BibleProject - 6th Commandment: Do Not Kill

Episode Date: May 18, 2026

The 10 Commandments E9 — We’re now entering the second half of the 10 Commandments, where God guides Israel in how to relate to one another. The 6th Commandment is often translated “Do not murder.” However, the Hebrew word translated as "murder" can also be translated as "kill," which refers to both the premeditated and the unintentional taking of human life. So is this command saying not to kill at all? In this episode, Jon and Tim unpack the sixth command, highlighting the Bible’s ideal of valuing and protecting all life, even as things get increasingly complicated outside of Eden. FULL SHOW NOTES For chapter-by-chapter summaries, biblical words, referenced Scriptures, and reflection questions, check out the full show notes for this episode. CHAPTERS The 6th Commandment and the Broad Meaning of Ratsakh (0:00-25:52) The Cosmic Value of Life (25:52-36:29) Accountability for Taking Life (36:29-1:00:32) THE 10 COMMANDMENTS BIBLEPROJECT TRANSLATION View our full translation of the 10 Commandments. REFERENCED RESOURCES Find the related animated video for this episode here. The Ten Commandments: Interpretation: Resources for the Use of Scripture in the Church by Patrick D. Miller  Check out Tim’s extensive collection of recommended books. SHOW MUSIC “Pure Joy ft. John Lee” by Lofi Sunday “Gentle Lamb” by Lofi Sunday, Yoni Charis BibleProject theme song by TENTS  SHOW CREDITS Production of today’s episode is by Lindsey Ponder, producer, and Cooper Peltz, managing producer. Tyler Bailey and Aaron Olsen edited today’s episode and provided the sound design and mix. JB Witty writes the show notes. Our host and creative director is Jon Collins, and our lead scholar is Tim Mackie.  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We're in a series exploring the Ten Commandments, and we're doing them one by one, and we've just finished the first five, which are all about how we relate to God. Today we'll move on to the last five, which are all about how we relate to others. We'll begin with command number six, don't murder. Or, as Tim will want us to translate it, don't kill. The Hebrew word is Rasa. Which can be premeditated murder, but it can also refer to just accidentally killing someone. what we would call manslaughter.

It's a pretty broad word. So I think our English word kill is probably the best. It overlaps the most. So don't kill. I mean, of course, murder's wrong, but aren't there times when killing, even though sad and unfortunate, is the right thing to do? This is a great example of the Bible's meditation literature. You hear don't kill.

There's something intuitive. You're like, yeah, that sounds about right. But then you start to think, well, what about self-defense? What about protecting someone else? and the biblical authors have already beaten you to the punch. This is going to lead us on a trail that, of course, is going to lead us back to Genesis 1 through 9. The Sixth Command is a blanket prohibition.

Don't end a life because life is of ultimate value in the Bible. God is the originator and the giver of life. He fills the world with living creatures. Then God shares that responsibility to care for life, oversee it, human image. Today we'll look at the first death in the Bible, which is a murder. Cain becomes jealous of his brother Abel and ends his life. God confronts Cain and tells him that the blood of his brother is crying out from the ground. Something cosmic has happened. Human life is an image of God, and it's so precious and valuable that you're causing a rupture in the cosmos to take a human

life in an unauthorized way. It's not yours to take. We'll also look at how, kosher food laws are connected to a deep respect of the life of animals. You can't take the life of an animal to eat its flesh, but not its blood. You've got to pour that blood back on the ground. There's this extreme valuing of life. Every time you take the life of an animal and want to eat it, I want you to go through a process that will remind you this life isn't yours. And we'll look at the inherent paradox of capital punishment in the Bible.

Capital punishment is allowed for here, but even capital punishment sets in motion a cycle of violence like an impossible crisis that drives the biblical story forward. And all of that is the rhetoric of the sixth command. Don't kill. The purpose of God's commands is for life. And the sixth command here makes that perfectly clear, that the best of our thinking, the best of our energies, our greatest wisdom and moral conviction

is most aligned with God when we aim all of it. of that at the preservation and the flourishing of life. Today, Tim and I wrestle with the wisdom of the sixth command. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. Hey, Tim. Hello, John Collins. We're in the Ten Commandments.

That is what we are doing. And today we move into, what are we, five? One, two, three, four, five, fifth command? We are doing Command six. Whoa, we're in six. And seven. It was a track. Yeah, and actually six, seven, eight.

are the ones that are most easy to remember from the Ten Commandments. Don't kill, don't commit adultery, don't steal. Yeah, you said these are two words in Hebrew each? Each of them is two words in Hebrew. Lowe is the Hebrew word for not or no. And then it's just the single verb. Lothir tach, lo tin ath, lo tignoth. No murder, no adultery, no stealing.

Stealing. No thieving. No thieving. Yeah, these three commands 6, 7, 8 are the shortest, and it's a little triad. So we're going to take them in turn one by one. We're going to dive in to You Will Not Kill. And even with that translation right there, I've already made a bunch of decisions that we're going to have to talk about. Okay.

By using the word kill? By using the word kill instead of murder. So it's just a great example of the Bible is meditation literature. It says one thing, and then you start to ask questions of it, and you think you're being like skeptical or innovative. What about this? What about that? What about this? What about that? Is that the classic, like, what if you're at war? What if you're... What about self-defense? What about protecting someone else? What about unintentional killing? What about accidents? When you hear don't kill, there's something intuitive, you're like, yeah, that sounds about right?

Don't do that. But then you start to think, well, what about in this situation? And the biblical authors have already beaten you to the punch. This is going to lead us on a trail that, of course, as always, is going to lead us back to Genesis 1 through, actually 9, 1 through 9. That's so rad. They anticipated all of your questions by addressing them already in the first nine pages of Genesis. the sixth command, Lothier Tzach, don't kill,

is just the opening of a door into a large, well-designed museum tour through the really complex set of issues around the value of a human life. That's really what we're invited to meditate on here is what is the value of a human life and why, why is a human life valuable the way that it is? how should we respond to that value?

There you go. These are the things we will meditate on. But first, how do you render Lothierzach? In English? Into English. Let's start there. Okay.

So, just a quick survey of contemporary English translations will show an interesting pattern. Almost all of our contemporary English translations render this sixth command as, you shall not, or thou shalt not,

murder. Murder. Murder. New international version, English standard version, new American standard, new revised version, Christian standard Bible. It's just really all the way across. But there's one outlier. One outlier, which is the good old King James. King James win a different route, going all the way back like many centuries, which translates it, thou shalt not kill.

So before I tell you what I think is the difference between those two Between killing and murdering Yeah, because I've given a lot of thought to it But I'm just curious like coming in cold When you hear those two English words, murder versus kill How would you describe the difference between them? Hmm I think that killing

Is the more general Making something ceased to be alive Yeah, yeah Super general. Murder has the same baseline. You're ceasing something to remain alive. Murder has a connotation to it of, and you shouldn't have done it. Yeah, yeah.

Because it's okay to kill your lawn if you want to plant new lawn. Yeah, sure. Or like dig a French drain in your yard. You're going to have to kill some grass. digging it up to get some drainage going. Yeah. It's okay to kill some bacteria in your gut if you don't want it there, I guess. So you're saying kill is a little more neutral or? Well, yeah, maybe it's more neutral.

I mean, it always feels intense. Killing is, yeah, yeah. There's intensity to it. Ending the biological vitality. Yeah. Life of something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it leaves open of whether or not it was allowable or whether or not it was okay.

Yeah. Or murder is saying you didn't have the right to take that life. Yeah, sure, sure. So we have kill, murder, slay. I think slaughter comes from slay. Yeah. I think manslaughter feels kind of similar to kill to me. Okay.

Yeah. In a way. Yeah, right. Like, yeah, you killed them. Yeah, so it's interesting. Kill can refer to taking human life and any other kind of life, animal life, plant life. Yeah. Murders reserved for humans. Murder is reserved for humans.

And I think slay or swaths. You don't murder your lawn. Oh, but slaughter can be for animals or humans. Yeah. But you wouldn't say you slaughter at the plant. No, you don't slaughter plants. So you kill humans, animals, or grass. Murder is only for humans.

Okay. And then slay or slaughter is for animals and humans, but not plants. Yeah. We can make a little Venn diagram right now. Sure. Like meaning and overlapping meanings. Yeah. So there's a variety of words in biblical Hebrew for the taking of life.

Okay. And they all, as you might imagine, have different nuances. Right. So the one used in the Kane and Abel story introduced there as Harag. Hmm. Harrog. Kane Harrogs. Kane Harrogs, his brother.

Harrog is used 160 times in the Hebrew Bible. that comes probably closest to our English definition of murder. So it's unauthorized taking of a life. Harog. Oh, so the verb to die, which means the ending of a life, but just on its own, is moot. But then you can make that verb causative and say, make something die. We might say put to death, cause the death. And that's instead of moot, which means to die, hey, meet.

It means to cause the death of somebody. To cause the death is a fairly good way to put it in English, because this can refer to murder sometimes. It can refer to accidental death. It can also refer to authorized death like capital punishment. And that phrase appears 200 times. So the one used here is Ratzach. Okay.

Lothirzach in the basic form Ratzach. it appears about 46 times in the Hebrew Bible, whereas other verbs for the taking of a human life occur way more often. So the question is, what does Ratzach mean? So let's look at some examples here. First, thinking back to our Le Venn diagram in English, Ratzach only ever refers to the taking of a human life, not animals. So in that sense, it's not like kill in English.

Or slaughter. Or slaughter. Yeah. Yep. Ratzach can describe premeditated murder. So a well-known story of premeditated murder in the Hebrew Bible is when Ahab sees that this guy who owns some ancestral property right next to his, like, palace, a guy named Navotte, has this really nice vineyard. This is in First Kings chapter 21. And so with the help of Ahab's wife, Jezebel, they scheme up this plan to get false witnesses to accuse this guy of cursing the name of God. This First King's 21.

The whole story is working with the Ten Commandments and all these interesting ways. But the word Ratzach is used in that story to describe when Ahab took the life of this guy Navote to get his land. But what's interesting is he actually hired two guys to accuse Navod of cursing God's name. And then once he's found guilty of that by the mouth of two witnesses,

then they execute him. Then they put him to death. Okay. But the word used is the rotsach. And then a prophet goes to meet Ahab and says, you ratzacht this guy. Oh, okay. That's what the prophet says.

Yeah. So it's really interesting, like it happens by someone else's hand, but yet it's Ahab that's accused of doing the rotsach. Okay. So clearly meditated, even though he didn't do it. Yeah. So that's interesting. So you can use Ratzach to refer to that.

Here's another example. Almost half of the times that Ratzach appears occurs in a very specific place and context, talking about the cities of refuge, where somebody who's killed another person can take refuge. Okay. In Numbers, Chapter 35, Joshua, chapters 2021. Half of the occur in those two places in the Hebrew Bible.

So these are six cities in ancient Israel that were set apart as like an asylum type of city. And anybody who has taken the life of another person can run there and be protected until like an actual judicial process and a hearing can go through fair trial. That's the basic idea. Our version of I want to call my lawyer. Yeah, that's right. And this is where you flee, because the family member, right, of the person that just died. He's going to exact revenge. He's going to come in hot and looking for revenge.

So these cities are selected in numbers 3511 so that a Rotsayach, which is the noun form of Ratzach, the killer, who has struck a person unintentionally can flee there. Yeah, because the point of this place is that it might be that you didn't mean to, and maybe you shouldn't be put to death. Or it could be that you were framed or something. Yeah. And so it wasn't a premeditated murder. Yeah. Yeah.

So Ratzach can refer to accidental taking of a life. It can refer to framing someone. The ends in them being killed. That ends in them dying under capital punishment. It's a pretty broad word. Okay. So murder doesn't work, I don't think. Because?

Because here in Numbers 35. We wouldn't call that murder. No. We'd call that manslaughter. Yes, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And what Ahab did isn't quite murder

because it's setting someone up, framing them, so that they end up dying. So I think our English word kill is probably the best. It overlaps the most because kill can refer to intentional or unintentional. And even though in Hebrew

you never Ratzach an animal whereas kill can refer to plants or animals or humans. But Kills about our most general word to describe taking the life but it doesn't address purpose, premeditated, accidental. It just covers all of them.

I think Kills pretty good. Yeah, I hear that. Help me understand this word more, Ruttalk. Is there any more examples we can see? Yeah, there's 46 examples, in fact. But I think it's just good to say in the moment that to translate it murder, kind of... Yeah, what's the problem with murder?

Stacks the deck. Stacks the deck. Yeah. Okay. When I think of Do Not Murder, I guess I don't think of the example of the person who unintentionally did manslaughter. Right. But you're saying this word is used in that instance.

Yes. In fact, in numbers 35, that's mostly what it refers to as somebody who's accidentally taken the life of someone. And murder doesn't mean that. Okay. But Ratzak does mean that. Okay. Now, but is that, I guess what I would want to know is the numbers use of Ratzach, is that a real baseline use or is that a more novel kind of use of it? Oh, I see.

Well, there's a bunch of cases where actually within numbers. Here, let's just go there. It gives you a bunch of case studies. So, numbers 35, 16. Let's say somebody hit someone with an iron tool, and that person dies. That person is a roteach. And they must be put to death.

Okay. So basically the idea is if you've got a hammer in your hand, you know that that's going to kill the person. Yeah. And if you choose to strike with a hammer, you're a Rotsakh. You're Rotsiech. Yep. If you strike with a stone large enough that it could kill the person and they do die,

you're a Rotsayach. Okay. You're subject to capital punishment. Yeah. Let's say you strike with a wooden weapon. Yep. And they die. So in all these cases, there are Rotsayach subject to capital punishment.

Let's say one guy strikes another guy out of hatred. or throws something at him on purpose, and he dies. You're about seach, and you're subject to capital punishment. But let's say the person struck them just right in a moment without hating them, they just threw something at him, but they didn't mean to, and that person dies, then the community needs to get involved. And then we need to have a trial.

What's that word there? This is the same word. Ratzach. The community must... Oh, it's rendered different in English. Yeah, the community must save the rote seach out of the hand of the Avenger of Blood. So there it is. It's also unintentional. Yeah, so it's a good example where Ratzach refers to intentional and... That's so interesting. What are you looking at NIV? This is the Net Bible, New English translation. Yeah, let's see with the NIV.

How they do that here. Yeah, murderer, murderer, murderer, that's all intentional. and then it switches to manslayer. Manslayer, yeah. But it's the same word. It's the same word. Yes, that's right. So in NIV, when it's talking about intentional killing, it translates murder.

When it's unintentional, it translates manslayer. But when it comes to the Ten Commandments, the NIV chooses murder to render thou shalt not murder. Because you have to choose one word. So it's interesting. NIV is deciding when I'm in a context where it's obviously murder versus manslaughter, we'll make the decision. In a situation where it's ambiguous, we're going to not use a more general term to capture the ambiguity. We're going to decide.

Yeah. In other words, when you translate, don't murder, you're limiting the application of what you think is being referred to. and here's why I think this matters is where is this command supposed to send our minds is it supposed to send our minds only to premeditated calculated like first or second degree murder

or is this command supposed to send our minds on a more cosmic meditation on just ending someone's life at any way what really is involved in the ending of a life

and why is it that that should be avoided at nearly every cost so much so that just a simple command don't end a life because that is what Rassah means just ending a life unrelated to purpose or premeditation. So I think we're in the same territory here

as Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount do not judge. It's just blanket command and it just, you're like, whoa. Yeah, how's that possible? But then he goes on to start qualifying, right? Uh-huh. Just saying, okay, so do you mean never evaluate anybody's choices or behavior at all, ever, under any circumstance?

And then he goes on to talk about situations where you might have to evaluate. But he wants you to, by the shock factor of the prohibition, to step back and to say, like, whoa, what's the bigger picture here? And I think something similar is going on here with the use of this word Ratzach instead of the word Harag, don't murder. Yeah. So it's rhetoric, a rhetorical overstatement that forces you to start thinking.

Okay. So here, I guess here's... So let me remember, there's something very important about the 10 commands is that they are closely joined to the 42 that come right after them. Okay. And what's so interesting

is when you get to the 4th, 42, there's a whole section of the 42 that starts working with all the qualifications. And all of a sudden it makes you start thinking about what is the purpose of that two-word prohibition back there in the 10? So in the 42 that follow, you have this case law in Exodus chapter 21. The one who strikes a man so that he dies, that one should be put to death. Yeah. So it's not the word ratach.

It's not even the word murder. It's just the word hit. Okay. Let's say you hit somebody and then that person dies, capital punishment. Whoa. Yeah, it's intense. It is intense. And you start asking, well, what about this?

What about that? Okay. So verse 13. Well, if that guy didn't lie and wait for him, meaning like scheme it. Yeah, scheme it. but rather there's a rabbit hole that I'm going to try and have a gingerly walk around. Okay. But let's say God allowed him to fall into his hand.

Okay. In other words, the guy didn't plan it. Yeah. But in the mysterious providence of God, circumstances came together so that an accident, the accidental murder. Okay. then I, God, will appoint for you all a place where he may flee. It's referring to the city of refuge. Okay.

But let's say that a man schemes against his neighbor so as to Harag murder him by treachery. Yeah, that guy needs to be put to death. Okay. So you have this general statement, anybody who hits another human and they die, they should be put to death. right there. Yep. You're like,

that sounds like a command. Okay. But then you have... All these qualifications. You have these, immediately these two qualifications. Well, but if it was unintentional, no. I see.

And if it was intentional, yes. So that's a pattern set right there. Mm-hmm. Okay. The baseline is, a human life is not there for you to take. Yeah. Apparently,

a human life is so valuable that it's worth this kind of blanket prohibition, even though we know and God knows and Moses knows, there's going to be all these qualifications. But let's for a moment forget about the qualifications. Don't end a life. Don't do it. In other words, the sixth command is a form of wisdom literature. It's forcing you to take responsibility for all of the infinite variety of ways

where you're supposed to carry out the value underneath the prohibition. Right, okay. But it's going to look different in every different circumstance. Yeah, we've always had so much trouble with this as one of the commands, right? Like, because if you're in the military or if you're... Yes. And you had to go to war. Right.

Or, yeah, what if someone's trying to kill your family? Like, you get to all these scenarios and you're like, and you feel all that tension. And if you come to this list going, this is like a definitive list that can just check things off or not, then it just feels weird. It's like it feels underdeveloped. But you come to it as wisdom literature. Yes. Yeah. And then the question is okay. What am I supposed to do? And you're saying, from the beginning of this conversation, let's go to Genesis. Yes. And let's see what the wisdom is. Yeah. Where is the first time that the word life is used? Let's start there. Okay. Because what we're this ending is, wow, apparently the value of a life is really important.

Yeah. So, to Genesis, one we go. So this is very, very simple point to be made. God is the originator and the giver of life, according to the narrative world and claim of Genesis 1. There was lifelessness, darkness, disorder. That's how the Genesis 1 narrative begins. God brings order in days 1 through 3. And then on days 5 and 6, He fills the world with living creatures. Chayot is the plural living beings, but it's the plural of chaya or chai, which means to be alive, living, animal or human life.

And then what we're tall on day six is one particular of those chayot living things is what's called Adam. And God says, let us make Adam in our image according to our likeness, and let them rule, overall, and there's a list of the animals, the fish, the birds, the cattle, or creeping things on the land.

Elohim created human in his image, in the image of Elohim, he created him, male and female, he created them, and Elohim blessed them, and said to them, be fruitful, and multiply, fill the land, subdue it, rule over the fish, the birds, and the chayot, the living things.

So life comes from God. Yeah. Genesis 2's way of depicting that will be God breathing into the dirt and animating the land with the life of heaven, so to speak, God's own heavenly life. And making creatures. And making humans. Yep, making humans. But then here's one particular creature here in Genesis 1 that is among the living things,

but then is also then called to take responsibility for the life of other living things in the form of ruling and having responsibility for. And that particular creature is called the image of God, made in the image. So that's a little meditation right there. Yeah. All life comes from God. So God has a responsibility over the life. So God is responsible for the life.

And can rule over the life. And can rule directly. But then God shares that responsibility. to care for life, oversee it, to a human image. God delegates that care for life. So that seems pretty foundational. All life comes from God, and then God shares that oversight and care for life with human image.

So it is very interesting, then, that in the Garden of Eden story, God is the giver of life. But then also, if humans prove themselves to be, bad partners, God has the prerogative to take away life, or at least he exiles Adam and Eve from the garden where they will die. They no longer have access to God's eternal life. So God both gives life now, and then God can make this call that, man, if the humans are going to define good and bad by their own wisdom, they should not have eternal life. access to eternal life if they're in that state.

So he can take away life. So he exiles them, and even though he doesn't kill them on the spot, as it were, he does banish them to the place where they will eventually die. So the biblical authors take for granted that it is God's prerogative alone to give and to take away life. And that human images can be delegated. to care for life. And that sends your mind, well, maybe human beings

could be delegated to take away life. Sure. It doesn't say that. It doesn't say, but it does say what's the word? It's subdue. Oh, yeah, subdue. That's right. In my mind, subduing can get kind of...

Yeah. It's anticipating that there'll be a hostile confrontation from some of the animals, like a snake, for example. Yeah. But it doesn't necessarily anticipate that you're going to have to hurt other humans. No, it's in relationship to the animals. Yeah, that's right.

Yeah. So God can give life. God can take away life. Humans are called to care for life. Yeah. But that's where the story is so far. Okay. Next story, Cain and Abel,

which incidentally, it's all about taking of life. Yeah. So you have a brother. He's angry. And God says that you have a choice between doing good and not doing good. good. This is Genesis of chapter 4 verse 7. If you do good, Cain, if you're angry, won't there be exaltation lifting up for you? If you do not do good, be careful, because sin is like a croucher,

and it desires you, but you can rule it. Like all the creatures, you're supposed to rule. Yes, now you've got this angry impulse against your brother, and you need to rule over it, just like a hostile animal might threaten your community or your village, your children, even though it doesn't haven't yet. So obviously Kane doesn't do good. He gives in to sin because he murders his brother. God comes to Kane and says, hey, where's your brother? And Abel says, what?

Am I the keeper of my brother? Which implied there is, am I responsible for him or his life, really? and very clearly God assumes that a brother is responsible for the life of his brother because he goes on and says, what have you done? The voice of the spilt blood, shed blood of your brother is crying out to me from the ground. Something cosmic has happened where the return of his brother's blood to the ground by his own hand instead of caring for the life of his brother, he's taken the life

and he's returned that human life to the ground but in an unauthorized way? It's not cool. Yeah. You just broke the cosmos. You just broke the system. The blood. You broke the cosmos.

You're saying this phrase, the blood crying out from the ground is a phrase that makes you think you broke the cosmos. You just, yeah, yep. Like the universe is designed to work a certain way. Life is a precious gift from God. The blood represents the life.

The blood is the life. And so the life is meant to be in you. In you. You're supposed to have the life. In your body. If the life is spilled out into the ground, now the ground has the life. Yep.

You don't have the life. You're dead. Yep. And so there's this turn of phrase. The blood now is crying out. crying out. It's your accuser. It's accusing the murderer saying, this is not okay. Yeah.

I'm supposed to be alive. You didn't have the authority to do that. You didn't give life to your brother. God did. You can't just take the life of another human like it's yours to take. It's not yours to take. And the crying out means not just accusing, but kind of saying something's wrong now. Yeah, that's right.

So within the narrative world of Genesis 1 through 4, God's the giver of life. Human life is an image of God, and it's so precious and valuable that you're actually rupturing, you're causing a rupture in the cosmos to take a human life in an unauthorized way. It's not yours to take.

So what's interesting is Kane begins a spiral of violence that continues on through his descendant Lamek, who starts like glorifying violent, taking of life. And then that leads to the whole debacle with the Nephalim and Genesis 6. And what results from all that is violence in the land,

Genesis 6, and innocent blood crying out to the ground, from the ground to God. The picture is, this is normalized now. People are just saying, it's not a big deal, we just kill each other.

That's right. Point is taking of human life starts becoming the norm. That's the norm. in a post-Kane world. Yeah. Kane sets in motion, a degrading trend. Life is a battlefield at this point.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And for Ghaniuk-Lemek, personal honor and status is just as valuable, if not more valuable, than another person's life. So you slap me, you wound me, I chop your head off. That is true in many traditional honor, shame cultures throughout history. And think if your generations into a culture where personal honor is more valuable than anybody's life,

then it actually becomes reasonable to take your own life if you have been dishonored. Oh. It becomes reasonable to take another person's life if they dishonored you. Yeah. So when we see the scaling of violence that leads up to the flood, it's in the model of, Lamek, who's saying, if you dishonor me, I take your life. Yeah, that's right. And that logic or that kind of way of living scaled up just makes things get out of control.

Yeah, that's right. Okay. So after the flood, where God purifies the land from all this built blood, and Noah and his sons get off the boat and their wives and his wife. And God says, then be fruitful and multiply. But then there's this whole little set of qualifications that God gives because now humans are in the habit of taking the life of creatures and of other humans. So the first thing that God does with Noah is modify the vegan diet of Eden and says,

okay, now the creatures, the birds and the fish and the ground creepers, they are in your hand to eat for food just like I gave you the plants in the Garden of Eden. So it's like a concession. God makes a concession. You can eat the animals now. Yep. However, and here's the concession.

Verse four, you cannot eat the flesh of another creature if it's lifeblood is still in the veins. You cannot. So we're back to thinking about the blood, like we did with Kane and Abel. then some well-known lines maybe, I don't know, it depends on how well-known. God says, indeed, I will require your life blood

from every beast I will require it, and from every human, from a man's brother, I will require the life of a human. So if you take the life of an animal or if you take the life of a human, God will come looking for you, just like he did with Kane. So if an animal takes the life of another human or animal, or if a human takes the life of another human or animal, you're accountable to God for that. From every beast, I will require it, and from every human.

And from a man's brother, I will require your lifeblood. If you take... Yeah, the general idea, I think, is that here's the thing. Humans are violent. You're going to kill each other, and you're going to kill animals to eat them, But I want you to know something. Anytime a life is taken, human or animal, God's paying attention.

God will require it. And that's a dense phrase, and we don't have time to go down a full study of it. But the point is, God will show up. He's paying attention anytime a living creature's life is taken. Okay. So you can eat animals. Yeah. But not the blood.

Don't eat the blood. Okay. Yeah. You got to pour it out. Yeah. I pour out the blood. And then it says, I will require your lifeblood. What does that mean?

I will require your lifeblood? If you take the life of another creature, there'll be some accountability. I will require your lifeblood. I think it's implied if you take it illegitimately or if you devalue. So we haven't finished reading. In classic biblical kind of meditation literature style, the main main thing. point is saved for the end. Okay. Which is this.

The one who pours out the blood of a human, by a human his blood will be poured out. Why? Because in the image of God, he made Adam humanity. So the life and the lifeblood of any creature, human or animal, is of ultimate value to God, God's pain attention. and if you illegitimately take the life of an animal or a human

because basically the flesh with its life and its blood you will not eat so this is the foundation of the kosher food laws that will get developed in Leviticus. But you've already killed the animal. That's right. So the life of the animal has been taken. So now it's honor the life of the animal

don't eat its blood. That's right. Okay. Yeah. Because the blood is the life. life, so let's flip it over. I think the logic underneath this is, God is the giver of life. And we've already established that it's not a human's prerogative based on their own desire

or honor shame system to take the life of another human. It's not okay. And if you take the life of another creature, you stand before God for it. If it's the life of an animal, you can't do that. if you want to, but you have to honor its blood, return it to the ground from which it came. Then verse 5 and 6, I think go on to talk about that even though you can kill and eat an animal, just so they were clear, like the lifeblood of any creature, it's mine, it's God's.

God will hold you accountable for acting like you have the other. authority to take the life of another creature. I will hold you accountable for murder. That's what require your lifeblood means. Yeah, yes. Hold you accountable for murder. And you'll be accountable for murder if you kill an animal and then consume its blood. Okay.

Because you are acting like God. Like you can just take the life of another animal. Now God says you can't take the life of an animal to eat. flesh, but not its blood. You got to pour that blood back on the ground and give it back to the ground from which it came. So there's this extreme valuing of life as a principle of the life of animals and humans. So you're saying that extreme value of life first showed up as you actually don't have the right to eat an animal. Yeah, in Eden. And Eden didn't say it explicitly. Yeah.

But it's eat the fruit. Eat the fruit. Eat the plants. Rule the animals. Yeah. And when Noah gets off the ark, you get this pretty strange concession where God says, okay, about the animals and you can eat them now. Yeah.

Which makes, just right there, you're like, wow. Okay, we weren't eating animals. That wasn't the point to eat the animals. Yeah, ruling animals, according in Genesis 1, did not involve being able to eat The life of animals are really important. Extremely important. Life is important.

Life is because life is important. Yeah. The life of specifically creatures here. And blood, the blood of animals, the blood of humans, is their life. Yeah. We know that from the cane story. Liquid life. Liquid life.

Okay. So when we get to this concession, God's telling Noah, you can eat the animals now, but man take this seriously. right that's what we're supposed to get because you're taking the life for your own benefit and you're stepping into territory that's very that's my territory

yeah yeah that's God's territory because God is the author of life humans aren't supposed to be the ones who can just decide when life ends for something else yeah human or animal human or animal yes that's right however

God knows that humans are both violent and that they want to eat flesh. So he makes this concession. But then even in the concession, he creates like a... Take the life of this animal. Every time you take the life of an animal and want to eat it, I want you to go through a ritual, a process that will remind you that actually this life isn't yours. It's gods.

Okay. That's not eating the blood of the animal. Yep, that's right. And this, indeed, I will require your lifeblood is saying like... Yeah, if you take the life of an animal and eat its blood, you are acting like it was your life to take. And that will require your life. And that is akin to taking the life of a human.

And for taking life of a human, the one who pours out the blood of a human by a human, his blood will be poured out. And then what's the ground for all of this? underneath all of this, is that in the image of God, he made human. So humans are called to rule and care for life on God's behalf. And if you selfishly appropriate the life of an animal and act like your God over it, not cool. God will require your life for that. And if you certainly do that for another human image of God, but notice there's a paradox here.

the one who pours out the blood of a human, that is who murders a human, by a human his blood will be poured out. You'll be put to death by another human. But then that human, who takes a life of a human as like a just response, will then be responsible, right? It sets up almost this little circular paradox.

We're now humans are just going to become endlessly responsible for this cycle of violence. it's almost like an impossible scenario. Human life is so valuable, humans should never take a life. But to enforce that very point, capital punishment is allowed for here, but even capital punishment is qualified because it just sets in motion in the cycle. That's really fascinating. It's almost like if you want to make your bed, so to speak, on a cycle of violence,

on one sense a cycle of violence like capital punishment upholds something capital punishment communicates something it communicates that it's not okay to take a human life but it also defeats itself because you're taking human life to make the point that it's not ours right prerogative to take human life isn't the logic of capital punishment like if you take someone's life how could you ever repay them there really is no way to repay them. The only really equitable thing is you forfeit your life. Right. But then you're saying, now we're in this paradox of, okay, well, if you force someone to forfeit

their life, well, now you've taken their life. Now you've taken their life. Yeah. Yes. And now you're responsible for their life. Right. And so right in this law of retaliation, capital punishment, is like a bug that's going to just create all these problems.

Yes, yeah, that's right. Yep. So Patrick Miller, who I learned a lot from on the Ten Commandments, Hebrew Bible scholar, he names it this way. This is helpful. He says, the tension of God's blessing of life and the warning of God's authority to take life through capital punishment is now remains within the human community.

So God's the giver of life. This is me commenting on Miller's comment. God's the giver of life, and only God has authority to take life. So that's a tension right there, even within, like, God's own responsibility of creation. And now God's giving over that responsibility to the human community. Miller goes on, the rule of God over life is so clear, and the value of life is so high that nothing except a human life can compensate for it. But in such act, however, the community, which we know is going to be fallible in its procedures of justice, the community is always at risk of violating the first part of the

tension, which is the sacred value of life. The text goes as far as one can in scripture in asserting the possibility of a legitimate taking of life through judicial procedure. But it does so within the context of God's instruction that goes as far as it can in protecting human life. The text doesn't give attention to the problems always present in a community's decision to take a life for a life that's been taken. And so the community has to face the thorny question of deciding on which side of the tension

it'll come down. So what he's trying to name is that there's this inherent paradox within the sacred value of human life, and then the taking of the life as a just demonstration of the value of human life. And that, in a way, this becomes like a little infinity loop. As I've reflected on this, this is a part of the tension driving the biblical story forward in a crisis of how do you both honor the sacred nature of God's life that God wants to desten his human images towards eternal life?

but yet to enforce and communicate that value if somebody is careless with a human life, the only way to really communicate that is to take a human life, which it's kind of like, well, what's the way forward then? I guess the way forward would be if you could surrender a life that truly isn't able to be conquered by death, I guess you'd be able to solve the riddle. I'm kind of pointing way forward here and quickly the story of Jesus. But you're setting up a problem here.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I'm beginning to appreciate the problem in a new light that this passage is, in a very forceful way, is making you reckon with the fact that all life, human and animal, is of this utmost value.

So, like, if you're going to start eating animal, like this is serious business because life is so, so important. Yes. So much so than when you get to human life now, it's like how much more important it is to respect the life of a human. And so what becomes kosher law is embedded in it, this deep, deep respect and honor for the life of an animal. Of another animal.

So much so that there's this phrase that I'm still just trying to reckon with where God says, I will require your life. By the way you mistreat another life. Even animals. Animal life, yeah, yeah. I mean, there I feel like I just need to stop and like... Yeah, go for a long walk. Yeah.

Evaluate. I don't think I've really come to terms with that, actually. So that's throwing me for a loop. Good. Well, I mean, I think probably it's supposed to, yeah, supposed to get in our face. It's getting in our face saying, this is how important life is.

Even animal life, like take that really, really seriously. So like we've just ramped up the value of life like as high as we could go. And then this is a puzzle. What do you do when someone violates that? Yeah, yeah. When someone like just takes someone's life for shaming them or decides your life's not important, I'm going to take it. if life is that extremely valuable, what is there to do in that situation with that person? Yeah.

That person is going to create chaos in our communities. That person also has just done something that is just cosmically violating. And so the only logical thing is that person has forfeited their right to live. They're right to be part of this whole thing. Yeah. They can't have the life anymore. They can't, yeah, yep. Okay, well then who's going to exact that?

Yeah, who's going to carry that out? Who's going to carry that out? Yeah. Because when you carry that out, well, now you're back in the exact same situation of what, but that person's life is still their life. They forfeited it, but like, it's still life. That's still life. Yeah.

And so, man, be careful. That's right. We were saying is implicit in this is like, man, that's a dangerous game to play of like now taking that person's life. And humans are well into playing that dangerous game full on by at this point in the biblical story. Yeah. And so that's why I was using the infinity loop. Yeah.

It's like an impossible crisis that drives the biblical story forward, that whatever is going to have to happen now. Humanity has forfeited its right to live. But yet God is the one who has declared that animals and humans should live. And that all of that is taking for granted and driving the rhetoric of the Sixth Command. Lothir Tsach, don't kill. There's something so foundational and important and valuable about life. Yeah. That the baseline is you do not take it.

Do not do it. you don't cause it to stop being life. Yeah. Let life be life. That's right. And after the Ten Commandments come the 42, which is going to qualify that in all these ways that are important. And so maybe it's just good to say,

you and I are not in this moment trying to make official declarations about the legitimacy of capital punishment or, we're just trying to meditate on these texts. Or when you can defend your family or... That's right. What does it mean to be a... soldier and all that stuff. Yeah, that's downstream.

And you've got to think that through. Like, we all have to think those questions through in our communities, in our context. But as you think those things through, you're confronted with what feels like this real riddle and this pretty exacting charge. Yeah. Which is life of all creatures is so. valuable. And then human life, that's made in the image of God. And there's even something more cosmic there. Yeah, that's right. And you just don't mess with it. Yeah. It's not yours to take. Yeah. So when you start from there, then you kind of with like trepidation and real kind of somberness kind of start to think,

well, then what does it mean to eat an animal? And even more so, what does it mean to hold someone accountable to murder? What does it mean to protect my family? What does it mean? Like, how am I really going to reckon with this? So maybe a good way to land the plane on this conversation, but not on the issue. The issue is one that all of us have to be thinking about all the time for the rest of our lives, is that this is the sixth command and the theme.

mini-themed study we did of God's commands, you know, as the frame leading up to the Ten Commandments, is God's commandments are for life. Like, life is actually one of the key words used, connected to the purpose of God's commands, is to protect and preserve the life of the one to whom God commands, and then also to avoid the things that will lead to death. The purpose of God's commands is for life. the sixth command here of the 10 just makes that perfectly clear. It's meant to direct that the best of our thinking, the best of our energies,

our greatest wisdom and moral conviction is most aligned with God when we aim all of that at the preservation and the flourishing of life. Yeah. You know that you are close to the heart of God and the purpose of God if your actions are aimed at preserving and making life flourish.

And maybe that very open-ended, positive value is maybe just a good place to end our meditations. Because in a way, that just opens up a whole human life as to how you do that. And that is the purpose, I guess, of these commands to point us towards life and wisdom. Thanks for listening to this episode of Bioproject Podcast. Next week, we'll look at the Seventh Commandment, Do Not Commit Adultery, which leads us to a deeper conversation about the meaning and value of marriage. Marriage is a symbol of the creator's relentless focus, love, and loyalty towards creation. God has a lot of ways that he could express his creative potential,

but that he would relentlessly commit himself to the dirt creatures and pursue them, to love them as God loves God's own self. That's what a human marriage is meant to symbolize. Bible Project is a crowdfunded nonprofit, and we exist to experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. Everything that we make is free because of the generous support thousands of people just like you. Thank you so much for being a part of this with us. Hi, my name is Martha, and I'm from Florida.

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