I was asked a great question by a friend tonight ,he asked Elijah how was the true actual stoning in the Torah different then that descibed in the christian new testament about Steven ? The first thought that came to mind was that Steven did not have a halachic trial . According to the Mishnah (Sanhedrin 1:4) the death penalty could only be inflicted, after trial, by a Sanhedrin composed of twenty-three judges and there were four types of death penalty (Sanhedrin 7:1): stoning, burning, slaying (by the sword), and strangling. According to the Torah cases must be settled based on the testimony of two or three witnesses. These witnesses would be the first to stone the guilty . As we will see this did not happen in the case of Steven . The witnesses are the ones to take an active role and to be the first to raise ones hand against the guilty person before the rest of the people . The steven story has everyone but the witnesses throw stones which was not the way stoning was done anyway according to the Talmud in ( Sanhedrin) . Lets look at the Greek Testament book of Acts. This is what it says . So they stirred up the people and the elders and the teachers of the law. They seized Stephen and brought him before the Sanhedrin. 13 They produced false witnesses, who testified, At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. Now lets look to see what Chazal says. (Lev. 19:17) was to be interpreted as applying even to the condemned criminal –you love him by giving him the most humane (the most beautiful) death possible (Sanh. 45a, 52a; Pes. 75a; Ket. 37a); secondly, that judicial execution should resemble the taking of life by God: as the body remains externally unchanged when God takes the life, so in judicial executions the body should not be destroyed or mutilated (Sanh. 52a; Sifra 7:9). Instead of having all the people kill the convicted person by pelting stones at him a stoning place was designed from which he was to be pushed down to death (Sanh. 6:4). This must not be too high, so that the body should not be mutilated falling down (Rashi, Sanh. 45a), and not too low, so that death would be instantaneous. One of the hermeneutical reasons given for this change of the law was the scriptural rule that the hands of the witnesses shall be first upon him to put him to death (Deut. 17:7); it is true that the hand of all the people [should be on him] afterward (ibid.), but it is the hand of the witness which is to put him to death. A mode of stoning had therefore to be devised in which the witness would not only be assured of the first chance to lay hands on the convicted person, but also of the certainty of thereby putting him to death (Sanh. 6:4). Maimonides justifies the talmudic method with the reflection that it really made no difference whether stones were thrown at one or one was thrown on the stones (Maimonides, Comment. to Sanh. 6:4). I used for my Sources: Encyclopaedia Judaica. © 2008 The Gale Group. All Rights Reserved. I also used for the NT The American Standard text of the book of Acts .
Posted on: Wed, 03 Sep 2014 09:53:23 +0000