An Eye for an Eye—The Biblical Principle of Proportionality

The Amalek Paradigm

How should one respond to violent aggression? One biblical answer to this question arises from the story of Amalek.

Following the exodus from Egypt, the Israelites are attacked in the wilderness by the Amalekites (Exod 17:8–16), a nomadic or semi-nomadic group located in southern Canaan.^[1] After Joshua defeats them, YHWH makes a solemn promise to destroy Amalek, and Moses makes an oath:

^{שמות יז:טז} וַיֹּאמֶר כִּי יָד עַל כֵּס יָהּ מִלְחָמָה לַי־הוָה בַּעֲמָלֵק מִדֹּר דֹּר.

^{Exod 17:16} He said, “A hand upon the throne of YHWH! YHWH will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.”

Here, YHWH is to fight Amalek, but in Deuteronomy, Moses explains that the Israelites themselves must carry out this war:

^{דברים כה:יז} זָכוֹר אֵת אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה לְךָ עֲמָלֵק בַּדֶּרֶךְ בְּצֵאתְכֶם מִמִּצְרָיִם. ^כה:יח אֲשֶׁר קָרְךָ בַּדֶּרֶךְ וַיְזַנֵּב בְּךָ כָּל הַנֶּחֱשָׁלִים אַחַרֶיךָ וְאַתָּה עָיֵף וְיָגֵעַ וְלֹא יָרֵא אֱלֹהִים. ^כה:יט וְהָיָה בְּהָנִיחַ יְ־הוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ לְךָ מִכָּל אֹיְבֶיךָ מִסָּבִיב בָּאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר יְ־הוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ נֹתֵן לְךָ נַחֲלָה לְרִשְׁתָּהּ תִּמְחֶה אֶת זֵכֶר עֲמָלֵק מִתַּחַת הַשָּׁמָיִם לֹא תִּשְׁכָּח.

^{Deut 25:17} Remember what Amalek did to you on your journey out of Egypt, ^25:18 how he attacked you on the way, when you were faint and weary, and struck down all who lagged behind you; he did not fear God. ^25:19 Therefore when YHWH your God has given you rest from all your enemies on every hand, in the land that YHWH your God is giving you as an inheritance to possess, you shall blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; do not forget.^[2]

According to the book of Samuel, the destruction of Amalek indeed takes place at the hands of the Israelite army. When the prophet Samuel presents this charge to Saul, the first king of Israel (1 Sam 15:2–3), he instructs Saul to kill women and children as well as men, and even to destroy the Amalekites’ animals, which Saul proceeds to do.^[3]

Divine Commands?

The claim of divinely sanctioned genocide, whether against the Amalekites or any other peoples, raises profound questions about the morality of the Bible.^[4]

Religious conservatives tend to take biblical commands at face value as expressions of the will of God. For example, discussing the biblical mandate for the Israelites to utterly destroy the Canaanite peoples of the land (Deut 7:1–6; 20:16-18)^[5]—a mandate allegedly carried out by Joshua (Josh 10:40–43)[6]—the Protestant reformer Jean Calvin noted that he was troubled by “the indiscriminate and promiscuous slaughter, making no distinction of age or sex, but including alike women and children, the aged and decrepit.”^[7] Nevertheless, he acquiesces to its ultimate justice since Joshua’s actions were in response to a divine command: “when it is added, that so God had commanded, there is no more ground for obloquy against him, than there is against those who pronounce sentence on criminals.”^[8]

A more pernicious problem than simply justifying the past is how these ancient laws and stories are applied by some to contemporary issues. In 1689, the Puritan preacher Cotton Mather urged the American colonists to “go forth against Amalek annoying this Israel in the wilderness.”^[9] In that case, the “Amalekites” were native Americans.

To choose a timelier example, in the wake of the Hamas’ attack on Israeli civilians on October 7, 2023, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a speech: “You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember.”^[10] Netanyahu was by no means the first to invoke the memory of Amalek with reference to the Palestinians.

In 1980, Bat Kol, a student publication of Bar-Ilan University, published an article by Rabbi Israel Hess claiming that genocide is a commandment of the Torah and that the Palestinians deserve the same fate as the Amalekites.^[11] He was roundly critiqued by other Jewish leaders at the time,^[12] and was dismissed from his position in the university.^[13]

The Amalek paradigm is unquestionably grounded in the Torah, but to many people, Jews as well as Gentiles, it seems extreme, dangerous and inhumane, because it claims divine authorization for unrestrained slaughter.^[14] Appeal to divine command is not enough to settle the morality of genocidal response to the aggression of the Amalekites; the Torah does not provide a stenographer’s record of the words of God but is rather a human composition which attributes certain actions and words to the deity.^[15]

The Perspective of Tradition

In an article published in 1995, the late Moshe Greenberg, Professor of Hebrew Bible at the Hebrew University, admitted that “the plain sense of Scripture” is that all Amalekites needed to be killed, but argued that that interpretation was cancelled by “the moral sensibility of postbiblical Judaism.”^[16] Thus, he tries to soften the ethical problem with the law by filtering it through the lens of tradition.

Greenberg first suggests that the command is addressed to a specific generation and commands the destruction of only one people, one which no longer exists. Thus, the commandment cannot be used to justify violence against anyone in a modern context. This line of argument is not entirely satisfactory, however.

Scripture lives by analogy. If we limit its application to the original situation, then we cannot use it at all. Moreover, the commandment to blot out another people, whether Amalekites or Canaanites, is morally offensive even in its original context.

Greenberg’s next, and more compelling point, is that Scripture speaks in many voices, which are not always consistent. Fortunately, tradition sometimes provides summaries of the most important commandments.^[17] Scripture itself sometimes does this, in texts such as the Decalogue. Other times, later teachers point to overarching principles, such as how Rabbi Akiba is said to have singled out Leviticus 19:18, וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ “you shall love your neighbor as yourself” as a key principle (כלל גדול), implying that it is the greatest overarching tenet.^[18]

The focus on loving one’s neighbor was not peculiar to Akiba but seems to have been widely accepted in Judaism around the turn of the era. In the New Testament,^[19] Jesus couples that commandment with the command to love God in the Shema (Deut 6:4–5). The commandment to destroy Amalek is never highlighted as one of the key religious tenets in any such text,^[20] nor is any requirement to demand vengeance against one’s enemies.^[21]

Thus, the problem that divinely sanctioned genocide presents for people in the modern world who want to be faithful to the biblical tradition is not only that it conflicts with modern values but that it conflicts with the central principles of the biblical tradition.

An Alternative Biblical Response

A different kind of response is provided by the law of the talion (lex talionis),^[22] which stipulates that punishment should correspond to the offense committed in kind and degree. It appears three times in the Torah. First, in the context of striking a pregnant woman, the Torah states:

^{שמות כא:כג} וְאִם אָסוֹן יִהְיֶה וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ. ^כא:כד עַיִן תַּחַת עַיִן שֵׁן תַּחַת שֵׁן יָד תַּחַת יָד רֶגֶל תַּחַת רָגֶל. ^כא:כה כְּוִיָּה תַּחַת כְּוִיָּה פֶּצַע תַּחַת פָּצַע חַבּוּרָה תַּחַת חַבּוּרָה.

^{Exod 21:23} If any harm follows, you will give a life for a life. ^21:24 Eye for eye; tooth for tooth; hand for hand; foot for foot; ^21:25 burn for burn; wound for wound; bruise for bruise.

In Deuteronomy, the principle comes in the context of punishing a false witness with the very penalty he tried to bring about for the person he testified against:

^{דברים יט:כא} וְלֹא תָחוֹס עֵינֶךָ נֶפֶשׁ בְּנֶפֶשׁ עַיִן בְּעַיִן שֵׁן בְּשֵׁן יָד בְּיָד רֶגֶל בְּרָגֶל.

^{Deut 19:21} Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.

The principle is explicated most clearly in Leviticus’ Holiness Collection, as an aside in the story of the blasphemer:

^{ויקרא כד:יז} וְאִישׁ כִּי יַכֶּה כָּל נֶפֶשׁ אָדָם מוֹת יוּמָת.... ^כד:יט וְאִישׁ כִּי יִתֵּן מוּם בַּעֲמִיתוֹ כַּאֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה כֵּן יֵעָשֶׂה לּוֹ. ^כד:כ שֶׁבֶר תַּחַת שֶׁבֶר עַיִן תַּחַת עַיִן שֵׁן תַּחַת שֵׁן כַּאֲשֶׁר יִתֵּן מוּם בָּאָדָם כֵּן יִנָּתֶן בּוֹ.

^{Lev 24:17} Anyone who kills a human being shall be put to death… ^24:19 Anyone who maims another shall suffer the same injury in return: ^24:20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; the injury inflicted is the injury to be suffered.^[23]

Although the law has long been interpreted as symbolic—monetary compensation as opposed to actual dismemberment—its very tit-for-tat principle has often been dismissed as primitive and vengeful. Indeed, in his Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus preaches against vengeance, he dismisses the talion, telling his followers not to react to an attack:

^{Matt 5:38} You have heard that it was said: “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” ^5:39 But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also....

There has been much debate as to the rationale underlying Jesus’ advice. Was it a tactic to shame the enemy?^[24] Nonviolence has been used effectively as a tactic, most famously by Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, but its effectiveness varies with the situation in which it is used. Or perhaps Jesus may have been leaving it to God to exact retribution.

The apostle Paul tells his readers in the Epistle to the Romans:

^{Romans 12:19} Never avenge yourselves but leave room for the wrath of God... ^12:21 No, if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty give them to drink, for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads (Rom 12:19–21).

Presumably, for Paul, the burning coals are in Hell.^[25] In that case, non-retaliation is not the perfection of love but of hatred.^[26] Since Jesus famously and exceptionally preached that we should love our enemies (Matt 5:44; Luke 6:27) this rationale seems unlikely. (That command is not found in the New Testament outside of the Gospels).

But however admirable the teaching of Jesus may be, and whatever potential it may have as a strategy of resistance in some circumstances, it can hardly serve as a guide for public policy. The main principle of the talion is worthy of consideration.

The Talion and Justice: Balancing between Forbearance and Vengeance

The purpose of the talion law was first of all to control the impulse to vengeance by subjecting it to the rule of law.^[27] It limits the scope of retaliation by making it proportional to the damage inflicted. Contrast this with the vengefulness of Lamech:

^{בראשית ד:כד} כִּי שִׁבְעָתַיִם יֻקַּם קָיִן וְלֶמֶךְ שִׁבְעִים וְשִׁבְעָה.

^{Gen 4:24} If Cain is avenged sevenfold, then Lamech seventy-seven fold.

Following the talion may not qualify as exemplifying the golden rule of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. But at least it refrains from doing to others anything worse than what they did to you. As Philo writes, in defense of the talion:

^{Special Laws 3. 181–2} Inequality and unevenness is repugnant to the commonwealth that pursues truth. Our law exhorts us to equality when it ordains that the penalties inflicted on offenders should correspond to their actions... For to tolerate a system in which the crime and the punishment do not correspond... is to subvert rather than uphold legality.^[28]

Moreover, it has great practical value as a deterrent. It may be that an eye for an eye would leave everyone blind, but history provides all too many examples of the death and suffering caused by aggressive violence, and it is not difficult to imagine what would happen if no one resisted evildoers at all. In the Bible, YHWH often follows the law of talion, sometimes applying it to individuals such as David (2 Sam 12:11 and 16:21–2) and Ahab (1 Kgs 21:19), and at other times to peoples, such as Edom (Obad 1:16) and Judah (Hab 2:8).

The story of Amalek, then, is not the only paradigm for how to respond to violence in the Hebrew Bible. If we must resist evil, and we surely must, the lex talionis allows for satisfaction of the demand for justice while tempering it with a principle of proportionality.