What? Another list?!

In raw form the lists are pedagogical. When embedded between prologue and epilogue as in Hammurabi’s stele, they serve as an accountability report to the gods. Consequently, these lists of legal sayings do not tell us what laws were in force in society, much like proverbs do not tell us how everyone lived their lives in society. Both sorts of corpus are illustrations compiled to communicate the wisdom that will lead to order and justice. Scholars who were engaged on behalf of the king sought not to define law but to offer guidance for discerning wise justice so that order might be maintained in society.—Walton and Walton, The Lost World of the Torah, 33