Leadership Lessons from Hammurabi
This series of articles seeks to examine the character attributes of highly successful leaders, regardless of their adherence to a strong faith or moral standard. In presenting these thoughts, Leadership Ministries is not agreeing with or advocating these traits or practices, but rather presents these as ideas for discussion and development in your own leadership journey.
Hammurabi (1810-1750 BC) was the sixth king of the First Babylonian dynasty. He issued a set of laws known as the Code of Hammurabi, which influence the laws and constitutions of nations even to this day. He ruled from 1792 to 1750 BC, and conquered several neighboring city-states, bringing nearly all of Mesopotamia under Babylonian rule. Hammurabi was seen as a god by his own people, and claimed to have received his laws from Shamash, the Babylonian god of justice. Following his death, Hammurabi’s military conquests were downplayed, and his role as the ideal law-giver became his legacy.
His comprehensive laws include one of the earliest examples of an accused person being considered innocent until proven guilty. Following his early military conquests, Hammurabi was satisfied with the size of his kingdom, and settled into the work of ruling his people. He ordered the construction of irrigation canals and protective walls for his cities.
Focus on accountability. Hammurabi’s Code consists of 282 laws, most concerning punishment for crimes. It also contains some of the earliest laws related to construction, to ensure that workers built safe houses by making them liable for bad workmanship. Code 229 says, “If a builder builds a house for a man and does not make its construction firm, and the house which he has built collapses and causes the death of the owner of the house, that builder shall be put to death.” And Code 233 states, “If a builder builds a house for a man and does not make its construction meet the requirements and a wall falls in, that builder shall strengthen the wall at his own expense.”[1]
Hammurabi’s Code, though in many ways crude and even cruel, set the foundation for many of the laws and codes we use today to hold people accountable for their work and their actions. To make sure everyone had access to the laws, Hammurabi had them inscribed on a stone tablet called a stele in the common language of Akkadian—one that many people could understand—and placed in public so all could view it. The original stele of Hammurabi’s code was rediscovered in 1901, and now resides in the Louvre Museum in Paris.
Hammurabi’s code, carved in this stone stele, can be viewed today at the Louvre Museum in Paris.
Communicate social order. Among the benefits of Hammurabi’s Code was to place the value of the society over the rights of the individual. The Code mentions the death penalty over 30 times. Hammurabi set out to create a peaceful society, even if it meant some people were treated harshly. Hammurabi wrote, “To keep the peace, a ruler must sometimes use force. But force must be used with wisdom and restraint, or it will only breed more violence.”
But the laws also helped with social order. For instance, in Hammurabi’s time, a family’s wealth was administered by the husband or father, and women had few rights, especially widows and divorcees. Hammurabi’s Code gave women more protections and sought to see them provided for in the event their husband died or divorced. Hammurabi wrote, “When a man leads and governs a great people, he must be just and merciful.” Before the Code, every disagreement was judged separately and by different standards. The Code was a set of laws that all of the people of the kingdom lived under, and thus created an order in Babylon trough consistent treatment of the people.[2]
Laws can be innovative. Hammurabi’s Code contains the first declaration of human rights in history: “To cause justice to prevail in the land… that the strong may not oppress the weak.”[3] And though we tend to think as innovation coming by way of technology or scientific research, Hammurabi teaches us that we can push society forward through other means. His Code contains rules that function as the first form of something we are all familiar with today: insurance.[4]
One Code states, “A borrower is not required to repay a loan if some disaster impairs his ability to repay. Types of events covered include flooding, inability to work and death.” During Hammurabi’s time, shipping was notoriously dangerous, with boats lost to bad weather, technical failure or pirates. His Code shared the burden of cost for a lost ship among the shipper and the owners of the cargo. And it allowed for forgiveness of debt in the instance of the ship sinking. The Code transformed maritime shipping, making it less financially volatile, and encouraging shippers to improve their boats and methods so that the financial risk was lessened and the rewards were enhanced.