Hammurabi Reaction

Today’s laws are not as harsh as Hammurabi’s. They are more civilized. For example, none of today’s laws include amputating other people’s body parts. Hammurabi thought it was necessary to amputate arms, breasts, digits, etc. I believe our laws are better, overall because they do not incorporate corporal punishment. I think Hammurabi’s Code of Law was an excellent deterrent against crime, and very few people would try to break the law. I think this is due to how harsh the laws were.

There was zero tolerance. For example, the sixth law says, “If any one steal the property of a temple or of the court, he shall be put to death, and also the one who receives the stolen thing from him shall be put to death. ” Also, because of the severity of some punishments (dismemberment, whippings, drowning, etc. ), I do not think people would want to test Hammurabi. I do not think Babylon was a safer society than the society that we currently live in.

There should be no need for the extreme laws I learned about if people behaved. I also think that these laws would cause many deaths. I think many members of the Babylon civilization were killed, sometimes unnecessarily. “If any one ensnare another, putting a ban upon him, but he cannot prove it, then he that ensnared him shall be put to death. ” This law would put people to death if they made a false accusation—in my opinion, this is too extreme and living under the Hammurabi laws would be like living under a dictatorship.