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Pastimes : Ask God -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Sidney Reilly who wrote (20043)8/6/1998 10:28:00 PM
From: Henry Volquardsen  Read Replies (3) | Respond to of 39621
 
It's not the inconvenience at all, it's an eye for an eye.

Vengance is mine sayeth the lord.

and

Thou shalt not kill.

Also the pro-life issue is not a seperate issue. Life is life and God makes no distinction. God says thou shalt not kill. Period. You can create whatever horrific scenario you wish but all earthly punishments are temporary. God's judgement is eternal. The rapist of children does not go unpunished if society refrains from killing him. God will punish him.



To: Sidney Reilly who wrote (20043)8/8/1998 1:56:00 AM
From: Gregory D. John  Respond to of 39621
 
Bob,

First off... please forgive my ignorance since I haven't been on "Ask God" for quite some time... You're Bob Sturgeon and you are distinct from Steve Meyer (Bob)... right?

Anyway... at the risk of repeating what John said in #reply-5443852, here's a few of my thoughts on the death penalty.

The context in which I am thinking about all this has an underlying idea of a "super-prison". This is a theoretical prison where inmates are kept in their cell for their entire sentence (except in emergency situations) and interact only on an audio level with each other. There's a lot of other details pertaining to implementation, but that's the fundamental idea. It is essentially solitary confinement modified to sufficiently (?) mitigate the cruelty.

Within this context, I consider arguments for the death penalty based on current judicial systems to be moot. If your system dumps waste upstream of your water source, don't import water, just change the system. OK... easier said than done... I know.

It's ironic that "an eye for an eye" is used so often to endorse the death penalty. In fact, that idea was originally an appeal to fair punishment - that the punishment should fit that crime and not exceed it, as was commonly done in the Old World. The fundamental problem with "an eye for an eye" is what measure do we use in determining what is fair punishment. Money? Is killing a rich man worse than killing a poor man? Is killing a good man worse than killing a bad man? Is killing a child worse than killing an head of an household? Is crippling a child worse than crippling an head of an household to the point where he or she can't support the household? Basically, if we can't determine a reasonable measure for applying "an eye for an eye", it is only rhetoric and can't be implemented.

The death penalty as deterrent is probably the strongest argument. Tough to find incontrovertible data supporting or refuting the claim. Interestingly, the argument can be turned around into a reasonably strong argument against: The death penalty is not a deterrent, so should not be implemented.

I think one of the strongest arguments against the death penalty is simply: The government should not have the right to kill it's own citizenry.

One of the slipperiest arguments involves the commandment about not killing or murdering. This simple statement suffers from more interpretation and translation problems than the 2nd amendment! (Ha ha... oh... no... don't start in on that one yet... please!)

My feeble interpretation of that commandment is simply that a society functions much better if we don't kill each other.

Sorry for the long post.

Greg



To: Sidney Reilly who wrote (20043)8/11/1998 9:56:00 PM
From: IN_GOD_I_TRUST  Respond to of 39621
 
Bob and all others on this thread (from Steve Meyer),

Genesis
9:1 And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
2 And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.
3 Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.
4 But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.
5 And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man.
6 Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.
7 And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.
8 And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying,
9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
10 And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.
11 And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
12 And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:
13 I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.
14 And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:
15 And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.
16 And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.
17 And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.
18 And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan.
19 These are the three sons of Noah: and of them was the whole earth overspread.
20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard:
21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.
22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.
23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness.
24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.
25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.
26 And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
28 And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years.
29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years: and he died.

(*** PLEASE READ THE POST FROM ME FOLLOWING THIS ***)