Comparing the Codex Hammurabi with the Mosaic Law
Hammurabi & Solomon
El Amarna' Mesopotamians
The History of Zimri Lim & Hammurabi
EA's Many Faces
 The Queen of Sheba
Thutmose III
Ramses II - English Ramses II - Deutsch
As our readers might be aware, there are several indications which prompt us to place Hammurabi into the time of King Solomon. This opens up a completely new area of connections which we discuss in various papers. Limestone carving of Hammurapi. Source: Bruno Meissner in `Der Alte Orient', Vol. 13-15, 1915, p. 58.An especially insightful result from such a revision of history is that it makes Hammurabi probably into one of those kings coming "from the ends of the earth" to visit Solomon. His Codex then may be the studied result of the Mosaic law in that this get together served as an inspirational stimulus for all those who attended to start an era of record keeping and writing never known before. We all know the meticulous counting and weighing scenes from the monuments of Hatshepsut and in the Books of Kings and Chronicles, in the Bible surrounding the Queen of Sheba, visit to get a glimpse of this period in history and how it transformed the ancient Middle East for ever.
As Damien has pointed out, another connection which can be made is to equate Hammurabi with Ur-Nammu of the so-called Ur III period. Both had famous law codes. Historians may have slid back Ur against Babylon, not realizing they were contemporaneous. While Ur Nammu's building activity is known, there is virtualy no trace of his much boasted military activities. Enter Hammurabi.
We like to invite our readers to keep an open mind on these developments and how they can contribute to a better understanding of the history of Mesopotamia, Palestine and Egypt.
The Mosaic Law The Codex Hammurabi
"You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor." Deut. 5:20
"If a malicious witness takes the stand to accuse a man of a crime, the two men involved in the dispute must stand in the presence of the Lord before the priests and the judges who are in office at the time. The judges must make a thorough investigation, and if the witness proves to be a liar, giving false testimony against his brother, then do to him as he intended to do to his brother. You must purge the evil from among you. The rest of the people will hear of this and be afraid, and never again will such an evil thing be done among you. Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot." Deut. 19:16-21
"Do not spread false reports. Do not help a wicked man by being a malicious witness. Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. When you give testimony in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd, and do not show favoritism to a poor man in his lawsuit." Exodus 23:1-3 		1. If any one ensnare another, putting a ban upon him, but he can not prove it, then he that ensnared him shall be put to death.
"You shall not steal."Exodus 20:15; Deut. 5:19
"If you see your brother's ox or sheep straying, do not ignore it but be sure to take it back to him. If the brother does not live near you or if you do not know who he is, take it home with you and keep it until he comes looking for it. Then give it back to him. Do the same if you find your brother's donkey or his cloak or anything he loses. Do not ignore it." Deut. 22:1-4; Exodus 22:1-2;
"Do not steal. ... Do not defraud your neighbor or rob him." Leviticus 19:11,13 		8. If any one steal cattle or sheep, or an ass, or a pig or a goat, if it belong to a god or to the court, the thief shall pay thirtyfold therefor; if they belonged to a freed man of the king he shall pay tenfold; if the thief has nothing with which to pay he shall be put to death.
Anyone who kidnaps another and either sells him or still has him when he is caught must be put to death." Exodus 21:16
"If a man is caught kidnapping one of his brother Israelites and treats him as a slave or sells him, the kidnapper must die. You must purge the evil from among you." Deut. 24:7 		14.If any one steal the minor son of another, he shall be put to death.
"If a thief is caught breaking in and is struck so that he dies, the defender is not guilty of bloodshed; but if it happens after sunrise, he is guilty of bloodshed. A thief must certainly make restitution, but if he has nothing, he must be sold to pay for his theft." Exodus 22:2-3 21.If any one break a hole into a house (break in to steal), he shall be put to death before that hole and be buried.
"If a man is found slain, lying in a field in the land the Lord your God is giving you to possess, and it is not known who killed him, your elders and judges shall go out and measure the distance from the body to the neighboring towns. Then the elders of the towns nearest the body shall take a heifer that has never been worked and has never worn a yoke and lead her down to a valley that has not been plowed or planted and where there is a flowing stream. There in the valley they break the heifers neck. The priests, the sons of Levi, shall step forward, for the Lord your God has chosen them to minister and to pronounce blessings in the name of the Lord and to decide all cases of dispute and assault." Deut. 21:1-5 24.If persons are stolen, then shall the community and ... pay one mina of silver to their relatives.
"When you enter the land and plant any kind of fruit tree, regard its fruit as forbidden. For three years you are to consider it forbidden; it must not be eaten. In the forth year all its fruit will be holy, an offering of praise to the Lord. But in the fifth year you may eat its fruit. In this way your harvest will be increased. I am the Lord your God." Leviticus 19:23-25 60. If any one give over a field to a gardener, for him to plant it as a garden, if he work at it, and care for it for four years, in the fifth year the owner and the gardener shall divide it, the owner taking his part in charge.
"If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything. If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free. But if the servant declares, `I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,' then his master must take him before the judges. He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he shall be his servant for life."
"If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as menservants do. If she does not please the master who has selected her for himself, he must let her be redeemed. He has no right to sell her to foreigners, because he has broken faith with her. If he selects her for his son, he must grant her the rights of a daughter. If he marries another woman, he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights. If he does not provide her with these three things, she is to go free, without payment of money." Exodus 21:2-11
"If a fellow Hebrew, a man or a woman, is sold to you and he serves you six years, in the seventh year you must let him go free. And when you release him, do not send him away empty-handed. Supply him liberally from your flock, your threshing floor and your winepress. Give to him as the Lord your God has blessed you. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you. That is why I give you this command today."
"But if your servant says to you, `I do not want to leave you,' because he loves you and your family and is well off with you, then take an awl and push it through his ear lobe into the door, and he will become your servant for life. Do the same for your maidservant."
"Do not consider it a hardship to set your servant free, because his service to you these six years has been worth twice as much as that of a hired hand. And the Lord your God will bless you in everything you do." Deut. 15:12-18 		117. If any one fail to meet a claim for debt, and sell himself, his wife, his son, and daughter for money or give them away to forced labor: they shall work for three years in the house of the man who bought them, or the proprietor, and in the fourth year they shall be set free.
118. If he give a male or female slave away for forced labor, and the merchant sublease them, or sell them for money, no objection can be raised.
119. If any one fail to meet a claim for debt, and he sell the maid servant who has borne him children, for money, the money which the merchant has paid shall be repaid to him by the owner of the slave and she shall be freed.
"If a man gives his neighbor silver or goods for safekeeping and they are stolen from the neighbor's house, the thief, if he is caught, must pay back double. But if the thief is not found, the owner of the house must appear before the judges to determine wether he has laid his hands on the other man's property. In all cases of illegal possession of an ox, a donkey, a sheep, a garment, or any other lost property about which somebody says, `This is mine,' both parties are to bring their cases before the judges. The one whom the judges declare guilty must pay back double to his neighbor." Exodus 22:7-9 120. If any one store corn for safe keeping in another person's house, and any harm happen to the corn in storage, or if the owner of the house open the granary and take some of the corn, or if especially he deny that the corn was stored in his house: then the owner of the corn shall claim his corn before God (on oath), and the owner of the house shall pay its owner for all of the corn that he took."
121. If any one store corn in another man's house he shall pay him storage at the rate of one gur for every five ka of corn per year.
122. If any one give another silver, gold, or anything else to keep, he shall show everything to some witness, draw up a contract, and then hand it over for safe keeping.
123. If he turn it over for safe keeping without witness or contract, and if he to whom it was given deny it, then he has no legitimate claim.
124. If any one deliver silver, gold, or anything else to another for safe keeping, before a witness, but he deny it, he shall be brought before a judge, and all that he has denied he shall pay in full.
125. If any one place his property with another for safe keeping, and there, either through thieves or robbers, his property and the property of the other man be lost, the owner of the house, through whose neglect the loss took place, shall compensate the owner for all that was given to him in charge. But the owner of the house shall try to follow up and recover his property, and take it away from the thief.
"And now, my daughter, don't be afraid. I will do for you all you ask. All my fellow townsmen know that you are a woman of noble character." Ruth 3:11
"I have also acquired Ruth the Moabites, Mahlon's widow, as my wife, in order to maintain the name of the dead with his property, so that his name will not disappear from among his family or from the town records. Today you are witnesses."Ruth 4:10 		126. If any one who has not lost his goods state that they have been lost, and make false claims: if he claim his goods and amount of injury before God, even though he has not lost them, he shall be fully compensated for all his loss claimed. (i.e., the oath is all that is needed.)
"Thou shalt not commit adultery." Exodus 20:14; Deut. 5:18.
"If a man is found sleeping with another man's wife, both the men who slept with her and the woman must die. You must purge the evil from Israel." Deut. 22:22 		129. If a man's wife be surprised (in flagrante delicto) with another man, both shall be tied and thrown into the water, but the husband may pardon his wife and the king his slaves.
"If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and rapes her, you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death-the girl because she was in a town and did not scream for help, and the man because he violated another man's wife. You must purge the evil from among you. But if out in the country a man happens to meet a girl pledged to be married and rapes her, only the man who has done this shall die. Do nothing to the girl; she has committed no sin deserving death. This case is like that of someone who attacks and murders his neighbor, for the man found the girl out in the country, and though the betrothed girl screamed, there was no one to rescue her." Deut. 22:23-27 130. If a man violate the wife (betrothed or child-wife) of another man, who has never known a man, and still lives in her father's house, and sleep with her and be surprised, this man shall be put to death, but the wife is blameless.
131. If a man bring a charge against one's wife, but she is not surprised with another man, she must take an oath and then may return to her house.
"Then the Lord said to Moses, "Speak to the Israelites and say to them: `If a man's wife goes astray and is unfaithful to him by sleeping with another man, and this is hidden from her husband and her impurity is undetected (since there is no witness against her and she has not been caught in the act), and if feelings of jealousy come over her husband and he suspects his wife and she is impure - or if he is jealous and suspects her even though she is not impure - then he is to take his wife to the priest. He must also take an offering of a tenth of an ephah of barley flour on her behalf. He must not pour oil on it or put incense on it, because it is a grain offering for jealousy, a reminder offering to draw attention to guilt."
"The priest shall bring her and have her stand before the Lord. Then he shall take some holy water in a clay jar and put some dust from the tabernacle floor into the water. After the priest has had the woman stand before the Lord, he shall loosen her hair and place in her hands the reminder offering, the grain offering for jealousy, while he himself holds the bitter water that brings a curse. Then the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, `If no other man has slept with you and you have not gone astray and become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water that brings a curse not harm you. But if you have gone astray while married to your husband ... may the Lord cause your people to curse and denounce you when he causes your thigh to waste away and your abdomen to swell.'
Then is the woman to say, `So be it.'... Numbers 5:5-29
 131. If a man bring a charge against one's wife, but she is not surprised with another man, she must take an oath and then may return to her house.
132. If the "finger is pointed" at a man's wife about another man, but she is not caught sleeping with the other man, she shall jump into the river for her husband.
"No one is to approach any close relative (by blood or through marriage) to have sexual relations." Leviticus 18:6-18; 20:10-21; Deut. 27:20, 22-23 154. If a man be guilty of incest with his daughter, he shall be driven from the place (exiled).
155. If a man betroth a girl to his son, and his son have intercourse with her, but he (the father) afterward defile her, and be surprised, then he shall be bound and cast into the water (drowned).
156. If a man betroth a girl to his son, but his son has not known her, and if then he defile her, he shall pay her half a gold mina, and compensate her for all that she brought out of her father's house. She may marry the man of her heart.
157. If any one be guilty of incest with his mother after his father, both shall be burned.
158. If any one be surprised after his father with his chief wife, who has borne children, he shall be driven out of his father's house.
"Anyone who attacks his father or his mother must be put to death." Exodus 21:15 195. If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn off.
"If man who are fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman's husband demands and the court allows. But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise."Exodus 21:22-25
"If anyone injures his neighbor, whatever he has done must be done to him: fracture for fracture, eye for eye, toothe for tooth. As he has injured the other, so he is to be injured." Leviticus 24:19-20
"Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot." Deut. 19:21 		196. If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out.
197. If he break another man's bone, his bone shall be broken.
198. If he put out the eye of a freed man, or break the bone of a freed man, he shall pay one gold mina.
199. If he put out the eye of a man's slave, or break the bone of a man's slave, he shall pay one-half of its value.
200. If a man knock out the teeth of his equal, his teeth shall be knocked out.
201. If he knock out the teeth of a freed man, he shall pay one-third of a gold mina.
"If a bull gores a man or a woman to death, the bull must be stoned to death, and its meat must not be eaten. But the owner of the bull will not be held responsible. If, however, the bull has had the habit of goring and the owner has been warned but has not kept it penned up and it kills a man or a woman, the bull must be stoned and the owner must also be put to death. However, if payment is demanded of him, he may redeem his life by paying whatever is demanded. This law also applies if the bull gores a son or a daughter. If the bull gores a male or female slave, the owner must pay thirty shekels of silver to the master of the slave, and the bull must be stoned."
"If a man uncovers a pit or digs one and fails to cover it and an ox or a donkey falls into it, the owner of the pit must pay for the loss; he must pay its owner, and the dead animal will be his."
"If a man's bull injures the bull of another and it dies, they are to sell the live one and divide both the money and the dead animal equally. However, if it was known that the bull had the habit of goring, yet the owner did not keep it penned up, the owner must pay, animal for animal, and the dead animal will be his." Exodus 21:28-36 		250. If while an ox is passing on the street (market) some one push it, and kill it, the owner can set up no claim in the suit (against the hirer).
251. If an ox be a goring ox, and it shown that he is a gorer, and he do not bind his horns, or fasten the ox up, and the ox gore a free-born man and kill him, the owner shall pay one-half a mina in money.
252. If he kill a man's slave, he shall pay one-third of a mina.
A Short Commentary on Hebrew Laws and Our Society

Everytime I press a key on my keyboard, a character appears on the screen of the monitor even though the two are attached only by a thin wire. If by chance a character does not appear, something is wrong and needs repair or replacement with a new product. This cause and effect situation is based on laws modern science discovered in nature, laws so dependable and accurate that they always function. Without such laws we would not have computers, cars or even exist. We probably can agree that there are laws pertaining to our physical world and other laws pertaining to our social world; or saying it this way, laws pertaining to things we can see and feel and spiritual laws, applying to what is going on in our mind.

Both of these sets of various laws are in effect all around us 24 hours a day. While we can live just fine without computers, electricity, cars, we cannot live long with no laws against crimes. So it was Satanism which advocates totally opposite virtues of biblical instructions on living in harmony. Subscribing to a no God theory also places people at risk, for if there is no higher authority to which we are responsible and have to account for our deeds, why not commit crimes if one can get away with it?

Therefore, those who teach `no God' are putting the whole world at risk. But the Bible says, if you break one, you break them all, that means all those believing in God, if they break one of His laws, they also put the whole world at risk. Moses knew two types of laws. First, the Ten Commandment Law which was so important that it was engraved on stone so as not to loose a single word, and the Civil and Religious Laws, which were written in a book (scrolls). The Ten Commandments Stone Tablets were not of clay, they were of hard rock and placed in the ark, located in the Most Holy of the Israelite Sanctuary Temple. The laws written in the book were kept in a side pocket in that same ark where the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments were kept. God expected people to memorize the Ten Commandments and live by them daily. These tablets taught to `love God' and they taught to `love our neighbor', fellow men and women, our family, friends and neighbors. Today we see the results of what happens if these laws are not written in our hearts. After years of making God's Law of no effect, and the ancient Egyptians and Israelites knew what sin was, men today often glorify sin. Men and women used their time to put their wisdom above that of God and theorized him out of our class rooms and replaced him with wickedness in high places.

And so we see nothing wrong if children study about mankind originating from animals, and teaching that the marvels around us just happened, the results of blind chance.

The Mosaic Law

Greed and selfishness are root causes of man's problems today. As the story goes, the difference between hell and heaven is something like this:
IN HELL people sit on both sides of a very long table with plenty of food but, alas, very long forks and spoons. In fact they are so long that the people there cannot manage to put the food into their mouths and thus starve and waste away.
IN HEAVEN the same situation exists, however, here the people have learned to feed each other, their partner opposite the table, and so they all can live.

While there is law all around us, man, unlike an animal, has the freedom to choose if to obey the `yellow traffic lights' or not. Throughout history some have degraded to a lower form of existence just by loosing sight of civil law and the law of love of God and fellow men. While the same law, which Moses wrote on stone, was known before his time, the civil laws were a rather new addition, the result of the Israelites now becoming a nation. While the laws in their previous homeland could change depending on the will of the king, God's civil law was to be adapted to the requirements of a nation growing and progressing in their skill to live together in harmony. The civil law would not be necessary if the Ten Commandment law was kept in all its aspects. But wily man would fain ignorance and try to impose his will over that of another. The further one strays from a voluntary willingness to keep the Ten Commandments, God's Law, the more minute instructions (civil laws) would have to be publicized to make people aware that there are limits. As a result we have today a prodigious number of laws, old and new, and judges and lawyers to interpret them. Resistance to laws is growing all around us since even those who made it their life's calling to uphold law, transgress it every day. And so a mother or father with their son or daughter in the car, speeds down the street in the neighborhood above the allowed limit, raising another traffic offender.

Crime and Punishment in the Mosaic Law

Having just left a life of slavery which had lasted some 3 to 5 generations (about 90 years), the Israelites now had to learn to live a life where they had once again personal freedom. During their years of bondage they had little education and knowledge of what makes a society work successfully. After Joseph and Moses, none of them held public office. Left to their own devices they would have followed the dictates of their own human wisdom and grown into just another nation as all those around them. But they were especially selected and called out to be a nation unlike any other. Because of their background, laws at first had to be more severe in order to control a people who just left a very controlled environment. Not stealing means people can live without fear and leave their doors unlocked. Not murdering means, people don't have to look over their shoulder when walking down the street. Not worshipping figurines made of wood and stone, but the living God, means, we will not forget his law and can live in freedom from fear. However, we are not perfect human beings and glad to have an understanding judge.

The Hebrew Law, or as it is sometimes called by the Jewish people `T-nach' (which means law, prophets and scriptures), originates from a living God who put his stamp of authority right in the center of his law. The baleful effects of disregarding his law we witness today.

Nations Laws
Rulers of the Middle East did generally not publish their wisdom through laws. They were more interested in protecting their own political and economic power. Any laws they had existed only in their head and were not made public for their citizens. Most of them were tyrants. A notable exception was Hammurabi. Having read the above and now knowing some of the issues, placing Hammurabi into the time of King Solomon makes perfect sense.

In Israel, laws were made public at regular intervals, Deuteronomy 1-4; 31:10-13, 24-26. They were to be obeyed because they loved Him, Deut. 6:5, 20-25. Even though the judges and priests interpreted the law, they did not make the Law (Deut. 17:8-13). Therefore, when Israel obeyed the Law, they showed their love for God, rather then for the interpreters of the law. Outside Israel, rich people could buy their way out of punishment; but God said that every lawbreaker must suffer for his own crime (Numbers 35:31), except when an animal committed an offense (Ex. 21:29-30). God forbade heavy penalties for debt. There were laws concerning inheritance (Deut. 21:15-17; Num. 27:1-11; 36:1-12), interest on loans, Deut. 23:20, etc. Deuteronomy 17:14-16 was found quoted in the so-called "Statutes of the King" which is part of the "Temple Scroll" which can be seen in BAR, Sept 1984, p. 44.

Notes & References

[010] For an image of part of the Stele of Hammurabi see BAR, Mar/Apr 2005, p. 38. For a detail image of the cuneiform text of the codex as stored in Paris see H.P. Eydoux, In Search of Lost Worlds, 1971, p. 63.
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