Why does Moses permit killing after he received the Ten Commandments

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In the OT Moses permits the killing of people for crimes. But he had already been given the Commandments that condemns killing. “How is this justified?” an atheist friend asks me.

Thanks,
 
There’s killing and then there’s murder. The Commandments are against murder, not killing in all forms. Capital punishment is not murder. Self-defense is not murder. Both are permissible.
 
I think the issue is as you say “murder” includes a determination that the killing was unjust. Need to be careful to avoid conflating current legal definitions of murder with the one intended in the wordin of the commandment. Not every culture for example considers self defense to not be murder, some do forbid capital punishment as being unjust. They may overlap with scripture they may not.
 
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Dan123 said:
Not every culture for example considers self defense to not be murder, some do forbid capital punishment as being unjust. They may overlap with scripture they may not.
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It doesn’t matter what those cultures think. The Catholic Church, so far as I’m aware, does not say that self-defense and capital punishment is murder. Neither did the Jews at that time, I believe.
 
In the United States, capital punishment might have been morally permissible at some point in time but its most likely immoral nowadays. Popes have said if Capital punishment was the only way of keeping others safe from a person who wouldn’t try to stop killing, it could be justified … but in todays day and age, our jail systems are secure enough to protect the community and general prison population and guards from a person like this. Capital punishment might be morally permissible in a country that cannot properly segregate a criminal like this, but Its 100% immoral in the United states, according to any of the previous popes.
 
John Paul II taught in Evangelium vitae that the death penalty is not to be sought for retributive purposes at all, but only for the protection of society.

“The nature and extent of the punishment must be carefully evaluated and decided upon, and ought not go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity: in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today however, as a result of steady improvements in the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent”
 
Joseph17 said:
In the OT Moses permits the killing of people for crimes. But he had already been given the Commandments that condemns killing. “How is this justified?” an atheist friend asks me.

Thanks,
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I would see this in how to understand Moses’s role. He was both a prophet and a ruler, albeit in a simplistic manner. In other word, he needed to govern his people. In order for a government to function, laws have to be promulgated.

That’s what happened in Moses’ time and subsequent Israelite nations.

God approved laws for good governance but God also gave His Commandments as well. Laws can be changed but God’s moral Commandments cannot.
 
Fauken said:
There’s killing and then there’s murder. The Commandments are against murder, not killing in all forms. Capital punishment is not murder. Self-defense is not murder. Both are permissible.
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The Church’s preferred translation, regardless of what Judaism may think, is “killing” rather than “murder”. Check the Catechism for example.

The better solution is probably that individuals may not wield the power of the sword but the legitimate Ruler may, in God’s place.
 
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Fauken - It may be argued that ‘Capital Punishment’, while not murder in secular legal terms in many countries in the world, can be considered less than morally desirable.
 
Mtdobbs said:
John Paul II taught in Evangelium vitae that the death penalty is not to be sought for retributive purposes at all, but only for the protection of society.
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The catechism of the Council of Trent says that the death penalty is not a sin at all. The good Larron under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit had said that his death sentence was right. So I think that JPII spoke under the influence of the humanist culture of our time which says that man has the right to certain goods (including life) whereas in the Faith, as a sinful men, we deserve … Hell. So we have no right to any good.
Someone who has committed murder deserves the death penalty, it is only fair.
 
MountCarmel said:
It may be argued that ‘Capital Punishment’, while not murder in secular legal terms in many countries in the world, can be considered less than morally desirable.
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Nevertheless capital punishment is accepted by the Church.
 
Mboo said:
whereas in the Faith, as a sinful men, we deserve … Hell. So we have no right to any good.
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So extending that logic, abortion is okay right? Because the fetus doesn’t have a right to any good, only death and hell.
 
You mix everything. For example, a thief has the right to the prison but it is up to the judge and not me to put him in jail.
My neighbor has no right to any good, but it is not for me to punish him, it is for the supreme judge (God) to do it. But God in his goodness wants to be indulgent to us sinners, and he asks us to collaborate in his mercy.
So when I hurt someone, I made a mistake, not because that person did not deserve to be harmed, but because I did it by malice or by selfishness and not by a concern for justice, and on the other hand, even if it had to be done by justice, God did not appoint me judge of souls
 
thistle - As St. Ambrose posed the issue in a letter to the Christian judge Studius - “authority, you see, has its rights, but mercy has its policy” - while the Church has, particularly in past times, assented to Capital Punishment under specific circumstances, it is something that has always courted controversy and moral and ethical unease. That controversy appears to have become ‘louder’ as time has progressed to the present day. I prefer that God is the only fail-safe authority to call time on a life.
 
Please help, my faith in Christ and God has nearly been destroyed because of this problem: Moses commands his army to take female virgins as captives of war (Numbers 31:17). Moses commands his people to chop off hands of women who interfere in a fight between two males (Deuteronomy 25:11), and also to stone children to death who disobey their parents (Deuteronomy 21:18).
 
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jordanmhall said:
Moses commands his people to chop off hands of women who interfere in a fight between two males (Deuteronomy 25:11), and also to stone children to death who disobey their parents (Deuteronomy 21:18).
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At the time of Moses and in the place which he lived - 15th/13th century B.C. Egypt and the Middle East - chopping off hands of women was equivalent to giving a woman a fine today, stoning children to death was equivalent to grounding your children today, and taking females as booty was equivalent to bringing in refugees and giving them a home. I know this sounds absurd, but it really is the truth… You cannot fathom how brutal the culture in those days was. These punishments Moses gave are actually incredibly temperant and progressive.

Those were all very just things to do in the time and place and circumstances which Moses lived.

It is utterly wrong to impose 21st century A.D. modern Western Christian morals and standards on a 15th century B.C. Oriental Jew.

Compare the Law of Moses with the Law codes of other surrounding peoples in that day and age and you will be shocked at how progressive, just, and merciful the Torah is.
 
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Mboo said:
a thief has the right to the prison but it is up to the judge and not me to put him in jail.

My neighbor has no right to any good, but it is not for me to punish him, it is for the supreme judge (God) to do it.
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I’m not a fan of this analogy. The judge doesn’t typically send the thief to jail, a jury does. Even if a jury trial is waived the judge can only adhere to the laws passed by representatives of the people. The prosecution is publicly funded and you’ll notice in criminal trials it’s not “Thiefy McThiefface vs The Prosecutor”, it’s vs “The People”. So yes you very much do send thieves to jail, as it’s our collective society holding them responsible not a single judge.
 
you stop on a detail that is not the essence of the comparison. In other words, it is not up to you as individual to do justice, to impose a sentence, it is to the judicial system , that can be a person or a jury council according to the country. In my country it is the president of the court alone who in conscience and according to the law inflicts penalties.
So the comparison is that God did not give us a mission to punish sinners as individual, that’s why we should not hurt others just because they are sinner. But as a sinner we deserve every possible evil, we have no right to any good! If we do good to the neighbor, it is because God commands it from us, and not because the neighbor deserves it.
 
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The council of Trent was over 400 years ago. Since then we have had saints like Faustina, Therese, Pio and Mother Theresa. The Church has changed or expanded its views in certain areas as more and more holy Men and Women of God have lived and revealed more and more of the beauties and mysteries of God. They have helped us understand more. Self defence is not immoral, even if you accidentally kill the person or even if its the only way to keep you or others safe. John Paul 2 wasn’t moved by a humanist culture, he was moved by a greater understanding that God loves all men and that life is sacred from conception to death. He understood that the life of newly conceived zygote(child) has the same value as a 30 year old priest, just as a 50 year old person on death row has as an 80 year old dementia patient in a nursing home. There has to be a continuity on the value of all human life or it Falls apart, not to mention how many people have been wrongfully convicted and put to death. Just because God allowed something in the Old Testament, does not mean that Jesus did not come to show a more perfect way. Pope John Paul’s views on the death penalty, are to me, a more perfect way of being Christ like.
 
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