The Law of God is God’s Word. This Ten Commandments are the main contents of the law. As such, the law is God’s testimony, God’s expression, a revelation of God to His people. The law of God reveals God’s attributes, in this commandment, showing that He is loving human’s life. The reality of keeping the law is to love God, live God and express God. In the horizontal relationship between humans, the very first commandment is related to the preciousness and protection of human life as God command it. Love lies behind this commandment, God is love, out of His great depth of love, He create and enable life and existence so that we can share His love and be in a loving relationship with Him (Exodus 20:6).

There is one fundamental principle of life, which is the truth of the sovereignty of God over every individual life. And if God regards human life as sacred, precious and need to be protected, we would do well to regard it as He regard it. Life is God’s gift and since God is the giver, creator and originator of human life, we can say that human life is a divine creation, marvelous, magnificent, and wonderful in its origin and utterly beyond the comprehension of any fellow human being. Therefore, life is not to be cut off at the hand of someone who does not know or understand all that it contains (is wonder, its meaning, its nature, its potential and its possibilities). God has a purpose for every individual that enter His world that stretching far beyond this present life. There can be no sin against humanity greater than that of taking or cutting off of human life.

Cities of Refuge

6 The cities which you shall give to the Levites shall be the six cities of refuge, which you shall give for the manslayer to flee to; and in addition to them you shall give forty-two cities. 7 All the cities which you shall give to the Levites shall be forty-eight cities, [a]together with their pasture lands. 8 As for the cities which you shall give from the possession of the sons of Israel, you shall take more from the larger and you shall take less from the smaller; each shall give some of his cities to the Levites in proportion to his possession which he inherits.”

9 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 10 “Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan, 11 then you shall select for yourselves cities to be your cities of refuge, that the manslayer who has [b]killed any person unintentionally may flee there. 12 The cities shall be to you as a refuge from the avenger, so that the manslayer will not die until he stands before the congregation for [c]trial. 13 The cities which you are to give shall be your six cities of refuge. 14 You shall give three cities across the Jordan and three cities [d]in the land of Canaan; they are to be cities of refuge. 15 These six cities shall be for refuge for the sons of Israel, and for the alien and for the sojourner among them; that anyone who [e]kills a person unintentionally may flee there.

16 ‘But if he struck him down with an iron object, so that he died, he is a murderer; the murderer shall surely be put to death. 17 If he struck him down with a stone in the hand, by which he will die, and as a result he died, he is a murderer; the murderer shall surely be put to death. 18 Or if he struck him with a wooden object in the hand, by which he might die, and as a result he died, he is a murderer; the murderer shall surely be put to death. 19 The blood avenger himself shall put the murderer to death; he shall put him to death when he meets him. 20 If he pushed him of hatred, or threw something at him lying in wait and as a result he died, 21 or if he struck him down with his hand in enmity, and as a result he died, the one who struck him shall surely be put to death, he is a murderer; the blood avenger shall put the murderer to death when he meets him.

22 ‘But if he pushed him suddenly without enmity, or threw something at him without lying in wait, 23 or with any [f]deadly object of stone, and without seeing it dropped on him so that he died, while he was not his enemy nor seeking his injury, 24 then the congregation shall judge between the slayer and the blood avenger according to these ordinances. 25 The congregation shall deliver the manslayer from the hand of the blood avenger, and the congregation shall restore him to his city of refuge to which he fled; and he shall live in it until the death of the high priest who was anointed with the holy oil. 26 But if the manslayer at any time goes beyond the border of his city of refuge to which he may flee, 27 and the blood avenger finds him outside the border of his city of refuge, and the blood avenger kills the manslayer, he will not be guilty of blood 28 because he should have remained in his city of refuge until the death of the high priest. But after the death of the high priest the manslayer shall return to the land of his possession.

29 ‘These things shall be for a statutory ordinance to you throughout your generations in all your dwellings.

30 ‘If anyone kills a person, the murderer shall be put to death at the [g]evidence of witnesses, but no person shall be put to death on the testimony of one witness. 31 Moreover, you shall not take ransom for the life of a murderer who is guilty of death, but he shall surely be put to death. 32 You shall not take ransom for him who has fled to his city of refuge, that he may return to live in the land [h]before the death of the priest. 33 So you shall not pollute the land in which you are; for blood pollutes the land and no expiation can be made for the land for the blood that is shed on it, except by the blood of him who shed it. 34 You shall not defile the land in which you live, in the midst of which I dwell; for I the Lord am dwelling in the midst of the sons of Israel.’”

In OT book of Numbers chapter 35 verse 6 to 34 above, we can draw an important lesson about this commandment. The Hebrew word for kill or murder in many translations are ratsach, used in this verse. This word has a deeper meaning than just to kill. It means to kill in anger or with premeditation (clear intention of action). All murder is off course killing, but all killing is not necessarily murder. In this passage, God instructed Israelites to establish six cities of refuge to which anyone (including foreigner and sojourner) who had been guilty of killing could go and gain protection. The main purpose was to protect the killer from the avenger of the victim. Kindly note the criteria which God gives for differentiating between killing and murder. Those who had killed someone but had not intended to do so, were not to be seen and punished as murderers. But those who had killed with premeditated intentions were to be shown no mercy and to be put to death. The task of the assembly (or court of jury) was to determine whether the killing was intentional or unintentional.

However, unintentional killings are also considered serious offense. Anyone who took life in this way was denied their liberty for a long term, having to remain in the city of refuge until the death of the high priest. If they ever walk out of the protecting boundaries of the refuge city, he could be killed by the avenger of the one whom he had killed. By being limited to the city of refuge, the offender will not have access to their own inheritance lands, therefore in those agricultural based economy of that age, he will lost substantial portions of his income. He probably have to seek employment in the refuge city to provide for his daily needs. This limits of liberty and movement control is just like our modern day prison for people who committed crime and get sentenced by the court. In God’s view, this is the punishment for the offender. But God is against punishing harshly by taking life of the killer with unintentional killings. Life is God’s gift and the taking of it, even unintentionally, is a serious and solemn offense.

In the New Testament, Jesus provide a divine understanding as Lord of life to this commandment. Gospel of Matthew Chapter 5 :17-26 give us insight about what lies behind this devastating and destructive action, how each one of us if not careful, possess possibility of arriving at such a dangerous state. Scripture often associate hate with murder (1 John 3:15), we also know from our studies that hate develops when anger is not resolved. Joseph become the object of his brother’s anger. Hate festered in their hearts and finally they conspired together to kill him. This is also found in the sad and tragic narrative of Cain and Abel (Gen 4:1-16). Cain was angry. Anger is almost always preceded by an offence, an event which if we do not recognise and resolve, will end in anger and frustration. Life in this fallen world can cause our many expectations not to be met and if we are not careful to manage it, we can become angry and take offense.

Think about another narrative in Genesis about the other siblings, Esau and Jacob. What an amazing moment it must have been after 20 years of estrangement, Esau embraces Jacob, his brother. When we find ourselves drowned in a valley of offense, we need to learn to forgive, even if the one offended us are in the wrong. But we don’t usually have to forgive someone who is right. It is time to stop, pause and remember to receive God’s grace and forgiveness. Then from that place we can ask God for His help to forgive other’s offences to us and not live our lives with anger and frustration. When Jesus restates this sixth commandment during His public ministry, He reveals the spiritual nature or our inner beings in relations to it. Jesus shed light and show us that this commandment is not just concern our outward actions that would bring about someone’s death, rather He takes us to the root of the problem, which is unrestrained anger in our hearts. We believe that very few people reading this blog now have been involved in physical actual act of murder. But how many of us are guilty of murder in our heart? We may not be able to stop anger arising in our heart, but we can certainly take steps to bring it under control.

If we fail to do that, we risk allowing it to burn and boil within our inner being. And in God’s sight, this makes us guilty of murder as if we had stabbed someone through the heart with a dagger. In John 8, Jesus during dialogue with the Jews, revealed their murderous intent towards Him, which led to them taking up stones to kill Him (John 8: 31-59).  Some other bible verses that can help us understand this matter:

1. “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him” (1 John 3:15).

2. Apostle Paul in his letter teach that “Be angry, and yet do not sin, do not let the sun go down on your anger” (Eph 4:26).

3. “For anger slays the foolish man and jealousy kills the simple” (Job 5:2).

4. “Cease from anger and forsake wrath, do not fret; it leads only to evildoing” (Psalm 37:8).

5. “A man of great anger will bear the penalty, For if you rescue him, you will only have to do it again.” (Proverbs 19:19).

These are serious warning and difficult for many people to accept. But the bible is crystal clear. Now we can see that in Old Testament, the commandment deal with the act of murder, but Jesus highlight a more serious aspect of the commandment, which deal with anger, the motive of murder. Hence, Jesus taught us a complete demand of this commandment which is originally deeper than the requirement in the Old Testament age. To meet this demand, we cannot rely on our own strength, we have to draw closer to God and experience help to have forgiveness and restoration in our inner being so that we can be enable to live this new regenerated life to meet the requirement of this commandment.

God Bless,

KS, Holyland Specialist Team