Paying evil unto evil in mythology and religion.
- The Bible:
- Book of Joshua tells how the Israelites conquered the land of Canaan and killed or enslaved the native peoples. It was justified by them evidently worshiping pagan gods — by practicing child sacrifice and being sexually immoral. Later, this punishment was applied to the Israelites themselves for the very same crimes.
- Around 400 years prior to the conquest, Noah has made a prophecy in Book of Genesis in which Canaan, the descendants of Ham will be cursed for Ham exposing Noah's nakedness, while Shem covered his nakedness and shame and will one day become Canaan's conqueror. It is up to debate whether the prophecy of punishments is for a case of Sins of Our Fathers or for their unrepentance even with hundreds of years given.
- While staying in the borders of Shechem, a city-state, the son of the lord of the city seduced or raped (depending on the version) Dinah, a daughter of Jacob who was visiting with some of the town girls. The two fathers hammered out an agreement between them so that Dinah's dowry would be paid, as well the two would wed to try and put the situation behind them. Two of Jacob's elder sons, Simeon and Levi, however, took offense to the rape and slaughtered the entire male population in retaliation, whilst carrying off the women. When confronted by an irate Jacob, who was worried about other city states sending out warriors to kill the entire clan and that nobody would trust them anymore, Simeon and Levi told him to screw himself with the reasoning "Should he treat our sister as a harlot?!" Subverted Trope, as in the end, Jacob never fully forgave Simeon and Levi for their vengeance and punished them on his deathbed.
- Sodom and Gomorrah. The Ten Plagues. The Flood. Samson killing 3,000 Philistines. The slaughter after the Israelites were found worshipping idols (though this one's debatable, as God actually didn't give Moses any instruction to do that, and it may have had more to do with putting down a revolt).
- The (executed) command to kill every Midianite male (regardless of age) and every Midianite female who wasn't a virgin. The Old Testament God was really into this trope.
- One of the reasons King Saul lost God's favor was because he refused to kill the Amalekite king Agag, despite God's decree that the entire nation of Amalek be wiped from the earth on account of them having raided the Israelites for hundreds of years.
- King David's daughter Tamar was raped by one of her brother's half-brothers Amnon. When David refused to take action, her brother Absalom ultimately took matters into his own hands and ordered his men to kill Amnon, and even David admitted this was understandable.
- King David made Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah, his mistress. When Bathsheba became pregnant, David called Uriah's troop back to the capital in the hopes that Uriah would sleep with Bathsheba so that the scandal would be hidden. Uriah was such a loyal soldier that he bunked down with his men instead, since it was unfair for him to go home when they couldn't. So David arranged for Uriah to die on the battlefield and took Bathsheba into his household. As punishment for his evil deeds, David's first son by Bathsheba fell ill and died after seven days and Absalom declared war on him.
- Moses sent twelve scouts into the land of Israel. Ten of them came back with a report that the people living there were unbeatable, and despite the protests of the other two spies, the Israelites formed a mob and turned on Moses and Aaron. After saving them, God decreed that the Israelites would never set foot in the Promised Land until after every adult — except the two good spies — who left Egypt had died. He then afflicted the other ten spies with a very painful and fatal illness.
- In the Scroll of Esther, Haman plotted to have all of the Jews in the Persian Empire killed. Instead, after Esther exposes Haman's plot, he and his sons (who were never mentioned as having been part of the plot) were hung on the gallows he had built for the Jews.
- Averted in the Book of Jonah. Jonah actually gets rather upset that God forgave the people of Nineveh. God explains that, unlike the people of Sodom and Gomorrah, the Ninevites took the warning seriously and repented sincerely, so He wasn't about to go killing a bunch of innocents along with the guilty when there wasn't any need.
- "For thus said the LORD: If they who rightly should not drink of the cup must drink it, are you the one to go unpunished? You shall not go unpunished: you will have to drink!" -Jeremiah 49:12
- Averted in the Book of Proverbs. Chapter 20, Verse 22: "Do not say, 'I will requite evil'; put your hope in the LORD and He will deliver you."
- And strongly condemned by the New Testament. As the Trope Namer for Turn the Other Cheek, in The Four Gospels, Jesus preaches nonviolence, even remonstrating Peter for attacking a Roman soldier to defend Him. However, considering that He was the one who told him to buy the sword in the first place, it can be reasonably assumed that self-defense is tolerated if there's no other option.
- Book of Joshua tells how the Israelites conquered the land of Canaan and killed or enslaved the native peoples. It was justified by them evidently worshiping pagan gods — by practicing child sacrifice and being sexually immoral. Later, this punishment was applied to the Israelites themselves for the very same crimes.
- The idea behind "an eye for an eye" was to limit what you could do in response to someone who wronged you. According to Hammurabi, the guy who codified the idea in the first place, this was to prevent the old-fashioned method of redressing a wrong… in that, in the old, bad days, if someone did a wrong to you, whether it was murder a loved one, rape your favorite daughter, steal your cattle, or insult you, you and your strongest male relatives would go out and kill the offender, then slaughter their entire clan before they could do the same to you. So, by making the law "an eye for an eye," you cannot take more than what you lost.
- Robin Hood: He steals from the rich and gives to the poor. Goes up and down the scales with each retelling; sometimes it's anyone rich, sometimes it's clearly someone who has unfairly taxed said poor. If it was anyone rich, that may be because the folks who told Robin's stories probably thought all nobles were evil back then.
