Murder
Exodus 20:13 “you shall not murder...” is so well know to so many people, nearly everybody has heard of this instruction in the ten commandments. However some English translations choose the word kill instead of murder. This fundamentally changes the whole instruction and also raises the question of "is murder and killing the same thing?", and argument that is very much going on in the euthanasia and pro life/choice arguments. So, let’s have a look at what is actually written and decipher this conundrum as much as possible.
The Hebrew of the Masoretic Text (MT) reads as follows
לֹ֥֖א תִּֿרְצָ֖͏ֽח׃ “Lō Tir-tsākh”. The problem comes from how to translate its root word רָצַח “Rā-tsākh”. Is it murder or kill? The first thing to do when trying to find out a meaning for a word is to look it up in the dictionary, in this case a biblical Hebrew lexicon. However, there is no consensus here. Some examples as being:
Brown-Driver- Briggs: Murder, Slay
Gesenius: to break, to dash into pieces, to kill
Dictionary of Biblical Languages: Murder, Kill
The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew: Murder, Commit manslaughter
So, from these Lexicons we can see Murder is a common theme but so is to kill, the last option brings in a new option and that is of manslaughter however, to kill could fall under this category as well. So, lets define these terms, back to a dictionary we go.
What is murder?
Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. This state of mind may, depending upon the jurisdiction, distinguish murder from other forms of unlawful homicide, such as manslaughter.
Killing of a person, without justification or valid excuse
Killing in malice, state of mind can be the determining factor between manslaughter and murder
What is Manslaughter?
Manslaughter is a common law legal term for homicide considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is sometimes said to have first been made by the ancient Athenian lawmaker Draco in the 7th century BC. The definition of manslaughter differs among legal jurisdictions
New Question what distinction did Draco make?
Draco was the first recorded legislator of Athens in Ancient Greece. He replaced the prevailing system of oral law and blood feud, with a written code to be enforced only by a court of law. Draco was the first democratic legislator requested by the Athenian citizens to be a lawgiver for the city-state, but the citizens had not expected that Draco would establish laws characterized by their harshness. Since the 19th century of the common era, the adjective "draconian" refers to similarly unforgiving rules or laws.
However, is not clear whether Draco's law specified the punishment for intentional homicide. In 409 BCE, intentional homicide was punished by death, but Draco's law begins:
'καὶ ἐὰμ μὲ ‘κ [π]ρονοί[α]ς [κ]τ[ένει τίς τινα, φεύγ]ε[ν]'
Although ambiguous and difficult to translate, one suggested translation is: "Even if a man not intentionally kills another, he is exiled."
Other uses
So, to define the Hebrew word used we should look at its other uses to see what common theme appears as there is more than one word for killing in Hebrew.
Numbers 35:6-34 is about the establishment of the cities of refuge. Here רָצַח “Rā-tsākh” is used to define the intentional act to cause harm with an implement that can cause death. This act is considered murder and the punishment for murder is death.
Numbers 35:15 also address that if the death was from an accident they can flee to a city of refuge. Notably here the word used is different it’s נָכָה “Nā-khāh” which the verb for striking, it’s the followed but the word שְׁגָגָה “Shəgāgāh” which means error or accidently. So, this suggests an accidental death “manslaughter” is not the same as murder.
Deuteronomy 4:41-43 19:1-13 and Joshua 20:3-5 cover the same “manslaughter” issues as Numbers 35 using the word רָצַח “Rā-tsākh” to describe the killer. These passages suggest that the only different between murder and manslaughter is that murder is done out of hatred and manslaughter is an accident with not hatred involved. However, they still use the same word for both options as the person here has done the verb of רָצַח “Rā-tsākh”.
Judges 20:4 is covers whole different issue on morals however, the word is once again used for killing with hatred.
1 Kings 21:19 Naboth was murdered however, even though the people who falsely accused him and killed him held no malice that we are aware of. The order stemmed from Jezebel using the name Ahab the king who hatred Naboth and it was these orders of Jezebel, in her malice towards him, Naboth was murdered.
2 kings 6:32, Hosea 6:9, Psalm 62:4, 94:6, Isaiah 1:21, Proverbs 22:13, Job 24:14, and Jeremiah 7:9 all use רָצַח “Rā-tsākh” as well, and all uses indicate a negative emotion of hatred, jealousy or malice.
Obvious omissions
What you may have noticed in the above references to רָצַח “Rā-tsākh” the murder of Abel in Genesis 4 is missing. After all isn’t this the first murder recorded in the scriptures. Well, it uses a different word הָרַג “Hā-rag” so back to the dictionary:
Brown-Driver- Briggs: Kill, Slay
Gesenius: Kill
Dictionary of Biblical Languages: Kill
The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew: Kill
At least this one is more consistent, so once again the question is "how is it used in scripture?". Some examples are Genesis 4:8, Isaiah 10:4, 14:20, Joshua 10:11, 13:22, Judges 9:54, Jerimiah 18:21.
This word is used many times and seems to be more consistent with violent and brutal killing. There is also a distinct different being that רָצַח “Rā-tsākh” is used more often when the killing is done privately, where הָרַג “Harag" is used in more in a public non-private setting i.e war, killing animals for food etc.
Also missing is when Moses attacked the Egyptian who was striking two Hebrew men. This is because it dose not use a word for killing, though some translations have definitely inserted that into the text. Most likely being based on the assumed context, as is says "...He looked around, he struck him and hid him in the sand." The word used here is the same as Numbers 35:15 נָכָה “Nā-khāh”, the interesting point here is that the Torah or the first 5 books of the bible is attributed to being authored by Moses. So here we have Moses saying that he looked around for witnesses and struck the Egyptian who appears to have died then he fled to a place of refuge, which is exactly what is later being described in Numbers 35:15. It could be argued here that Moses wrote in his own innocence later in the recording of the laws.
New Testament Jesus’s “Yeshua” view
Matthew 5:21-26 Yeshua clarifies murder (φονεύω “phoneuo” is consistent in the Septuagint (LXX) with ever use of “Rā-tsākh” in the MT. Here he even links anger, insult and calling someone a fool the same as murder. He encourages us there to reconcile with the person that has something against you even before you present your offering to the Lord at the altar. He shows that getting our heart right with our peers is the most important thing to do. If not how easy would it be for us to have anger, hatred, and malice in our hearts. If our heart isn’t pure even calling someone a fool can lead down the path to murder, and the act of calling someone a fool rather than reconciling with them is when the act of murder begins.
What have we learnt?
Murder is private act not one that incorporates the public, it’s motivated by malice in the heart, and its intentional.
Manslaughter is different however, the person who did the killing is still called a murderer in the scriptures for definition’s sake.
As the word רָצַח “Ratsakh” is only used concerning the killing of people and not animals, the commandment doesn’t relate to killing animals. Likewise it is not used for killing in war, this is where “Harag” is primarily used.
