Links for today’s readings:
Read: Exodus 22 Listen: (4:23) Read: Luke 4 Listen: (5:27)
Scripture Focus: Exodus 22.2-3
2 “If a thief is caught breaking in at night and is struck a fatal blow, the defender is not guilty of bloodshed; 3 but if it happens after sunrise, the defender is guilty of bloodshed.
Reflection: Justice That Protects Even Criminals’ Lives
By John Tillman
The life of the criminal matters to God.
Thieves who broke in at night had less protection under the law than those who broke in during the day. The homeowner who killed a daytime thief was guilty of bloodshed but was innocent of bloodshed if he killed a nighttime thief.
This law’s logic has several important moral considerations.
First, it prioritizes life over property. Even though the daytime thief is violating property rights, he is not threatening life and his life still has value that must be protected.
Second, it prevents abuse of the law to excuse murder. Without this law, a murder could easily be covered up by claiming that the victim was a thief. Limiting the force homeowners could use protected against corrupt use of force and held them accountable for responding with more force than necessary.
Third, it allows greater force in more dangerous circumstances. During the day, the entire community could help catch a thief. This provided justice to the homeowner without endangering life. But at night, the homeowner was more vulnerable. Allowing greater force at night provided more protection when homeowners needed it.
These laws don’t apply directly today. Our communities and justice systems are different. We have different advantages (like bright exterior lighting) and disadvantages (like weak bonds with our neighbors). But we can apply principles to our lives and justice systems.
It is unjust to respond with violence to non-violent crimes. The use of force by citizens and by officers of the law must be proportional to the threat and limited by the circumstances.
Those who use violence or deadly force must be held accountable. They must not automatically be exonerated just because the victim was a criminal.
Committing a crime does not justify violent, inhumane, or abusive treatment. The lives of criminals, even in the act of committing a crime, have value to God.
God judges nations by the justice they enact, and he looks most closely at how the poor, the foreigners, the outcasts, and the vulnerable get justice. These groups need protection from criminals. But they also need to be protected from a justice system that assumes their criminality and responds with brutality,
Carry out these principles in your life and work to see them implemented in your community. Let us ensure that we maintain justice that protects life, including the life of the criminal.
Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence
May God be merciful to us and bless us, show us the light of his countenance and come to us. — Psalm 67.1
– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.
Read more: Hope in Mercy, Not Wrath
It is hypocritical for those of us delivered from destruction only by the mercy of God to desire only destruction for our enemies.
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