that “he who is without sin should cast the first stone,” without acknowledging that these exhortations apply to individual conduct and not to governmental authorities. In the New Testament, in fact, Paul makes clear in Romans 13:4 that believers should not expect society to abolish capital punishment: “But if you do evil, be afraid; for (the governing authority) does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister; an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil.”
Moreover, the same section of Matthew’s Gospel that includes the celebrated exhortations to “love thine enemy” and “turn the other cheek” begins with Christ’s unequivocal declaration (Matthew 5: 17-18) that he has no intention of abrogating properly interpreted Old Testament law: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.”
In this context, the early Church unhesitatingly endorsed the death penalty. Clement of Alexandria, the great scholar and teacher of the Second Century, declared that “if someone falls into incurable evil – when taken possession of by wrong or covetousness – it will be for his good if he is put to death.” In the Fourth Century, St. Jerome (venerated by Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox and Lutherans alike) wrote that execution of “murderers, blasphemers and poisoners” is not “shedding of blood, but administration of laws.” Aquinas also strongly reasoned for the death penalty, and as recently as the Catechism of Trent (1566), the Catholic Church unequivocally affirmed that “lawful slaying belongs to the civil authorities, to whom is entrusted power of life and death, by the legal and judicious exercise of which they punish the guilty and protect the innocent.”
Of course, the Church has changed its position in recent years (particularly since the Second Vatican Council in 1962-65), in most cases discouraging the death penalty as non-reformative and non-rehabilitative. In terms of religious authority, however, sacred scholars and teachers many centuries closer to Jesus and his message (not to mention closer to Moses and his law) affirmed and prescribed the death penalty with scant hesitation.
In short, the attempt by opponents of capital punishment to cite Biblical authority not only ignores the plain language of Old Testament and New Testament text as well as thousands of years of authoritative interpretation, but also highlights the hypocritical willingness of secular progressives to trot out religious arguments (no matter how specious) whenever it helps them to make their feeble case.
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