Code of Hammurabi
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The Code of Hammurabi is a Babylonian legal text composed c. 1753 BC. It is the longest, best-organized, and best-preserved legal text from the ancient Near East. It is written in the Old Babylonian d
The Louvre stele
The excavation of the Susa acropolis in 1897–1898, four years before the Code was found at the site
The Royal City (left) and Acropolis (right) of Susa in 2007
Father Jean-Vincent Scheil, first modern editor of the Code
Eye for an eye
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"An eye for an eye" is a commandment found in the Book of Exodus 21:23–27 expressing the principle of reciprocal justice measure for measure. The earliest known use of the principle appears in the Cod
Code of Hammurabi
…law, and at the complexity of Old Babylonian society. There was also much discussion of its influence on the Mosaic Law. Scholars quickly identified lex talionis—the "eye for an eye" principle—underlying the two collections. Debate among Assyriologists has since centred around several aspects of the Code: its…
In the laws of Hammurabi, an eye for an eye was applied if a free man (avīlum) gouged out the eye/broke the bone of another free man of equal status; otherwise, a monetary penalty was paid.
Sermon on the Mount, an 1877 painting by Carl Bloch