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I am by no means an apologist or a theologian. I, however, do believe in the death penalty for murder. (I live in Texas).

I have an issue that I can’t understand. People get tatoos. And somewhere in the OT is says not to mark the body. Today, this is justified because that was the old law and we are under the new law (New Testament). Now, how is this different than the law referenced in the article dealing with the death penalth? Is there any reference in the NT dealing with the issue?

Is there any reference in the NT dealing with the issue?

God, the Father, willed that His Only Son suffer the death penalty to save mankind. And Jesus Christ said, "It were better for him, that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should scandalize one of these little ones."

That's enough for me.

I hope somebody will jump in here with a more adequate answer, but my short take is that the laws of the OT are of three kinds:

ceremonial law (like, how to conduct animals sacrifices in the Temple);
customary law (often geared toward strictly rejecting customs of their gentile neighbors, namely what they ate, how they dressed, what kind of festivals they kept) and
the Eternal Moral Law, which is best summarized in the Ten Commandments (reiterated strongly by Christ Himself in the NT) and made even more succinct in the Two Great Commandments (Love God with your whole heart, and your neighbor as yourself) --- also repeatedly affirmed by Christ.

Thus the OT laws pertaining to Temple sacrifice, ritual uncleanness and so forth are set aside in the NT; the ritualized differentness, centered on "keep apart from the gentiles" laws are set aside because the Jewish and Gentile communities are to be made one in Christ; and what remains are he Eternal Moral Laws, which will remain forever.

Make sense?

As I said,I hope somebody else will jump in here and say more. Im sure there has been plenty of controversy about which sort of law is which. For instance, the so-called Gay Christian movement illegitimately claims that the prohibitions of deviate intercourse are just a ritual customary law, whereas Christianity ha always --- for 20 centuries now --- taught that it is part of the Eternal Moral Law.