Against the Death Penalty: Christian and Secular Arguments Against Capital Punishment

by Gardner C. Hanks

Drawing on Old and New Testament resources as well as secular arguments, Gardner C. Hanks shows that the death penalty harms rather than helps any quest for a just, humane society. He demonstrates through research data that the death penalty is an ineffective crime-fighting tool.

Genres: Politics, Theology, Nonfiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1997

Reviews

[Adam Ross · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was hoping for more. Hanks brief book attempts to summarize both the Christian and the social arguments against the death penalty, but the book is much heavier on the social, rather than the theological, front. There are must stronger Biblical cases against capital punishment to be made elsewhere, but he does effectively show that society doesn't benefit at all from keeping the death penalty, and for these arguments the book will be a useful resource.

[Victoria (hotcocoaandbooks) · Rating 3 out of 5]

As someone who believes fully in the love of our enemies and neighbors and to forgive those who hurt us, I take my stance against the death penalty seriously. I wanted to see what another fellow believer had to say on the matter with research included. Although this is a dated book (where the statistics don't seem to go past 1995), it had great information about first the Biblical aspects of Christians stances into the more modern histories of executions. He explains how violence and murders actually increase where the death penalty lies rather than decreases and gives information about the horrors of how people are killed through capital punishment. I learned a lot and found it to be filled with good information.