If someone is harassing someone, and the victim of this harassment decides to kill the perpetrator, does this break the 6th commandment?

It does say in scripture that the wicked are the ones who intentionally provoke people to anger. What if a person were killed over something like this? Would it be mortal sin?

If someone is harassing someone, and the victim of this harassment decides to kill the perpetrator, does this break the 6th commandment?

It does say in scripture that the wicked are the ones who intentionally provoke people to anger. What if a person were killed over something like this? Would it be mortal sin?

Considering the 6th Commandment is, "Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery", I'd say no it doesn't.

Murder is always mortally sinful against the Fifth Commandment, though.

Where are you getting your list of Commandments? from the Protestants?
Still to Catholic sources and you'll do well.

Quote from: InfiniteFaith

If someone is harassing someone, and the victim of this harassment decides to kill the perpetrator, does this break the 6th commandment?

It does say in scripture that the wicked are the ones who intentionally provoke people to anger. What if a person were killed over something like this? Would it be mortal sin?

Considering the 6th Commandment is, "Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery", I'd say no it doesn't.

Murder is always mortally sinful against the Fifth Commandment, though.

Where are you getting your list of Commandments? from the Protestants?
Still to Catholic sources and you'll do well.

Yeah it must not have been a Catholic source.

Yes, I know that murder is a mortal sin. But that does not mean that all killing is mortal. If there is a just reason to kill then it is OK. I was wondering if the reason I provided in the OP was just and good enough.

Quote from: Nadir

Killing is always mortal!

Maybe you might like to define harrassment; it could be anything from pinching a lady's bottom or calling your neighbour "big ears". What did you have in mind?

Killing is not always mortal. War is a justification for killing. So is adultery and a number of other things. God has killed before (Sodom and Gomorrah, The flood). It has to be for a just reason. It becomes murder when it is done unjustly. In which case it would break the fifth commandment and be mortal.

IF, I apologise for being so flippant. It is just that I found your post so laughable.

But yes! You referred to killing and if you kill someone they are dead. So in that sense killing is mortal. It was a joke!

The point is if someone is harrassing you cannot just kill them. That would be overkill (pardon the pun). If they are endangering your life, you have the right to preserve your life and that might mean stopping them somehow from endangering you but it does not necessarily justify killing them.

You did not explain yet just what you mean by harrassment.

Quote from: InfiniteFaith

If someone is harassing someone, and the victim of this harassment decides to kill the perpetrator, does this break the 6th commandment?

It does say in scripture that the wicked are the ones who intentionally provoke people to anger. What if a person were killed over something like this? Would it be mortal sin?

The Catholic church has always held that the death penalty was a permissible act for serious crimes. People who receive the death penalty can be said to have provoked society to anger, and society kills them in that rage so to speak. But killing also has practical purposes, like ensuring the person never does any provoking again. In the case of harassment I feel, perhaps it is up to the judgement of the person being harassed as to whether they feel commissioned by God to punish the offender with death, and ensure that the harassment stops. If the offender is particularly vile, why ought a victim to wait for enough like minded victims to form a society and then grow into a nation with its own death penalty, and then carry out a sentence?

Does the death penalty being "just" depend on how many people are involved in procuring a death?
If so, there is no such thing as justice, because Jesus was one man (God) and He was justice incarnate, and the world was against him, but nevertheless He did as justice demanded. So I say it is permissible for Catholics to kill if they encounter extreme evil. Provoking them would seem to mean that they offend against their Catholic sensibilities, by grave evil.
Remember the crusaders, the church would not be here without them.
RIG (Reliquscent in Gloria)

 :applause:

Bravo. No, it does not matter how many people are involved.

Tcat said

People who receive the death penalty can be said to have provoked society to anger, and society kills them in that rage so to speak.

You are wrong here, Tcat. Such things are never to be decided in anger or in rage. Such would be a grave sin against justice.  

... In the case of harassment I feel, perhaps it is up to the judgement of the person being harassed as to whether they feel commissioned by God to punish the offender with death, and ensure that the harassment stops.

If you were being martyred, would you be justified in killing your tormentor? Nobody is commissioned by God to kill. Maybe an executioner could be commissioned by his government to kill, or a soldier might be commissioned to defend his country but that is not quite the same thing as being commissioned by God.


IF still has not explained what he means by harassment, but harassment is not something Catholics kill for.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/harassment
ha·rass  (h-rs, hrs)
tr.v.ha·rassed, ha·rass·ing, ha·rass·es
1. To irritate or torment persistently.

2. To wear out; exhaust.

3. To impede and exhaust (an enemy) by repeated attacks or raids.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[French harasser, possibly from Old French harer, to set a dog on, from hare, interj. used to set a dog on, of Germanic origin.]

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ha·rasser n.

ha·rassment n.

Synonyms: harass, harry, hound, badger, pester, plague
 These verbs mean to trouble persistently or incessantly. Harass and harry imply systematic persecution by besieging with repeated annoyances, threats, or demands: The landlord harassed tenants who were behind in their rent. A rude customer had harried the storekeeper.
 Hound suggests unrelenting pursuit to gain a desired end: Reporters hounded the celebrity for an interview.
 To badger is to nag or tease persistently: The child badgered his parents for a new bicycle.
 To pester is to inflict a succession of petty annoyances: "How she would have pursued and pestered me with questions and surmises" (Charlotte Brontë).
 Plague refers to a problem likened to an epidemic disease: "As I have no estate, I am plagued with no tenants or stewards" (Henry Fielding).

If harassment is murder, then I am free to kill a number of people in my sspx chapel because they verbally harass me?  I could also do away with the two persons who send me threatening emails from other's computers under different gmail addresses in the belief that I do not know who they are!

 :dancing-banana:Better watch out, you two! :dwarf: :light-saber:

Was not St. Paul harassed?  Why didn't he kill his detractors?

No, I think this is incorrect!  Not self-defense!  Rather, premeditated murder.  Clearly mortal sin!

Quote from: InfiniteFaith

If someone is harassing someone, and the victim of this harassment decides to kill the perpetrator, does this break the 6th commandment?

It does say in scripture that the wicked are the ones who intentionally provoke people to anger. What if a person were killed over something like this? Would it be mortal sin?

Considering the 6th Commandment is, "Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery", I'd say no it doesn't.

Murder is always mortally sinful against the Fifth Commandment, though.

Where are you getting your list of Commandments? from the Protestants?
Still to Catholic sources and you'll do well.

This error about the 5th vs 6th has me wondering about IF.  Even in the NO, I learned the correct Catholic list of commandments.  I don't see how a college age Catholic wouldn't know the correct Catholic numeration of the Commandments.  What has he been using all these years to review his conscience for confession?  Why on earth in looking into such question as he poses here wouldn't he be using a Catholic source?  Referring to a wretched heretical protestant source doesn't happen by accident.

I don't think this needs brushed off so easily.