Mishpatim: Justice

Mishpatim: Justice

Mishpatim  introduces the type of thinking that becomes Talmud, the distinctive Hebrew way.  It devolves form the Ten Commandments, it is the synthesis of the human and the divine law. 

A notable property of the laws in mishpatim is that they are not only sympathetic to the victim, but they linit the liability and punishment of the perpetrator. If my ox kills your ox, I have to pay for the dead ox, but I get the carcass. Killing a fetus is settled with money.  

Mishplatim is just, the compensation to the victim is only ( just) what was lost and the defendant is not  generally penalized beyond that. 

The is no room  for vengeance.  Sometimes the compensation includes a premium - the thief pays double, the profiteer 4 or 5 fold, but there are always  limits.

This is Gd's law: all suffering has limits, even the suffering of the slave and the criminal.