Hyperbole? I wouldn't use it in a billion years!

Dave Thurston has been speaking on the Sermon on the Mount for the past couple of weeks at our university Lunchtime Bible Talks. One of the things Dave highlighted was Jesus' use of hyperbole as he speaks on lust in Matthew 5;

27 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. 29 If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.

I'm told by those who understand Greek that Jesus is here referring not simply to noticing a pretty girl walking by, but it is looking "in order to lust" or as Dave put it, "It's not the first look, but the second. It's the use of our imagination to create unrealistic and unhelpful scenarios which play out in our minds." 

One level of application here is the condemnation of pornography. I have also heard elsewhere this passage used to condemn masturbation in all forms. This is probably not the forum to discuss the merits or problems of that particular view but I do have to wonder if people arrive at this because it's the sin of the eyes that leads to the "right hand caus(ing) you to sin." If so, I don't even want to think about what it means to lose a "member".

But I digress, because what Dave really got me thinking about was the use of hyperbole to highlight the seriousness with which we should take sin (in this case sexual sin). Particularly my mind wandered back to this morning as I read Exodus 21-22 with a couple of students. This is what it says in Exodus 21:15-17

15 “Whoever strikes his father or his mother shall be put to death.

16 “Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.

17 “Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death.

Was there hyperbole in the Law? Did the Israelites really enforce this law? I can understand verse 16, I think I can understand verse 15, but even cursing your folks meant capital punishment? No wooden spoon?

I am embarrassed of the disobedience I showed to my parents growing up (and occasionally still do to my shame) but if I was a little Israelite child would I have been rightfully put to death? I'm not trying to dismiss God's word, or seek out the minimum requirement, or try and logically disregard it, but were Israelite children who disobeyed their parents literally killed? Or is there hyperbole in the law?

I feel like I've just written into one of those dodgy advice columns in the newspaper where they make up the letters...

Please help,

Confused.