The Sixth Commandment.

Exodus 20:13   "Thou shalt not kill," or more accurately, 

"Thou shalt not murder," is the sixth of the Ten Commandments which were engraved by God Himself on tablets of stone and given to the people of Israel.

Do they have any relevance for our lives today?

Absolutely!

They are God’s expressed will for all mankind, and they reveal to us that we fall far short of the Glory of God.

 Regardless of current philosophies to the contrary, God has given to the entire human family 

His standard for right and wrong. 

Past civilizations which have violated His laws have disappeared from the face of the earth and lie this moment in rubble and ashes.

When we begin to inspect this commandment we find there are other complications that are connected with it. It is not quite so simple. This is the most complicated commandment of all. 

Is capital punishment a relic of a barbaric age?

On the surface it may seem very simple, but to understand what God had in mind, it will be necessary for us to dissect it and give it some study. 

Briefly, let us look at 

1) The intrinsic value of the sixth commandment. 

2) The inherent nature of the sixth commandment.

3) The indispensable necessity for the sixth commandment.

Even in this day in which we live.

1) Intrinsic Value.

Theo sixth commandment is the most important and vital commandment to every person topside of this earth. The sixth commandment is basic to all human governments. It is the foundation of contemporary society. It is the bulwark of all civilization.

The violation of this commandment was the first outbreak of sin after man disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden. It was the murder by Cain of his brother Abel, recorded in 

Genesis 4:8   "And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him."

Then God’s pronouncement of Cain’s punishment is in

Genesis 4:11–13   "And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand; When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth. And Cain said unto the LORD, My punishment is greater than I can bear."

That is very interesting is it not.

 At the very beginning, the first sinner who committed this overt act of murder said his punishment was greater than he could bear - and that was true. It is unfortunate that Cain did not turn to a substitute and receive forgiveness—God would have provided a substitute. But Cain attempted to bear, in his own body, the punishment for his sin. And yet, God forbade that any man should put his hand on Cain because of this crime. God put around him a hedge and said that no man could touch him. That seems exceedingly strange.

But when we turn a few pages of the Scriptures we come to the time of Noah after the Flood, and we  find that the human family has moved into an altogether different era. The first great civilization upon the earth had been washed out in the Flood. Those who came through that devastation were Noah and his family. After the Flood not only do we have a new beginning for the human race, but we find God placing man on an altogether different foundation - a foundation that was different from that which gave protection to even a murderer. However, before the Flood, the murderer had to bear his own punishment.

In Genesis 9:5-6  we read God’s instructions to Noah after the Flood:

"And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made he man."

This was the institution of capital punishment, 

and it was placed for the first time in the hands of man. 

When a person's life is taken, in that which is murder, then the murderer is to have his life taken in turn.

That command was never repealed, it never has been revoked; it is the foundation of all government. 

It was given to protect human life.

We need to see how important it is.

God gives us the reason why.

Genesis 9:6   "Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made he man."

Human life sacred? 

Man has been made in the image of God- this is the only thing that makes human life sacred. 

If man is an animal in the process of evolution, then life is not sacred. 

Over a century of that kind of teaching has produced the greatest crime wave in the most enlightened nations.

God’s basis is that since He created man in His image, there should be a reverence for human life. 

Dear reader, when anyone strikes at a human being it is an indirect way of striking at God, because that person is in the image of God and that is the only thing that gives value to it. That is the intrinsic value of this law; it is the basis of it. 

Because man is in God’s image, you and I dare not take human life.

Does this apply to abortion? 

Psalms 139:13–16  "For Thou hast possessed (formed) my inward parts; Thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb:

From the time we are conceived in the womb, we never get away from the Presence of God in this life.

God reinforces this truth in the next verse:

"I will praise Thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are Thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well."

God is everywhere, and each person is a creature who has the attention of God constantly.

"My substance was not hidden from Thee, when I was made in secret, and intricately wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unformed; and in Thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them."

Before his body was formed David says he was a person. He was a person as he was being formed (literally, skillfully woven) in the womb. The personhood is declared to take place at the very moment of conception.

This is very important in our day because of the question of abortion. I once heard a minister of the liberal persuasion say that the Bible has nothing to say about abortion and therefore we are to make our own decision. However, the Bible does have something to say about it, and here is a clear-cut reference. While the body was being formed, David said he was a person, a human being. God had the blueprint of his members before they came into existence! The person was there.

Abortion to get rid of the unformed child before it has an opportunity to utter a cry is murder. 

Doing it in order to cover up sin or escape responsibility merely enhances the awful and cruel crime. 

Do not blame me for this charge. Blame David - he wrote it. 

Blame God for He declared it.

Notice this distinction:

it is not human life ipso facto, that is, the life in itself that is sacred, because in God’s economy there have been martyrs who have sacrificed their lives - thrown them away and poured them out like water. They did not count them sacred. The writer to the Hebrews says of that great company, 

"…And others were tortured, not accepting deliverance…" (Hebrews 11:35).

How we need that dedication of  life to God in this day, a dedication that means something - not just attending church on Sunday, or serving on a committee, or rendering some little service to Him. 

We need our whole lives dedicated on the altar to God! 

That is the only thing the world outside will be impressed by. It is not our doctrine that will impress the world; it is our dedication. Oh we need that today! Life is not sacred in and of itself.

There is a mystery about life.

We cannot give it, and, we have no right to take it.

God alone can give life, and God alone has the right to take it, or it can be taken according to His law. 

No one else has that right.

Othello, in Shakespeare’s play, when he went in to murder his wife Desdemona, found a light burning on the table beside her. He made a play upon the two "lights"—the light that was there in the candle and the one that was in her body, the light of life. And he said this:

That was the thing that held back his hand for awhile. He wondered if he dare take her life because he could not put it back. But the light on the candle he could blow out, and if he had made a mistake, he could relight it. He could not restore human life. There is a mystery about it, and for that reason, 

God says it is sacred.

Let me say here that it ought to be illegal to have all these showings of killings on television and in movies. I think it is without doubt one of the most dangerous things because it treats human life as something cheap, certainly not in the image of Almighty God!

Man’s creation in the image of God is the reason human life is not to be taken.

2) Inherent Nature.

Secondly, we must take into consideration the inherent nature of the sixth commandment, 

"Thou shalt not murder." 

Here is a place where some of the newer translations missed an opportunity to make a needed improvement over the way we find it in the Authorized Version. 

The New King James translates it, "You shall not murder." 

That is much more accurate than 

"Thou shalt not kill," because it is possible to kill without murdering. There is a cult today that accepts the Ten Commandments but rejects the remainder of the Mosaic Law. That is perfectly absurd. 

We need all the Mosaic Law to interpret the Ten Commandments, and that is especially true of the sixth commandment, because there are degrees of murder: first degree, justifiable homicide, manslaughter, self-defense - and the Scriptures recognize all of these. There are ten Hebrew words translated by our English word "kill." 

In Exodus 20:13, the Hebrew word is ratsach, which means "murder."

I now call our attention to these distinctions that are made in the Mosaic Law concerning the sixth commandment, "Thou shalt not murder." 

In Exodus 21 which immediately follows the giving of the Ten Commandments, we have set before us that which is first degree murder.

Exodus 21:12   "He that smiteth a man, so that he die, shall be surely put to death."

This is first degree murder. And here it is premeditated murder:

Exodus 21:14   "But if a man come presumptuously upon his neighbor, to slay him with guile, thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he may die."

God says that if a man plans and plots the murder of another, his own life shall be taken even if he goes in to the altar and lays hold of the horns of the altar, which always signified a cry for mercy. God says that such a man shall not have mercy; he shall be put to death. 

That is first degree murder of the very worst sort.

God even put down the penalty for attempted murder:

Exodus 21:18-19   "And if men strive together, and one smite another with a stone, or with his fist, and he die not, but keepeth his bed; if he rise again, and walk abroad upon his staff, then shall he that smote him be clear: only he shall pay for the loss of his time, and shall cause him to be thoroughly healed."

That is attempted murder. And a man was not to die for attempted murder but he was to pay his victim’s medical expenses and the time he lost while recuperating.

Now we come to a most unusual arrangement. 

That’s the interesting thing about God’s arrangements - they’re unusual and not according to man’s way of doing things. This next law was to protect those who had killed innocently; that is, those guilty of manslaughter. They may have been negligent, other things may have entered in, but God gave them a protection. There are several passages that deal with this

Deuteronomy 19:2-3, 8–10  "Thou shalt set apart three cities.… Thou shalt prepare thee a way, and divide the borders of thy land, which the Lord thy God giveth thee to inherit, into three parts, that every slayer may flee there.… And if the Lord thy God enlarge thy borders… then shalt thou add three cities more beside these three, that innocent blood be not shed in thy land…"

In other words, God appointed six cities of refuge in the land of Israel, three on one side of the Jordan River and three on the other side, designated places on both the east and west banks of the Jordan River. These cities were arranged geographically so that a person in any part of the land was able to get to one quickly. The purpose for these cities of refuge was for the protection of a person who would slay another accidentally, yet some relative, or even a mob, might feel he had done it purposely and would try to do away with him. He could flee to a city of refuge where he would be safe. The cities were the Levites’ cities. The man was to be brought before the Levites, God’s priests, and was to be given an opportunity to state his case. If it was determined that he had done it accidentally, then this man could stay inside the city of refuge and no one could harm him.

He gave a very practical illustration lifted out of life in Israel of that day:

Deuteronomy 19:4-5   "And this is the case of the slayer who shall flee there, that he may live: whoso killeth his neighbor unintentionally, whom he hated not in time past; (and now he gives an illustration) as when a man goeth into the forest with his neighbor to hew wood, and his hand swingeth with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slippeth from the helve and lighteth upon his neighbor, that he die; he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live."

This gets right down where people lived. Suppose two men go out into the woods to cut down trees to build a house. As one man is swinging his axe, the head slips off the handle and strikes the other man in the temple and kills him instantly. When he realizes what has happened, he is afraid to go report it in the city where they live because he knows that this man’s brother is a hotheaded fellow who doesn’t like him anyway, and he has a notion that he will think he did it purposely. So this man goes immediately to the closest city of refuge where he cannot be touched. 

He will be safe (as long as he stays inside the city limits) until he can be given a fair trial without any prejudice and without any heat. 

That is God’s wonderful arrangement to take care of this type of thing in Israel.

There were many other things for which men were held guilty of murder. For instance this,

Exodus 21:15   "And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death."

By inference and interpretation of the law, I think there were many additional things for which capital punishment was required. I’ll mention a few, with no attempt to prove them by Scripture, hoping you will follow them through in the Bible. Sons or daughters who left home, went off into sin and broke their parents’ hearts so that they died, in God’s sight were guilty of murder. If a man betrayed a girl, and that girl, finding that she was to be disgraced, took her own life, the man was guilty of murder in God’s sight. Also abortion is murder in God’s sight. And the drunk driver who gets into a car, drives down the highway and kills someone, is a murderer in God’s sight.

I believe Scripture infers that the men who made the liquor and sold it to him are guilty of murder also.

I take it that the laws relating to man’s responsibility to man would cover that situation because God gives the following example of a certain restriction on building permits:

Deuteronomy 22:8  "When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a parapet for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any man fall from there

If a man builds a house and does not put up a railing around the roof, which was the front porch or patio in that day and anyone fell off and broke their neck, the man who built that house was guilty of murder. 

God makes us responsible for safeguarding the lives of our fellowmen.

Even a person who has a malicious tongue and plunges it like a knife into the back of another person’s character - this one is also considered a murderer in God’s sight.

This law has many ramifications.

3) Indispensable Necessity.

As we have been considering this sixth commandment, we have seen its intrinsic value, its inherent nature, and now we will see the indispensable necessity of the commandment,

"Thou shalt not murder."

When we get to the New Testament, we find that this commandment was not repealed or revoked. All the Ten Commandments are repeated for Christians, with the exception of the one regarding the Sabbath day. The  sixth commandment, "Thou shalt not murder"

is given in the New Testament, and our Lord did something remarkable to it. 

He lifted it to the nth degree. 

You may think that there cannot be any universal application of this commandment because very few people are murderers. I have a notion that we would suspect very few people in our circle of acquaintances of being murderers. But maybe someone in the same room with us right now - without our knowing it - is a murderer! I’m not sure that any of us can escape this charge.

Listen to our Lord Jesus as He expounds on the sixth commandment and lifts it to the nth degree:

Matthew 5:21-22   "Ye have heard that it was said by them of old, Thou shalt not kill and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of judgment; but I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of judgment; and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council; but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire."

The second statement concerning raca goes with the first. Let me give it like that and see if it doesn’t make more sense to you: "You have heard that it was said of old, you shall not kill. Whoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment; whoever shall say to his brother, ‘Raca,’ shall be in danger of the council." The word raca means "empty" or "good-for-nothing." The rabbis in our Lord Jesus’ day said that you could be brought into court and tried for calling someone that.

Our Lord Jesus has something else to say about it: 

"But I say unto you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of judgment. Whoever shall say, Thou fool (a fool is a rebel and implies godlessness), shall be in danger of hell fire."

That dearly beloved, is very solemn and very serious. 

When we drive on the freeway, do you sometimes call other drivers fools?

If we have, then in God’s sight we are guilty of murder.

Anger is the basis of all murder.

Anger is the thing that is back of murder, and 

in God’s sight anger is murder.

You may be objecting, I know lovely people, cultured and refined, surely cannot be guilty of murder. Well, they are not if they have never been angry but if they have been angry, they are murderers in God’s sight. 

You must have heard of sweet, refined women who placed arsenic in her husbands tea! In England a very lovely doctor killed his suffering patients for money. And in America a Sunday school superintendent was arrested for murder. It’s in our hearts, dear reader.

Mark 7:21   "For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders.'

Out of the heart,

Our Lord Jesus Christ said, 

'come the ugliest things and murder is one of them.

Are you prepared to defend yourself before God and say you have never been angry and that you are not guilty of murder before Him? 

Maybe you want to raise some technical point, as some people will, that since this commandment is in the Sermon on the Mount, it is not for us today. Turn to one of the last books in the Bible to be written, the First Epistle of John:

"Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer; and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him" (1 John 3:15).

The Holy Spirit, as God’s attorney (for He’s called that), brings a charge against you and against me that we are murderers in God’s sight. May I suggest that we will have a difficult time proving ourselves innocent before God. I suggest we plead guilty. 

Let us cast ourselves upon the mercy of the Court.

God has another charge against us also. 

Remember Stephen, when he stood on trial before the Sanhedrin that day, said, referring to Christ,

" ...  of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers" (Acts 7:52). 

And there sat Saul of Tarsus, a member of the Sanhedrin, guilty of the murder of our Lord Jesus Christ. And I must confess that I too share his guilt. I myself put Christ Jesus to death. If it hadn’t been for my sin, He never would have gone to the Cross, "For He hath made Him who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him" (2 Cor. 5:21). 

Our Saviour our Most Precious Lord Jesus Christ was made sin for us, we put Him to death.

Oh why don’t you plead guilty?

Apostle  Peter wrote,

"Let none of you suffer as a murderer…" (1 Peter 4:15). 

We’ve got to defend ourselves against the charge here. 

But Oh I want to tell you dear reader that you can defend yourself. There is a city of refuge to which you can flee and find mercy. 

All the way to Calvary He went for me, 
He went for me, He went for me.

All the way to Calvary He went for me,
He died to set me free.

Amen!

That city of refuge is Christ Jesus.

Oh the Love that Drew Salvations Plan!
Oh, the grace that brought it down to man!
Oh, the mighty gulf that God did span at Calvary!

Mercy there was great, and grace was free;
Pardon there was multiplied to me;
There my burdened soul found liberty at Calvary.

 Years I spent in vanity and pride,
Caring not my Lord was crucified,
Knowing not it was for me He died  at Calvary.

Mercy there was great, and grace was free;
Pardon there was multiplied to me;
There my burdened soul found liberty at Calvary. 

By God's Word at last my sin I learned;
Then I trembled at the law I'd spurned,
Till my guilty soul imploring turned,  to Calvary.

Mercy there was great, and grace was free;
Pardon there was multiplied to me;
There my burdened soul found liberty at Calvary. 

Now I've given to Jesus everything,
Now I gladly own Him as my King,
Now my raptured soul can only sing of Calvary!

Mercy there was great, and grace was free;
Pardon there was multiplied to me;
There my burdened soul found liberty at Calvary. 

Amen!

It is recorded in 2 Samuel 3 that after King Saul died, Abner, his captain, finally deserted to David. However, David’s captain, Joab, suspected Abner of being a spy and, wanting to avenge the death of his brother whom Abner had slain in battle, he contrived to get him out of Hebron because Hebron was a city of refuge. I think he must have said "Come out here, Abner, I’ve got something to tell you." Abner made the mistake of his life. 

He came out of the city of refuge, and when he was on neutral ground Joab killed him.

King David went to the funeral and wept at his grave.

He made it clear he was not guilty of this crime. Notice 

2 Samuel 3:33  "And the king lamented over Abner, and said, Died Abner as a fool dieth?"

Abner could have been safe in a city of refuge, but he was foolish  to be lured out and killed.

Dear reader, we all stand as sinners before Holy, Righteous, Just, God. How foolish it is to try somehow or another to defend ourselves by saying we are not really as guilty as we are because others are involved.

Dear reader, when God says we are guilty, we are guilty and He knows exactly our guilt. There is no way we can fool Him by bringing another persons name before Him. We must take full responsibility for our sin and no one else is to blame other than ourselves. Oh, to flee to the city of refuge and cast ourselves upon our Savior! The Bible says that we are a fool if we do not do it. "Died Abner as a fool dieth?" Abner could have been safe. And at this moment you can be safe. I did it and the peace and joy that filled my life for being obedient to His voice is more than I can tell for 

"He restoreth MY soul, He leadeth ME in the paths of righteousness for HIS Names sake" (Ps. 23:3).   

How wise it is to come to the Savior - He is our city of refuge and we do find safety and security in Him. 

Christ Jesus saves sinners, even murderers.

Words: George Keith.

THIS PAGE UPDATED: 5-11-2010