Exodus 21:15

Striking a parent. Notice that the mother is placed on an equality with the father.

smiteth simply, without killing: the murder of a parent would fall under the general rule of v.12. The severity of the penalty was in accordance with the high respect paid to both parents in ancient Israel: see Exodus 20:12, and cf. Deuteronomy 21:18-21. Hạmmurabi (§ 195) ordained that if a son struck his father no mention is made of his mother his hands should be cut off. The older Sumerian laws said 1 [188] : -If a son has said to his father, Thou art not my father [i.e. repudiated him], he may brand him, lay fetters upon him, and sell him. If a son has said to his mother, Thou art not my mother, one shall brand his forehead, drive him round the city, and expel him from the house." At Athens γονέων κάκωσις (-maltreatment of parents") was actionable, and might be punished with ἀτιμία, or loss of civil rights (Andoc. de Myst.§ 74, cf. Demosth. adv. Timocr.§§ 103, 105, p. 732 f.); and Plato (Legg.ix. 881 b d), if any one struck a parent, would have any one who witnessed the act, and failed to interfere, severely punished, and the offender himself condemned to perpetual exile, or death if he ever returned home. Solon (Cic. Rosc.25) is said to have made no mention of such a crime, on the ground that he considered its occurrence impossible (Kn.).

[188] Winckler, Gesetze Hamm. (1904), p. 85; Pinches, op cit.[p. 212 n., p. 190 f.