I think it was Chuck Colson who said a long time ago that our punishments for violent crime were too weak and our punishments for nonviolent crime were too strong. (It might have been Marvin Olasky, or they might agree with each other.)
The Bible’s punishments in Torah are simple and explicit. Most violent crime was punishable by death. Property crime was punishable by reparation plus 20%. Some other crimes were punishable by exile.
There was no such thing as jail time, because there was no such thing as a jail. The concept of a correctional institution or penitentiary comes from the Quakers, who thought a person, given enough time to think about his crimes, would come to repentance. (Doesn’t work.)
> I think it was Chuck Colson who said a long time ago that our punishments for violent crime were too weak and our punishments for nonviolent crime were too strong. <
It’s a bit of a tough call. A thug threatens a clerk with a pistol, and steals $100 from a convenience store. A top executive types a few things into a computer and embezzles $1,000,000 from his company.
Given that part of punishment is to deter future bad behavior, which person above deserves the longer sentence? I dunno.