Question

Explain how Christianity came to embody contradictory attitudes toward the death penalty and other forms of state-sanctioned violence. Your answer should summarize these contrasting positions, address their respective origins, and discuss the historical circumstances by which each was incorporated into mainstream Christian thought and practice.

Answer 1

Christians argue both for and against the death penalty using secular arguments (see Ethics: Capital punishment), but like other religious people they often make an additional case based on the tenets of their faith.

For much of history, the Christian Churches accepted that capital punishment was a necessary part of the mechanisms of society.

Pope Innocent III, for example, put forward the proposition: "The secular power can, without mortal sin, exercise judgment of blood, provided that it punishes with justice, not out of hatred, with prudence, not precipitation."

The Roman Catechism, issued in 1566, stated that the power of life and death had been entrusted by God to the civil authorities. The use of this power did not embody the act of murder, but rather a supreme obedience to God's commandments.

In the high Middle Ages and later, the Holy See authorized that heretics be turned over to the secular authorities for execution.

The law of Vatican City from 1929 to 1969 included the death penalty for anyone who tried to assassinate the Pope.

Research done in the 1990s in the USA found that Protestants (who interpret the Bible to be the literal word of God) were more likely to be in favour of the death penalty than members of other religious factions and denominations.

Old Testament

The death penalty is consistent with Old Testament Biblical teaching, and suggests that God created the death penalty.

In total, the Old Testament specifies 36 capital offences including crimes such as idolatry, magic and blasphemy, as well as murder.

But many Christians don't think that is a convincing argument - they say that there are 35 capital offences, in addition to murder, described in the Old Testament. As these are no longer capital offences, Christians say it is inconsistent to preserve murder alone as a capital crime.

New Testament

The New Testament embodies what must be the most famous execution in history, that of Jesus on the cross. But paradoxically, although the tone of the whole of the New Testament is one of forgiveness, it seems to take the right of the state to execute offenders for granted.

• In Matthew 7:2 we read "Whatever measure you deal out to others will be dealt back to you", though this is unspecific as to whether it is God who is doing the dealing, or the state.
• In Matthew 15:4 Jesus says "He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him surely die".
• Despite the fact that Jesus himself refrains from using violence, he at no point denies the state's authority to exact capital punishment.
• At the moment that Pilate has to decide whether or not to crucify Jesus, Jesus tells him that the power to make this decision has been given to him by God. (John 19:11).
• Paul has an apparent reference to the death penalty, when he writes that the magistrate who holds authority "does not bear the sword in vain; for he is the servant of God to execute His wrath on the wrongdoer" (Romans 13:4).
• Capital punishment affirms the commandment that 'thou shalt not kill' by affirming the seriousness of the crime of murder.

This argument is based on interpreting the commandment as meaning "thou shalt not murder", but some Christians argue that the 'Thou shalt not kill' commandment is an absolute prohibition on killing.

God authorises the death penalty

Christians who support the death penalty often do so on the ground that the state acts not on its own authority but as the agent of God, who does have legal power over life and death

Capital punishment is like suicide

This argument is that the criminal, by choosing to commit a particular crime has also chosen to surrender his life to the state if caught.

Only God should create and destroy life

This argument is used to oppose abortion and euthanasia as well.

Many Christians believe that God commanded "Thou shalt not kill" (Exodus 21:13), and that this is a clear instruction with no exceptions.

The Bible teaching is inconsistent

The Bible speaks in favour of the death penalty for murder. But it also prescribes it for 35 other crimes that we no longer regard as deserving the death penalty. In order to be consistent, humanity should remove the death penalty for murder.

Secondly, modern society has alternative punishments available which were not used in Biblical times, and these make the death penalty unnecessary.

Christianity is based on forgiveness and compassion

Capital punishment is incompatible with a teaching that emphasises forgiveness and compassion.

Capital punishment is biased against the poor

Some Christians argue that in many countries the imposition of the death penalty is biased against the poor. Since Christian teaching is to support the poor, Christians should not support the death penalty.

Abolition is in line with support for life

Capital punishment is inconsistent with the general Christian stand that life should always be supported. This stand is most often taught in issues such as abortion and euthanasia, but consistency requires Christians to apply it across the board.

The Catholic Church and capital punishment

Throughout the first half of the twentieth century the consensus amongst Catholic theologians remained in favour of capital punishment in those cases deemed suitably extreme. Until 1969, the Vatican had a penal code that included the death penalty for anyone who attempted to assassinate the Pope.

However, by the end of this century opinions were changing. In 1980, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops published an almost entirely negative statement on capital punishment, approved by a majority vote of those present, though not by the required two-thirds majority of the entire conference.

In 1997 the Vatican announced changes to the Catechism, thus making it more in line with John Paul II's 1995 encyclical The Gospel of Life. The amendments include the following statement concerning capital punishment:

continues to be associated with violent fanaticism, as religion-inspired horror occurs with "unceasing regularity. Whether the struggles occur among Sikhs, Muslims and Hindus in India, or between Jews and Muslims in Jerusalem"₁. No major world religion has avoided generating violence extremist movements from within its ranks₂. This has been the case "since time immemorial"₃. Religion-inspired violence is the stimulus for some people to call for the abandonment of religion altogether₄ - it's not worth the risk. Monotheism has bred the most violent individuals and cultures due its intolerance of 'other' gods and a general strictness on the specifics of belief but, other forms of religion also breed antisocial and violent individuals. Public opinion (in the USA) correctly rates Islam, Christianity and Hinduism as the most violent religions (64%, 9% and 4% said so); Judaismwas rated last at 2%₅.