How to answer this? This is a tough corner that you all have put me in, and goes against my total belief in "Thou shall not kill" period. However, I see the point that you all are getting at with war. God knows it's gonna happen. That's because he knows we can't get along. That is why an American thinks he is greater than an Englishman, or why a whiteman thinks he is better than a blackman, etc etc. We are all different, and yes world politics is a lot like grade school politics. When one kid doesn't like the shirt another one is wearing and punches him in the nose, or when two girls fight one another for the conquest of trying to win the attention of 1 boy. War should not happen, period. We are all too selfish, greedy, and undeserving of God's love and good grace. No wonder why we are here! Life is a test of morales. If we can't even get this right we will be doomed by our own hands, not his.

BUT


This thread is not about war however. It's about the Death Penalty.

"Thou shalt not Kill" is a mistranslation. It should read "Thou shalt not Murder".

I don't know how you mistranslate the Lords words? "Thou shall not kill" is written plain as day. Are you saying the Lord somehow made a mistake and doesn't know what he said?

No. Are you saying the Lord wrote the 10 commandments in modern English?

Death as a penalty is a contradiction in itself, because a penalty by definition is a sanction by which you want to change the reaction pattern of a subject. where you talk about death as a penalty, you are not talking about justice, but you are talking about revenge, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth: the correction of a bilance in fate. That has nothing to do with penalty. Death "penalty's value as a deterrant obviously also is extremely low.

Death in legislative context can only be a preventive ("vorbeugend") measure, to hinder the drug baron or Godfather to control his cartel from within prison, for example. I would only reserve it for religiously or politically motivated terrorists, big fishes in arms smuggling, drug smuggling, girl smuggling, state corruption, and comparing things where you must grant a significant probability that a prison sentence will not prevent them to continue with their evil doing, or after they had been released again. So, for me death "penalty" is ruled out for example for the family drama that ended with murder.

I do not claim to have given the complete definition for when killing someone by law is acceptable, and when not, but you got my general idea.

It's also a deterence because the accused, condemmed will never do it again.

It has been updated to modern English for us to understand. Killing is Killing. It is wrong in every aspect.

I'll leave this to someone else to explain the transliteral difference between Anciet Greek, Latin, Old English, Middle English and Modern English. Not to mention errors committed by scribes and jealots.

No, because the argument is that death penalty is a deterrence - for others than the the execution candidate. General crime statistics cannot support this thesis, nor the study of individual cases. In fact, the practicing of death penalties does not seem to have any significant effect on the number of crimes being committed at all.

Agreed. It's just a cold cruel way for revenge.

If all killing is wrong, then the police should be disarmed. Any time a policeman shoots someone in the line of duty he is making a decision to take a life; and that's one man, not a jury coming to a reasoned decision.

Me, if someone threatens my family or friends in a manner that makes me believe he's serious, I'll kill him. Cheerfully.

As to the death penalty, we just recently had a five-year-old girl murdered by her next-door neighbor. Not only do I hope they fry the &*#^@#*, I actually think a simple death is to good for him. I'd like to see a little torture thrown in as well.

OK, I'll go along with your thesis. Perhaps if the punishment came within two years, instesd of ten plus years, the deterent effect would be greater. Since terrible crimes are easily forgotten, the sooner the punishment the more likely the deterent.

writes down notes: When in subsim do not upset sailor steve :arrgh!:

You can upset me all you want. I'm a very peaceful guy.


Just don't threaten my loved ones.

(eats popcorn)