The significance of the Code has been recognized ever since its discovery; for, indeed, it is the most ancient collection of laws which we know. For judgment concerning the ancient Babylonian civilization, for the history of slavery, for the position of woman and many other questions the Code offers the most important material. The fact that law and religion are nearly always distinctly separated is worthy of special attention.
1. Hammurabi and Moses:
It is not to be wondered at that a monument of such importance demands comparison with similar monuments. In this reference the most important question is as to the relation in which the Code stands to the Law of Moses. Hammurabi was not only king of Babylonia but also of Amurru (= "land of the Amorites"), called later Palestine and Western Syria. As his successors also retained the dominion over Amurru, it is quite possible that, for a considerable time, the laws of Hammurabi were in force here also, even if perhaps in a modified form. In the time of Abraham, for example, one may consider the narratives of Sarah and Hagar (Ge 16:1 ff), and Rachel and Bilhah (Ge 30:1 ff), which show the same juridical principles as the Code (compare sections 144 ff; see above). Other narratives of the Old Testament indicate the same customs as the Code does for Babylonia; compare Ge 24:53, where the bridal gifts to Rebekah correspond to the Babylonian terhatu (section 159); similarly Ge 31:14 f.
Between the Code and the Law of Moses, especially in the so-called Book of the Covenant (Ex 20:22 through Ex 23:33), there are indeed extraordinary parallels. We might mention here the following examples:
Ex 21:2: "If thou buy a Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve: and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing." Similarly, Code of Hammurabi, section 117: "If a man become involved in debt, and give his wife, his son or his daughter for silver or for labor, they shall serve three years in the house of their purchaser or bondmaster: in the fourth year they shall regain their freedom."
Ex 21:15: "And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death." Compare Code of Hammurabi, section 195: "If a son strike his father, his hand shall be cut off."
Ex 21:18 f: "And if men contend, and one smite the other with a stone, or with his fist, and he die not, but keep his bed; if he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote him be quit: only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall cause him to be thoroughly healed." Compare Code of Hammurabi, section 206: "If a man strike another man in a noisy dispute and wound him, that man shall swear, `I did not strike him knowingly'; and he shall pay for the physician."
Ex 21:22: "If men strive together, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart, and yet no harm follow; he shall surely be fined, according as the woman's husband shall lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine." Compare Code of Hammurabi, section 209: "If a man strike a free woman and cause her fruit to depart, he shall pay ten shekels of silver for her fruit."
Ex 21:24: "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot." Compare Code of Hammurabi, section 196: "If a man destroy the eye of a free man, his eye shall be destroyed." section 197: "If he break the bone of a free man, his bone shall be broken." section 200: "If a man knock out the teeth of a man of the same rank, his teeth shall be knocked out."
Ex 21:28-32: "If an ox gore a man or a woman to death, the ox shall be surely stoned, and its flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be quit. But if the ox was wont to gore in time past, and it hath been testified to its owner, and he hath not kept it in, but it hath killed a man or a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and its owner also shall be put to death. .... If the ox gore a man-servant or a maid-servant, there shall be given unto their master 30 shekels of silver, and the ox shall be stoned." Compare Code of Hammurabi, sections 250 ff: "If an ox, while going along the street, gore a man and cause his death, no claims of any kind can be made. If a man's ox be addicted to goring and have manifested to him his failing, that it is addicted to goring, and, nevertheless, he have neither blunted his horns, nor fastened up his ox; then if his ox gore a free man and cause his death, he shall give 30 shekels of silver. If it be a man's slave, he shall give 20 shekels of silver."
Ex 22:7 ff reminds one of Code of Hammurabi, sections 124 ff; Ex 22:10 ff of Code of Hammurabi, sections 244 ff and 266 f.
The resemblances between the other parts of the Pentateuch and the Code are not so striking as those between the Code and the. Book of the Covenant; nevertheless one may compare Le 19:35 f with Code of Hammurabi, section Le 5:1-19; 20:10 with Code of Hammurabi, section 129; Le 24:19 f with Code of Hammurabi, sections 196 ff; Le 25:39 ff with Code of Hammurabi, section 117; De 19:16 ff with Code of Hammurabi, sections 3 f; De 22:22 with Code of Hammurabi, section 129; De 24:1 with Code of Hammurabi, sections 137 ff and sections 148 f; De 24:7 with Code of Hammurabi, section De 14:1-29; especially De 21:15 ff,De 18:1-22 ff, with Code of Hammurabi, sections 167, 168 f, where, in both cases, there is a transition from regulations concerning the property left by a man, married several times, to provisions referring to the punishment of a disobedient son, certainly a remarkable agreement in sequence.
One can hardly assert that the parallels quoted are accidental, but just as little could one say that they are directly taken from the Code; for they bear quite a definite impression due to the Israelite culture, and numerous marked divergences also exist. As we have already mentioned, the land Amurru was for a time Babylonian territory, so that Babylonian law must have found entrance there. When the Israelites came into contact with Babylonian culture, on taking possession of the land of Canaan (a part of the old Amurru), it was natural that they should employ the results of that culture as far as they found them of use for themselves. Under no circumstances may one suppose here direct quotation. Single parts of the Laws of Moses, especially the Decalogue (Ex 20:1-26), with its particularly pointed conciseness, have no parallel in Code of Hammurabi.
2. The Code and Other Legal Systems:
It has also been attempted to establish relations between the Code and other legal systems. In the Talmud, especially in the fourth order of the Mishna called Neziqin (i.e. "damages"), there are many regulations which remind one of the Code. But one must bear in mind that the Jews during the exile could hardly have known the Code in detail; if there happen to be similarities, these are to be explained by the fact that many of the regulations of the Code were still retained in the later Babylonian law, and the Talmud drew upon this later Babylonian law for many regulations which seemed useful for its purposes. The connection is therefore an indirect one.
The similarities with the remains of old Arabian laws and the so-called Syrio-Roman Lawbook (5th century AD) have to be considered in the same way, though some of these agreements may have only come about accidentally.
That the similarities between Roman and Greek legal usages and the Code are only of an accidental nature may be taken as assured. This seems all the more probable, in that between the Code and other legal systems there are quite striking similarities in individual points, even though we cannot find any historical connection, e.g. the Salic law, the lawbook of the Salic Franks, compiled about 500 AD, and which is the oldest preserved Germanic legal code.
Until a whole number of lost codes, as the Old Amoritish and the neo-Bab, are known to us in detail, one must guard well against hasty conclusions. In any case it is rash to speak of direct borrowings where there may be a whole series of mediating factors.
LITERATURE.
(Concerning the questions treated of in the last paragraphs refer especially to: S. A. Cook, The Laws of Moses and Code of Hammurabi, London, 1903; J. Jeremias, Moses and Hammurabi, Leipzig, 1903; S. Oettli, Das Gesetz Hammurabis und die Thora Israels, Leipzig, 1903; H. Grimme, Das Gesetz Hammurabis und Moses, Koln, 1903; H. Fehr, Hammurapi und das Salische Recht, Bonn, 1910.
Arthur Ungnad