Reference no: EM133229084

Assignment:

The death penalty has been a punishment as far back as the Ancient Laws of China. In the eighteenth century B.C, the Code of King Hammurabi of Babylon brought the death penalty into his laws (DPIC, 2019). They used this punishment for twenty-five different crimes, not including murder. The British settlers that came to America brought with them capital punishment. Although not the first death sentence ever recorded, the first death sentence in America was in 1608. Captain George Kendall was hanged for the capital offense of treason. The biblical basis for capital punishment begins with Genesis 9:6, which states, "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed." There are arguments for and against the biblical stances on the death penalty. While some people state that the Bible is for it, others think that because God emphasizes forgiveness, then it is not permitted. In John 8, God did not command death to the adulteress and instead showed her mercy. He did not allow the men who committed sins to punish her.

There are noticeable differences between the Old and New Testament approaches to the death penalty. In the Old Testament, The Law given to Moses on Mt. Sinai states that the death penalty is obligatory for several crimes. In the New Testament, there is nowhere that obligated the death penalty. It also does not say that we must follow the Old Testament law. There are conditions in the Bible where capital punishment can be exercised. Throughout Numbers, principles such as certainty of guilt, intent, proportionality, and due process must be considered before everything else (Prison Fellowship, 2019).

The death penalty does not provide a valid punishment option in today's society. The Death Penalty Information Center states that since 1973 there have been 190 prisoners that have mistakenly been convicted and exonerated. These wrongful convictions corrupt our current system. The death penalty is applied unfairly and unjustly. Capital punishment deprives prisoners of the benefits of new future evidence in their cases, which denies them the due process of law. Eleven countries have abolished criminal punishment and have reported a decrease in murder rates in the following decades (DPIC, 2019). There are also decreasing murder rates in the U.S. states that have abolished the death penalty (DPIC, 2019).

References

DPIC. (2019, June 20). Early History of the Death Penalty. Death Penalty Information Center.

New International Version. (2011). BibleGateway.com.

Prison Fellowship. (2019, April 12). A Biblical Perspective on The Death Penalty.

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