Kezia Nyarko

Mr. Saldivar
WHAP A4
4 Sept. 2013

Comparing Laws: Hammurabis Code & Jewish Laws
1. The Babylonian laws made the rights of the individual second to the rights of the state.
Basically, soldiers and such could strike a person and get very few punishments but if a man was
to do the same, they would undergo a public execution.
2. Women didnt have much protection in the law as most of the punishments given for
committing crimes against women was divorce or a women taking an oath. Compared to the
stipulations for women in Jewish law , the Babylonians look like a pro-feminist organization.
Although the babylonians dont treat the women as queens, they treat the women as human, a
lesser human but a human nonetheless. Its easy to see that both societies have a patriarchal
lifestyle as they have a bias toward men getting more respect.
3. Babylonians have four social classes: villien, freeman, common, and slave. The Jewish law
had a much safer approach to poorer classes as they feared to be cursed on by Yehweh for
treating people wrong just because they are poor.
4. Babylonians have more forgiving in their religion as in Judaism, its more to get rid of those
who sin. The Jews are trying to go back to the garden of eden and getting rid of evil is the way.
5. The Babylonian claim the gods and their power while the Jews pick Yehweh, Jehovah. For the
Babylonians, the government had a larger role and more respectable role as they were thought to
be god-like for working with the king. In Judaism, the priests had a larger role as the Jewish
life was based on the teachings of Jehovah.
6. The similarities of the two law codes is the fact that they both agree with an eye for an eye. If
you fight with another man, the stricken man is not blamed for fighting back.
7. Well, modern law is no longer an eye for an eye but instead if hit by someone, you simply take

Kezia Nyarko
Mr. Saldivar
WHAP A4
4 Sept. 2013

them to court or get them arrested for that act of violence. The whole receiving something back
for going to court is still in modern law. Also, the struggle to pay for slaves still exists in
modern day law.
8. Mostly, their religion. Most of the laws wouldve have been incredibly similar if it werent for
the way the Jews viewed life, vice versa for the Babylonians.