Leviticus 24:20 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Breach for breach, &c.— These words fully prove that we are to take those in Exodus 21:24 in a literal sense. We are not to imagine that individuals were permitted to avenge themselves, they were to refer their injuries to the judges. There is no doubt, however, that reason, in various cases, required a compensation; for the same member is far more valuable to one man than to another; as in that case mentioned by Diodorus Siculus, lib. 12: where the one-eyed man complains of the rigour of this law, as it took place among the heathens: for, if he lost his other eye, he must have suffered more than the man whom he injured, and who still had one eye left; so the right hand of a scribe, or painter, cannot be so well spared as that of a finger. The lex talionis, therefore, of the twelve tables made this exception, si membrum rupit, ni cum eo pacet, talio esto; i.e. unless he agree with the person injured to make him satisfaction, and to redeem the punishment, he was to suffer in the same kind. That, in like manner, the law of Moses allows all these punishments to be redeemed by money, except that of life for life, is gathered from Numbers 35:31 ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer: which seems to intimate, that smaller personal injuries might be redeemed; and so it is explained by Maimonides and others. Be it further observed, that though Moses might think it necessary, for preserving the peace and order of the community, to permit this revenge of injuries, yet it is not to be doubted, but many of the pious Jews were far from making use of this permission. Compare Matthew 5:38; Matthew 5:48.