Hammurabi’s Code and the Modern Law

Throughout the book so far, Hammurabi has been depicted as a really magnificent king; he was a considerate and loving ruler who always put his people first. He was concerned with his people by letting them practice their religions, building temples for them, accepting complaints directly from ordinary people, and building canals and irrigation systems etc. One of the most brilliant accomplishments by Hammurabi on record is definitely the famous Hammurabi’s Law Code. In the law code, he set up some basic rules to regulate the society.

Hammurabi’s law code in a way can be considered as a model of the modern laws. General violations like stealing, lying, and murdering are punished harshly. Therefore, even though his law code does not exactly resemble the modern law, they do share the same basis, which is to keep justice and legal rights of everyone in place. Just like the “rule of law,” Hammurabi’s code was agreed by the general public for everyone to follow and no one can be an exception of the law. Because this well-known law code was the earliest recorded “law,” it seems like the modern law has evolved from Hammurabi’s law code, which served as a model for the later generations.

Some experts argue that the law code is not really considered as a law in today’s perspective; it’s more like the ideas and regulations that the king came up with as he judged different cases. Indeed, a distinct difference between the modern law and Hammurabi’s law code is that, the latter was not always fair according to conventions we hold today. For example, people with higher social status were not punished as harshly as people with lower status. Therefore, people were still discriminated and stratified. This shows that the purpose of the law code and the modern law are ultimately different. Unlike the modern law, Hammurabi’s law code was not to protect everyone fairly, but merely to regulate the society and to keep it in order so that his reign was stable.