Sunday, February 20, 2011

Numbers 35

Numbers 35:30
'If anyone kills a person, the murderer shall be put to death at the evidence of witnesses, but no person shall be put to death on the testimony of one witness.
I find this an interesting legal decision. The testimony of one person for murder is not sufficient.  There must be at least two people for condemnation.  Today, one person's testimony is often sufficient for a conviction, even if that person is a child.  With modern forensics, there are many cases where no witness is necessary.  However, back then, it took at least two people to prove murder.

Why require two, and not one?  The simple answer would be that one is much easier for a murder to lie, and say someone else did it.  However, if you have two people giving the same testimony, lying would be a conspiracy, which is always harder to pull off.  It's easier to find gaps in their stories, or one may chicken out.  It can still be abused, as we see later on in the Bible, but by having two or more witnesses, the likelihood of false conviction is greatly reduced.  God gave the people remarkable forethought on this command.

No comments:

Post a Comment