Matthew 5:38 known as the principle of "lex talionis", is an ancient statement of the principle of retributive punishment dating back to the Code of Hammurabi. This phrasing appears several times in the Old Testament at Exodus 21:24, Leviticus 24:20, and Deuteronomy 19:21. This was a moderate rule compared with the blood feuds described in Genesis 4:23-24. The New Testament scholar R. T. France notes that by Jesus' era such punishments were no longer in practice, rather they had been replaced with fines judged to be of equal value to the damage caused. Thus, according to France, Jesus is not here condemning
August Dillmann ihrer politischen Wirksamkeit" (1868). In 1869 appeared his commentary on "Hiob", (4th edition 1891) which stamped him as one of the foremost Old Testament exegetes. His renown as a theologian was mainly founded on the series of commentaries, based on those of August Wilhelm Knobel's "Die Genesis" (Leipzig, 1875); "Die Bücher Exodus und Leviticus", 1880; "Die Bücher Numeri, Deuteronomium und Josua", with a dissertation on the origin of the Hexateuch, 1886; "Der Prophet Jesaja", 1890. In 1877 he published the "Ascension of Isaiah" in Ethiopian and Latin. He was also a contributor to Daniel Schenkel's "Bibellexikon", Brockhaus's "Conversationslexikon", and Johann