Death by Hanging
December 30, 2006 Posted by Roger Overton
How should we react to Saddam’s execution as Christians? I’m sure some one will come along and write something better, but I’d like to put my thoughts out there to help start the conversation.
I believe our reaction should be mixed. On one hand, we should be joyful that goodness and justice has triumphed over evil in a significant way this day. It is significant because a symbol of death and
tyranny in the world has been destroyed. Instead of fading away into the pages of history via old age, a strong conclusion has been dealt. Such a triumph, I believe, is a blessed manifestation of God’s hand moving to make things right.
Conversely, we should also be mournful. Despite the wretchedness of the man hanged, he is a man made in the image of God. No matter how corrupted that image is, it resides nonetheless. Saddam Hussein is also a reminder of how fallen we all are. Certainly he caused more death than most of us will ever even have the opportunity to cause. But we, just as he is, were dead in sin as a result of the fall. The death and tyranny inflicted by Saddam are the consequences of what happened long ago in the garden, as is Saddam’s death. This should cause us to reflect on the sinfulness and guilt that mars us all who are children of Adam. Though those of us in Christ have been saved from the ultimate consequence of sin, we still daily experience and participate in it’s tragedies.
To go too far in either of these reactions would be wrong. It would be easy to be so joyful that we become jovial and make jokes about Saddam’s death. Such humor quickly crosses the line into inappropriate since a human death has occurred. The other extreme would be to be upset or depressed over the execution. Such a reaction does not pay appropriate regard to the justness of the death. There ought not to be any remorse or resentment because the execution was just and especially warranted in this case.
Related posts:
- Death Penalty Saves Lives
- Victory in Death
- Do You Ever Think About This?
- The Problem of Evil
- Yippee, Kids! It Is the Time of Death!
- More Moral Repugnancy
Posted in Ethics, Main Page, Roger's Posts
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December 30th, 2006 at 10:10 am
I appreciate your words here, Roger. You touch on the vast complexity of the issue — it is even complex for someone like me who opposes the death penalty altogether. Thank you for this post.
December 30th, 2006 at 12:07 pm
Very well said, Roger. Saddam's sin and the evil he committed might be seen as a human aberration, an anomaly. But the Genesis story tells us that he is the rule, not the exception. We are all fallen and given to sin, to arrogance, to pride, to the lust for power, all of which led Saddam to the murderous life he lived. So his execution should serve as a reminder of our desperate need for the cross and the transformation promised by Christ.
December 30th, 2006 at 11:15 pm
In Genesis 9:6 God says, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.”
This is a command from God. Because one person violates the image of God in another person, they forfeit their right to life. Of course not even God considers the death of the wicked as a pleasurable measure to be taken (Ezekiel 33:11) but it is justice He prescribes nonetheless.
December 30th, 2006 at 11:23 pm
I'll reply to my own post here to keep the comments on track – it is, of course, a much greater reminder of the justice each of us deserve every day outside the immeasurable grace and mercy of God. And so much more so for those who are saved through the precious blood of Jesus the Christ.
December 31st, 2006 at 10:44 am
FYI: Love your enemies –jesus
FYI: Replace evil with good — paul
FYI: hanging has been banned in most of the states because it's cruel and unusual punishment…
December 31st, 2006 at 9:43 pm
I find the “FYI” insulting. I hope it was not meant in that way. I have previously read the verses you allude to though.
In the context of Matthew 5:44, Jesus is speaking to individuals. He is not condemning just punishment prescribed by the government for wrongdoing.
In the context of Romans 12:21, Paul is speaking to his Christian brothers. He tells them not to take wrath into their own hands. Instead, in the next four verses, he says to leave it to the government, which God has instituted, to carry out God's wrath on the wrongdoer (Romans 13:1-4).
Lastly, the method of punishment is not an opinion poll. What makes the people of the United States the most just people, giving them the right to decide methods of punishment for others? God instituted death by stoning. God cannot do evil or command evil. Is death by stoning better than hanging? Have these states progressed beyond God?
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:23 pm
Joshua I was only responding to your post. I appreciated Roger's thoughts, and in your comment, it seemed that you were too quick to defend the hanging using the Bible. If the hanging of Saddam epitomizes biblical justice, then God's justice is far too small in our eyes.
I disagree with you regarding Matthew 5.44 and the context of the Sermon on the Mount. The context is speaking to a community of believers and less about individuals. Our western theological lens bids us to read it as prescriptions of individual living.
In no way did I intend to insult you. If you felt insulted, I apologize
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:47 pm
I like Greg Koukl's observation regarding Jesus' saying that we should love our enemies and those that try to use that as an argument against capital crime…
That is, why stop with capital crime(in this instance-Sadaam); life in prison? Jesus said to love our enemies…20-80 years? Jesus said love your enemies…any punishment for wrongdoing this side of heaven? Jesus said to love our enemies.
Now, capital punishment may be wrong-I don't think it is- but Jesus telling us to love our enemies does not seem like a good reason to not support it.
In any case, I thought Koukl's observation about that was interesting.
Derrick
January 3rd, 2007 at 11:42 am
EE, I am glad you were not insulting anyone. Thank you.
I was confused by your use of “individual”. When I used the word, I meant a single person, not a government. In your response it seemed that you used “individual” in contrast to “believer”. The audience of the Sermon on the Mount was a mix of believers and unbelievers. Matthew 5:1 and 7:28 refer to the crowds who also listened and a separate group of disciples. Not all were believers. Jesus does not have two different sets of commands, one for believers and one for unbelievers. His commands do fluctuate between singular nouns and plural. A plural command like “Love your enemy” still involves the individual loving their enemy. Jesus' commands are commands meant for people who are living. I would like to hear why you think this is somehow a “western theological lens”. Further, Jesus does not contradict Paul because 1) the Bible does not contradict itself, and 2) Jesus is not giving commands to or about governments. So Romans 13 stands as precedent for government determined death penalties.
I did not say that Saddam's execution “epitomizes biblical justice”. It does fit with Genesis 9:6 and Romans 13 though (while remembering Ezekiel 33:11). The government, instituted by God (Romans 13:1), used its established channels of justice to determine guilt and punishment. According to Romans 13:4, the government does not “bear the sword in vain” and it “carries out God's wrath”. The government is by no means free of the responsibility for its decisions but it does possess the ability and right to rule and to exercise the death penalty. Concerning Saddam, there is certainly much more weight of evidence that the government executed justice, not unlike God's instituted standards for judges in the Old Testament, and determined a suitable punishment (Genesis 9:6).
January 3rd, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Joshua,,, this is where we disagree. I believe the Sermon on the Mount was to his disciples, with the crowds in the backdrop. Most of us in the west tend to read Sermon on the mount as “What does this mean to me?” That is a rooted in a western value of the individual over the community. The sermon was spoken to a community of believers. I'm just responding to your comment refuting that this is not necessarily valid in the case of Saddam.
Second, your little interjection of “Jesus does not contradict Paul” is confusing. I don't understand how this “inerrancy” argument got into this discussion. Did I communicate that i believe Paul and Jesus are in contradiction?
I agree with you that Jesus is not giving commands about governments, which is why it is dangerous when we try to defend capital punishment using scriptural references. You came out strong in your comment defending capital punishment using scripture and I just wanted to point out that such a route can be a dangerous theolical path.
I doubt that Genesis 9.6 is meant to be a prescription for capital punishment and applies directly to Saddam. I will grant you this–while I am against Capital Punishment, I am not blind that biblically, this is more of a gray area than I'd like.
Finally, if you really want to go down the Romans 13.4 route, then you would agree with me that by deposing Saddam and instigating such chaos in Iraq, the US would be guilty of great sin as we took down a government (pre-2003 Iraq) that does not bear the sword in vain and “carries out God's wrath”?
I am no fan of Saddam and his execution definitely challenges my ethics. Again, I appreciate how Roger highlighted the tension, and i felt that you too quickly tried to diffuse it.
January 4th, 2007 at 11:15 am
Hello again EE,
Ok, if the Sermon on the Mount was primarily to his disciples then (1) why does Matthew 5:1 say “Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain”, (keeping in mind that He must not have meant to get away from them because they are still there in 7:28 and because there is just as much, if not more, reason for Him doing it because He wanted to be heard by all) and (2) again, why would the commands of Jesus be different for individuals vs. communities or believers vs. unbelievers?
If you are suggesting that we should instead ask the question, “What does this mean to the community?” then how would we act on the answer without submitting ourselves as individuals to God first? The community has as its core the individual. It does not have to involve any idea of individual OVER community but individuals as ROOT of the community. If the sermon were not directed at individuals then we would not find so many singular commands (“And do not take an oath by your [singular] head, for you [singular] cannot make one hair white or black.” 5:36). I still do not see why a distinction of a community of believers as the audience changes the command to love your enemy into a command directed at a government to stop or question its ability and right to the death penalty given in Romans 13.
The question of inerrancy and infallibility comes from what I assumed as you line of reasoning – that Matthew 5:44 somehow trumped or otherwise explained Paul's clear teaching in Romans 13.
Did I understand you correctly that because Jesus is not giving commands about governments in the Sermon on the Mount, it is dangerous to defend capital punishment with Scripture? And having Scripture references for our beliefs is a dangerous theological path? I am not sure I see the connection.
Let's review Genesis 9:6. There are only eight people on the earth. God is restating commands that apply to the entire human race, like being fruitful and multiplying (9:1), their relation to animals (9:2), and the extended variety of food they are allowed (9:3). God also institutes punishment for those who murder (9:6). God allows killing as punishment for murder. Saddam, having orchestrated hundreds of murders, would fall into the category of a murderer whose punishment could be death by other humans.
Next is the Romans 13:4 route, as you call it. Again, the context needs to be considered more closely. The commands of obedience are given to individuals who are under governments, not governments themselves. Paul has just completed a teaching on not returning evil for evil. He tells his readers that God will repay for evil (Romans 12:19). In Romans 13 he tells them one way God does that, the government is instituted by God for many reasons, one of which is to be “an avenger who carries out God's wrath”. I do not mean to fully justify the motives and actions of the US but Romans 13 cannot be used to judge the US as being “guilty of great sin”. God often used other governments in the Old Testament, even by their wrong motives, to punish disobedient nations.
Lastly, I do not think Roger's “tension” was lost in my first entry. I just highlighted two Scripture passages that revealed the Scripture behind the “tension”. As Roger says, justice was done, so I referenced Genesis 9:6, and pleasure was not to had over the death of another, for which I referenced Ezekiel 33:11.
Thank you for continuing this discussion and doing so thoughtfully and respectfully. I am not sure I have much else to say but I would enjoy your response.
January 4th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Joshua, I started to respond and I realized this has gone a bit more on the tangential. I will stick more to the relevance of this post. You're right in that God allows killing as punishment for murder, but God also allows grace as response for murder (i.e. David, Paul, Adulterous Woman). So why is it alright to identify the scriptures that highlight killing as punishment rather than the scriptures that highlight grace/mercy?
Second, if Saddam is guilty of orchestrating such murder (therefore punishable by death), then I would use that line of reasoning to accuse the Bush administration for orchestrating a war (resulting in thousands of innocent deaths) on false premises (WMDs + poor research on the intelligence). Wouldn't Christian ethics call us to raise the same level of accountability for Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Bush and Tennet (to name a few)?
If we use Romans 13 to defend government, then why would you use that to defend our government but not the 'legitimate' government of Saddam's Iraq? Does Romans 13 only work for certain forms of governments? Wouldn't Paul's experience of government be closer to Saddam's Iraq than the US?
January 5th, 2007 at 7:20 am
Hi EE,
So are we agreed that a government has the right to capital punishment? If so, I'm very glad.
When we are trying to determine whether or not the current government of Iraq acted justly in the execution of Saddam then we consider the Scripture that addresses it. Since Scripture is never contradictory then we know that if Scripture prescribes the use of capital punishment, it never mandates the opposite. Grace is never mandated or it would not be grace. If Iraq found Saddam guilty and granted clemency then we would probably be discussing that right for government.
When we compare the governments of Iraq (pre-war) and the US we see a difference between a nation killing its own people without just cause and a nation at war. They are not the same topic. There is the whole theory of Just Warfare to which the US should be conforming but that is a whole other topic.
Thanks for the discussion. I think I'm going to link to it on my website.
January 5th, 2007 at 9:51 am
Hey Joshua, I think you took my acknowledgment a step too far. While I acknowledge that God allows killing, I will not go so far as to say that the government has the right to capital punishment. What I will re-itirate is this–though I am against capital punishment, I recognize that scripture is more gray than black and white on this issue.
And I would not say that the current government of Iraq acted “justly” but acted constitutionally. In other words, it didn't do anything illegal, but that does not necessarily mean it did the right thing.
Of course, some of this debate is also highlighting some of our hermeneutical differences–I do not subscribe to the inerrancy doctrine, so I am alright with certain tensions of scripture. Because you do not allow scripture to contract itself, I can see how capital punishment is really a non-issue for you. I would challenge you with this though: Why not take scriptures that extend grace and begin with that, and then ask yourself, “If scripture does not contradict itself, then how shall I read the passages that prescribe killing as a form of justice?”
While we do see a difference between the US and pre-war Iraq, what I was trying to bring up is to highlight that your understanding of the rights of our government only seem to apply to our government. If our government is ordained by God as you seem to point out using Romans 13, wouldn't it be fair to believe that Saddam's government is also ordained by God? Yes, Iraq was a nation “killing its own people without just cause” (though they would argue it was just cause), but scripture doesn't necessarily give us a framework on what is a good government or a bad government, and are we to be judges of that?
Finally, I subscribe to just war, and I believe that the Iraq war did not “pass the test” of just war. (I am not a pacifist, so I do believe there are certain cases where war may be necessary).
January 8th, 2007 at 12:02 pm
Hi EE,
I am glad to see your admission that you do not believe in inerrancy. I was even more pleased with your admission that if someone does recognize inerrancy then capital punishment falls into place effortlessly. If you are deceived into thinking the Bible can contain contradictions then you are establishing yourself as the final authority on what applies and what does not.
You also say, “Why not take scriptures that extend grace and begin with that, and then ask yourself, 'If scripture does not contradict itself, then how shall I read the passages that prescribe killing as a form of justice?'” Sure, we can do that. The reason why is because God encourage us to “extend” grace. And He “prescribes” justice. Extending and prescribing are not contradictory. We would end up at the same place.
I would encourage you to review some of the great literature on inerrancy like Sproul's “Explaining Inerrancy” and Geisler's “Inerrancy”.