This book is simply a historical as well as philosophical meditation on paying back as well as buying back, that is, it's about retaliation as well as redemption. It takes the law of the talion – eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth – seriously. In its biblical formulation that law states the value of my eye in terms of your eye, the value of your teeth in terms of my teeth. Eyes as well as teeth become units of valuation. But the talion doesn’t stop there. It seems to demand that eyes, teeth, as well as lives are another to provide the means of payment. Bodies as well as body parts, it seems, have a just claim to being not just money, but the first as well as precisest of money substances. In its highly original way, the book offers a theory of justice, not an airy theory though. It's about getting even in a toughminded, unsentimental, but respectful way. As well as finds that much of what we take to be justice, honor, as well as respect for persons requires, at its core, measuring as well as measuring up
