Ana Ittishu

The laws etched on pillar covered criminal behavior, slavery, marriage and divorce. There were brutal punishments for the disobedient. The Hammurabi Code is one of the oldest documents of significant length with at least 282 laws applied according to gender and social status (free or bond) with an "eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" fashion. Before that there was the precepts of the Ana Ittishu followed by the Code of Ur-Nammu (c. 2100 BCE) and Code of Hammurabi (c. 1755 BCE).

Ana Ittishu

The Ana Ittishu were legal phrases and extracts that were a part of an ancient examination of natural rights within and between families reaching back to the third millennium.

They were critical to understand family structure and community interactions with consistency and justice in a Voluntary society.

There are cuneiform writings that recorded and preserved the “Sumerian Family Laws” and Akkadian legal clauses existing before the Code of Ur-Nammu considered the world's oldest known law code (c. 2100 BCE) and Code of Hammurabi (c. 1755 BCE).

Akkadian a Semitic language spoken in ancient Mesopotamia and recorded upon cuneiform tablets. It contains case laws and recording of legal precedents established over the years. It covered contracts, crimes and even in the domestic family inheritance, divorce, etc. The comparison of system helps us in understanding the broader ancient western and eastern legal environment.

The Ana Ittishu were a record of principals and precept stemming from early perceptions of the Natural Law.

The Code of Ur-Nammu was concerned more with equity and reciprocation of justice. While the Code of Hammurabi was more about punishment and retribution in an attempt of maintaining law and order as well as the position of the elites with in a city state.

Numerous academic discussions within Jewish sources and biblical law journals frequently mention the "Ana Ittishu" texts to highlight similarities and differences within the precepts found in the Pentateuch.