Letter to the Editor: Rabbis Group Supports Abolishing Death Penalty

This week, the Baltimore Board of Rabbis met at Beth El Congregation, and spoke out against the death penalty.

Rabbi Michael Meyerstein, the executive director, sent the board's full position statement to Pikesville Patch.

It is as follows:

Jewish tradition both supports and opposes imposing the death penalty on murderers. Biblical and Rabbinic writings cite strong positions on both sides of the issue. Yet, evolving tradition makes it virtually impossible for a person found guilty of a capital crime to be executed. Why this seeming contradiction? Competing values frame the issue:

1. Sanctity of all human life

2. Just retribution

3. Compassion

4. Importance (and difficulty) of discerning the truth

How shall we choose between compelling virtues?
The sanctity of human life is the governing principle of the Bible and vigorously extolled by our Talmudic Sages. Whoever sheds the blood of a person, by a person shall his blood be shed (Genesis 9:6), meaning, whosoever commits murder will pay with his
life. No exceptions are permitted based on social status because every victim is a sacred person. For its time, this was a progressive attitude reflecting the evolving idea of the sanctity of every human life.

While the Bible permits the death penalty, the Talmud, in tractate Sanhedrin, imposes severe limits on the administration of execution even where the death sentence is mandated for murder.

• Circumstantial evidence is inadmissible.

• Two eyewitnesses must provide corresponding testimony
and must have forewarned the murderer that such an act is
punishable by execution.

• Judgment by a large Sanhedrin (rabbinical court) is required to
afford the defendant every benefit of the doubt.

• Following conviction, the witnesses themselves must initiate
the execution.

• Witnesses are held responsible not only for the death of the
defendant but also for the souls of all his would-be progeny.

Finally, Sanhedrin remarks: “A court that executes a murderer once in 70 years is a bloody court.” It is evident that our Rabbis found the application of capital punishment abhorrent. Still, they worried that overturning the death penalty might be dangerous to society. We note that the State of Israel follows the example of the Sages and does not impose the death penalty even on terrorist-murderers. The only ground for imposing capital punishment in Israel’s legal code is “crimes against humanity.”

Today, even those supporting the death penalty recognize the extreme inequity in its application. Moreover, since 1973, 139 innocent people have been exonerated and released from death row; in 17 cases DNA evidence played a substantial role. Problems of coerced confessions, false witnesses, mishandled physical evidence, and questionable testimony abound, compromising truth and justice. Even with more stringent rules of evidence in place in Maryland since 2009, the possibility for error remains. The only safeguard against mistaken executions is no executions.
We cannot avoid the question: how many innocent people have been executed in our name?

We are deeply sympathetic to the families of murder victims, yet we note that execution of the murderer does not bring closure to their tragedy.

As rabbis, we are committed to doing our utmost to help those touched by violence and tragedy to survive the trauma inflicted on them. We will bring all our resources and skills to bear in an effort to promote healing. At the same time, we are cognizant that the sanctity of life, already violated by a murder, is not enhanced by the death penalty. Such sanctity must be modern society’s supreme value.

Therefore, the Baltimore Board of Rabbis vigorously supports the ABOLITION OF THE DEATH PENALTY IN MARYLAND

President: Rabbi Amy Scheinerman

1st Vice-President: Rabbi Gila Ruskin

2nd Vice-President: Rabbi Chaim Landau

Treasurer: Rabbi Avram Israel Reisner

Secretary: Rabbi Andrew Busch

Immediate Past President: Rabbi Steven Fink