What is An Eye for an Eye, a Tooth for a Tooth:
Eye by eye, tooth by tooth, is a popular saying used to refer to revenge. However, in order to cause the same damage that the individual received. As such, it is a saying of Spanish origin, very popular spread throughout Latin America.
The expression “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” arose in ancient times where justice was applied by the hands of men.
The popular saying, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, is the best known expression for the law of Talion, which refers to a legal principle of retributive justice, in which the norm that is imposed must be equitable and reciprocal with the crime committed. .
The phrase can be interpreted as the search for a proportionality between the action performed and the response to the damage received. An example of this assumption is the Code of Hammurabi, in which it established among many of its legal norms: “if a free man emptied the eye of a son of another free man, his eye would be emptied in return.”
Currently, there are countries that include this way of carrying out justice in their legal systems, through the law of Talion, especially in Islamic countries.
In English, the expression “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” is “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”despite the fact that on many occasions the first part is used “an eye for an eye”.
Code of Hammurabi
Hammurabi, sixth king of Babylon, in the 18th century BC, and the author of 282 laws that formed the Code of Hammurabi, based on the law of Talion, an ancient punishment by which the crime was avenged, inflicting the same damage or harm on the offender. bad that he practiced.
An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, was the basis of any justice.
It was discovered in 1901 by the French archaeologist Jacques de Morgan, in the surroundings of ancient Susa, present-day Tunisia. Currently, the Code of Hammurabi is in the Louvre Museum, Paris.
“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,” in the Bible
The proverb in development is used in various biblical passages, with the same intention as the definition identified above. This expression is found in the Bible, more specifically in Exodus 21: 24: “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot”, in this passage God reveals to Moses some laws to transmit to the rest of the world. town.
Later, these laws changed with the arrival of Jesus and the New Covenant, in the book of Matthew 5:38: “You have heard that it was said, ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I tell you: do not resist him who is evil; Rather, whoever slaps you on the right cheek, turn the other to him as well (…).”
However, Gandhi stated: “an eye for an eye and the world will end up blind.” With these statements, Jesus and Gandhi were revealing the importance of forgiveness and non-violence, because revenge blinds human beings.