Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Does Torah believe in capital punishment?
[00:00:04] If we read the Torah, if we read the five books of Moses, it speaks about capital punishments quite elaborately. And there's a long list of things that people should be punished for, starting from murder and to violating Shabbat and for many other ritual violations.
[00:00:23] And based on that, people might think that if the rabbis would be asked whether America today or Israel today should have capital punishment, the answer would be a definite yes.
[00:00:36] But really, it is not so simple.
[00:00:39] The Torah speaks a lot about capital punishment, but Torah does so in order to explain how difficult it is to convict someone of a crime to be worthy of capital punishment.
[00:00:54] For example, Shabbat. The Torah is saying that a person who's violating Shabbat supposed to be put to death. There is a story in the chapter of Shlah about a person who was caught violating Shabbat, and they brought him to Moishe Rabbeinu, to Moses, and they asked him what to do with him. And Moishe said, one second, let me consult the higher authorities. And the higher authorities said to be put to death by stoning. And he was put to death.
[00:01:26] So people read the Torah and say, okay, so that means the Torah says that whoever is turning on light in his bedroom on Shabbos supposed to be put to death. And if I cook a bowl of oatmeal on Shabbos, that means I have to be stoned. Well, not really.
[00:01:43] And this is because this specific story is teaching us why what is required for someone to be put to death for violating Shabbat?
[00:01:52] So this was right after the Torah was given, which means that every single Jew heard from Moses, from Moshe Rabbeinu, all the details of Lor Shabbos, and they heard also the punishments for various violations of Shabbos.
[00:02:08] So number one, in order for a person to be worthy of being put to death for violating of Shabbos, he has to, a, know or all the laws in their complete details, B, be aware of the punishments for violating these laws.
[00:02:24] That's number one. Number two, in order to be put to death, someone has to be violating Shabbos not in his house and not in his bedroom, but in public in front of at least 10 people, because that's the definition of public in the Jewish law.
[00:02:40] Number three, he has to be doing it intentionally.
[00:02:44] Number four, he's supposed to be warned already by the Jewish court, which means that he has to be seen violating Shabbos already once before.
[00:02:54] And a messenger from the court has to arrive together with two witnesses and the two Witnesses will be testifying that he was warned, but this is not it. When the person is about to violate Shabbat for the second time after he was warned, he is supposed to be warned again for the second time immediately before his violation in front of two witnesses. So now, in other words, in order for a person to be eligible for death roll for violating Shabbat, he has to do the number one, he's supposed to be a learned person and he's supposed to be well versed in the laws of Shabbos and in the punishments that the Tor is prescribing for those violations. Number two, he's supposed to violate Shabbos once before and warned by the Jewish court in front of two witnesses.
[00:03:50] Number three, he's supposed to be doing it now again in public intentionally.
[00:03:58] Number four, he's supposed to be doing it in public right after he's been warned again by the messenger of the court in front of two witnesses. So if somebody actually does it, he is supposed to be probably violating Shabbos just in spite, and he is doing it knowing that he's going to be put to death for it. As a matter of fact, all these laws are making us think whether it's even possible to put someone to death for violating of Shabbat.
[00:04:35] So listening to all of these prerequisites for death penalty, we are thinking, well, is it even possible for someone to do all this? And the answer is possibly no.
[00:04:48] As a matter of fact, we don't even know whether in our history there was even once a situation where someone was put to death by the Jewish court for Vladishabat. It's not recorded anywhere it could have possibly happened, but we don't know about it. Besides that one story which happened in the desert when Moishe Rabbeinu Moses directly asked God what to do. But during the subsequent years when Jews were traveled through the desert, when Jews came to Israel, Jews had the era of Judges and then Jews had the era of Kings. And there was a First Temple and there was a Second Temple. We don't know if anyone was ever put to death for violating Shabbat. Now this is about violating Shabbat. What about murder? We do know that people were put to death for murder. Talmud tells us about those stories. But in order to be eligible for death penalty for murdering someone, the Torah says that a person supposed to be killing another person in front of two witnesses. Torah does not allow any admission of circumstantial evidence. No medical examiner testimonies can help.
[00:06:01] Has to be in front of two people who saw him and who are questioned in great detail. And they have to see the actual act. In other words, if I see that Reuven is running after Shimon with a knife, and then they turn the corner and I run right after them, and when I turn a corner right behind them, I see Szymon already lying on the ground covered in blood, and Szuman standing with a bloody knife over him. I cannot be a witness because I did not see the actual act of murder. I only saw them a second before and a second after. Now, you will tell me that it's probably very hard to convict someone for murder and put him to death according to the Torah. And the answer is correct. The Torah's approach is it is better for a thousand murderers to go unpunished than one innocent person to be put to death by mistake. And that's the Torah's perspective.
[00:07:03] And by the way, the laws pertaining to witnesses according to the Torah are much stricter than, let's say in American law, for example, anybody who has any vested interest or anyone who is related to any of the party is not allowed to testify. Here in America, in our courts, anyone is allowed to testify, but the jury is going to decide how much weight are they going to give to his testimony. They're going to decide how credible he is. So this is all in the eyes of the jury or the judge. But in the Jewish law, he would not be allowed to approach the witness stand. He cannot talk if he has any vested interest, because a person who is a relative of any of the sides or person who is somehow biased for or against, even if you don't officially give much credibility to his testimony, he still has an effect on the jury or on the judge. So therefore, Torah would not allow him to speak.
[00:08:04] And now we are circling back to the original question, whether the Torah would be for death penalty in the US or in Israel. And as we see, the answer is probably no. Because the laws that our courts in America are operating by are not the same as the laws of the Torah. And because of that, a person who is innocent according to the Torah or not proven guilty, put it this way, according to the Torah can be proven guilty by the American courts. And therefore a person could be put to death when, according to the Torah, he is not worthy of death penalty.
[00:08:52] And according to the Torah, that would be an outright murder. Let's say, if, in theory, American courts would start operating according to the Jewish laws of procedures, that then the rabbis would probably say, yes, America should have death penalty, but I'm not holding my breath for that to happen within next couple of weeks. Put it this way.
[00:09:13] So now we understand that the Torah believes that capital punishment supposed to be in theory because capital punishment, when you say that some violations are worthy of capital punishment, that describes how serious these violations are and that tells us about how I'm supposed to look at them.
[00:09:35] So that's why many times Torah believes that the capital punishment supposed to be in the books but whether it should be adjudicated in practice, it's a whole different story.
[00:09:47] In order for me to understand the worth of human life and in order for me to understand how serious it is for someone to kill another person, I have to read that someone who murders an innocent human being supposed to be put to death. That's the concept. The concept is that whoever murders another person supposed to be put to death in reality. In practice, how it's working, that's already a whole different ballgame.
