Last night, Saddam Hussein was executed in Iraq. No matter how you feel about capital punishment or the war in Iraq, it’s pretty obvious that he deserved it, and not just in a “wages of sin is death” kind of way. MSNBC has posted a video which shows Saddam, on the very first day of his reign in 1979, sitting in a crowded room reading off the names of his enemies who are then snatched out of the room and taken away. Many of these “traitors” to the Baath party were shot without trial. These were but the first of his crimes as president. Even the ones for which he was convicted and hanged (the 1982 slaughter of 148 Shi’ite villagers) were but a tiny part of his infernal legacy.

Should Saddam have died? I have problems with capital punishment as it is carried out in the U. S., but those problems stem not primarily from Scripture (I understand Romans 13:1-7 to allow for capital punishment, along with Genesis 9:4-6), but from our system’s inability to reliably find the guilty person. That wasn’t an issue with Saddam to say the least.

What if Saddam had been sentenced to life in prison instead? Could this have been a tiny step toward ending the eye-for-an-eye cycle of retribution in that region? I’d like to think so. It’s just as likely, however, that his continued presence would have have been seen as 1) a horrible injustice to the tens of thousands he tortured and killed, and 2) a rallying symbol for those on all sides who desire to stoke violence.

The major news sites have all posted footage of Saddam with the noose around his neck, along with stills of his corpse. I suppose it’s just a matter of time before the moment of his death is widely available too. A friend said to me yesterday that when we finally have that video, we’ll see a lost man stepping through the gates of hell. That’s that saddest thing that can be said of anyone.