In <>, (Graeme) wrote:

>I haven’t missed any such thing. In fact Jesus never said He opposed

>them. Can you see any words in the text that says He did? He made

>fools of their hypocrisy is what He did.

The crowd in John 8 wanted to apply the death penalty. The woman was guilty of a crime which deserved death under to the law. They came to Jesus to see if he would uphold the law in this matter. He said “let the one of you without sin cast the first stone”. They all went away.

It seems very clear to me that this story illustrates the incompatibility of the death penalty and following Jesus. If he had supported the death penalty under the law, he would have just stood aside and let them get on with it. The way the Bible presents the incident, it was an open and shut case.

>>The Bible teaches that every human being is made in the image of God.

>> >May I ask what you take that to mean?

When we kill or diminish a fellow human being, we both diminish ourselves and insult God.

>>But his [Pilate's] exercise of the death penalty against Jesus was lawful!

>>>It most certainly was not lawful. Are you not familiar with the trials

>of Christ? Everything about them was illegal — everything!

Under what law?

Jesus had been convicted in a Jewish court (sanhedrin) of blasphemy.

He had been convicted by the governor of the province of sedition.

You may argue (as I would) that both of these convictions were unsound, and possibly would have been overturned on appeal, but from the information in the Gospels it seems that both the Sanhedrin and the Roman governor exercised their lawful authority in sentencing Jesus to death.

>> >I don’t think they do.

>I am fairly familiar with Judaism in Jesus’ day and it wasn’t a very

>pretty picture.

When I get back to my office tomorrow I will suggest some sources where you can find an analysis of both the true nature of Judaism in the time of Jesus, and the easily documented Christian distortion of Judaism in the past 2000 years.

>>The USA. >> >The USA has always had it!

No, the USA did not have the death penalty for about 10 years – it was abolished, and later reinstated by the supreme court. I understand that neither decision made any difference to the crime rate.

>>This has not worked anywhere else, so why would it work in >>Australasia?. Also, how would you ensure that there were no wrongful >>convictions and executions (or wouldn’t you bother)? >> >Oh yes it has. Take Singapore, for example. But to say that it doesn’t >work anywhere else is very misleading. Where, for example in western >countries is it used properly. What seems to be forgotten here is that >many countries once used it and there was much less crime than there >is today. It seems clear to me that it was rationalising of liberal >thinking that caused it’s cessation.

1. Singapore is hardly a ‘western’ country.


2. I doubt that it will be used what you call ‘properly’ in any western country – mainly because we have a legal system which respects the rights of the individual over the rights of society, and a society which over the past 100 years had developed a respect for life and revulsion for state violence which would make the death penalty impossible to enforce.


3. As I have said, the evidence I have seen indicates that rates of violent crime in western countries is falling (on a per capita basis), and the death penalty has not, and would not, make any difference.

>But all that is beside the point. The Bible definitely advocates it.

I suspect that this is what we should be talking about here. If you want to debate the social advantages and disadvantages of the death penalty, read alt.activism.death penalty.

I maintain that on the basis of John 8, we are on secure ground in saying that Jesus opposed the death penalty. I also believe that state violence is incompatible with Christian witness, and it is potentially destructive to the Gospel message for Christians to publicly advocate the death penalty.

Nigel B. Mitchell

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