“Your eye shall not pity. It shall be life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.” Deuteronomy 19:21 ESV

” But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” Matthew 5:39 ESV

Skeptics claim that the God of the Old Testament is different from the God of the New Testament. The God of the Old Testament is a spiteful, vengeful, violent God in their minds and they point to the lex talionis, the law of retaliation, an eye for an eye, as one of their proofs. Jesus was much more kind and gentle with His “turn the other cheek” philosophy, skeptics could almost like this Jesus character if He didn’t claim an association with this violent Old Testament God…

But what is the truth about lex talionis? Was an eye for an eye really a law of retaliation? Did Jesus negate this law? Let’s look at the truth about these passages in the Bible that offend the sensibilities of modern day skeptics.

I’ve already quoted Deuteronomy 19:21 above, but the lex talionis also appears in Leviticus 24:17-21 with a little more detail:

¹⁷ “Whoever takes a human life shall surely be put to death. ¹⁸ Whoever takes an animal’s life shall make it good, life for life. ¹⁹ If anyone injures his neighbor, as he has done it shall be done to him, ²⁰ fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; whatever injury he has given a person shall be given to him. ²¹ Whoever kills an animal shall make it good, and whoever kills a person shall be put to death. (ESV)

So why would a good God condone this kind of vigilante justice? Why would a good God condone vengeance, retribution, and retaliation? Well, the short answer is, He wouldn’t. The longer answer would be, He didn’t. Let me explain what I mean by this:

First we have to ask, who was God talking to here?

God was talking to Moses and He was setting up the laws for the future nation of Israel. These were laws intended for judicial use in court cases brought before the judges, ¹ they were never intended for personal vigilante justice. In fact Leviticus 19:18 warns against this.²

God was setting limits on state punishments for different crimes, not condoning retaliation. If followed properly this so-called law of retaliation actually ensured the state punishment would fit the crime and that unjust sentences would not be carried out.

There was much more to God’s law than just an eye for an eye. Cities of refuge³ were set up so people who committed manslaughter could get a fair trial, and there had to be at least two witnesses to most crimes.⁴ There were laws of restitution, property rights, home defense, perjury, and more.⁵

And yet skeptics ignore all of this and turn straight to “an eye for an eye” to show us an example of how barbaric God was in the Old Testament. But they ignore the intent of the law, the recipient of the law, the purpose of the law, and the human factor which naturally led to the abuse of the law. Skeptics have actually twisted the intent of these laws 180 degrees, and ignore the fact that the idea of the punishment fitting the crime is still in effect in civilized nations to this day.

Now we’ll look at Jesus’ “turn the other cheek” philosophy to see if this indeed nullified lex talionis. Here is what Jesus said in Matthew 5:38, 39:

³⁸ “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ ³⁹ But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. (ESV)

At first glance, and without context, it certainly looks as if Jesus was nullifying lex talionis, but again we have to ask, who was Jesus talking to?

This passage is from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was speaking to the people and He was addressing individual conduct. He was talking about the abuse of lex talionis by individuals who were using it to exact personal revenge on their enemies. He was correcting a misunderstanding, or an abuse, of the law which was leading people into taking the law into their own hands.

So yes, Jesus was trying to change the actions of the people who were abusing lex talionis, however He was not abolishing God’s laws for justice. Jesus Himself said he did not come to abolish the law⁶ and I think we can take Him at His word…

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1. Deuteronomy 1:16, 17, Deuteronomy 19:17 ↩︎
2. “you shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people” ↩︎
3. Numbers 35:9, Deuteronomy 4:41 ↩︎
4. Deuteronomy 19:15 ↩︎
5. Exodus 22-23 ↩︎
6. Matthew 5:17-19 ↩︎