This is an excerpt from my book, GRAFTED: Embracing Torah, which can be purchased on Amazon.
Enjoy!
The Ten Commandments (The Big Ones)
And God (Elohim) spake all these words, saying, (Exodus 20:1)
Exodus 19:25 states, “So Moses went down unto the people,
and spake unto them.” This is the third time Moses came down from
Mount Sinai (between Exodus 19:3 and Exodus 34:29, Moses goes
up to meet Elohim atop Mount Sinai and comes back down seven
times – not bad for an eighty-year-old guy).
The verse following Exodus 19:25 (Exodus 20:1) states, “God
spake all these words…” so it appears Elohim audibly spoke to all the Israelites.
This seems to be confirmed in verses 18–22:
18 And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they removed, and stood afar off. 19 And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die. 20 And Moses said unto the people, Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that his fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not. 21 And the people stood afar off, and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was. 22 And the LORD said unto Moses, Thus thou shalt say unto the children of Israel, Ye have seen that I have talked with you from heaven.
The people in the valley were so shaken by the experience that
they did not want Elohim to speak to them again (I’m sure there was
a lot of reverb and pyrotechnics). The word Elohim is used because
His Message was for more than just the Israelites. This tells me that
what we refer to as the Ten Commandments are so important that
Elohim felt the need to personally tell them to His people. This is
why I wanted to start with them.
6. “Thou shalt not kill [murder]” (Exodus 20:12).
My soldiers asked me about this before we deployed to Desert Storm because it appears to be rather cut and dry and they were being ordered to violate it. It also appears to be a huge contradiction because the Israelites were being told to “not kill”, but later, Yahweh orders them to “utterly destroy” everyone in the land they are possessing, including the cattle and burning all the spoils (Deuteronomy 13:15).
The easy answer is that the word kill is mistranslated from the Hebrew. It is the Hebrew word ratsach that is defined as “murder.” All murder is killing, but not all killing is murder.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines murder as:
The crime committed where a person of sound mind and discretion (that is, of sufficient age to form and execute a criminal design and not legally “insane”) kills any human creature in being (excluding quick but unborn children) and in the peace of the state or nation (including all persons except the military forces of the public enemy in time of war or battle) without any warrant, justification, or excuse in law with malice aforethought, express or implied, that is, with a deliberate purpose or a design or determination distinctly formed in the mind before the commission of the act, provided that death results from the injury Inflicted within one year and a day after its infliction.
Murder requires motive and planning. It entails a cold-blooded determination to end a life and a methodical plan to achieve that end. Manslaughter is not murder because the requisite motive is not present; there was no plan to kill someone even if there was a plan to commit a crime.
Crimes of passion or negligence are normally considered manslaughter, and Yahweh provides for these by establishing “cities of refuge” (Numbers 35), where people could go to escape the revenge of the victim’s family and/or friends while they waited on the judicial system to assess the facts and render judgment.
Fighting in combat in defense of your nation is not murder (it may be expedient to take the battle to the enemy rather than wait for them to attack you on your land), unless you are doing it wrong. Oftentimes, the wrong people may get killed as part of the collateral damage of waging war. This is going to happen when people are in or near a battlefield. If someone surrenders, then they are no longer a hostile and deserve protection if it can be provided. If you target people who have surrendered, then that would be murder.
Civilians are considered combatants in most cases because they support the military of their nation. Their taxes, food, and moral support make them an active participant, and if it becomes necessary to bomb civilian areas to keep them from supporting the enemy armed forces, then this is not murder.
Yahweh destroyed the entire earth because His creation had become so irreparably corrupted. “Sons of God” (angels or devils) cohabitated with human women and created the mighty men (giants – Nephilim) of Genesis 6.
And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”
(Genesis 6:5).
There was no way to redeem this corruption, which would have ultimately destroyed the entire creation, so Yahweh decided to start over with the sole man who was “just and perfect and walked with God” (Genesis 6:9) – Noah. The Flood was necessary to save mankind and what was left of His Creation.
This corruption made it onto the Ark in the DNA of many of the survivors. It appears that the effects manifested themselves almost immediately in the offspring of Noah’s son Ham (see the notes at Genesis 9:25-26 in my commentary on Genesis, In the Beginning).
The “Noahide Laws” address the taking of life, also (Genesis 9:6).
The Nephilim (malevolent giants) and their legacy is a fascinating study, and there are many good videos about it on YouTube. Doug Hamp has written a book entitled Corrupting the Image that goes into great detail of how the Nephilim corruption could have passed into the general population after the Flood, even though all the original Nephilim died before the Flood.
Self-defense is not murder, which is why Yahweh commands His people to “utterly destroy” the people in Canaan. The Word tells us that giants inhabited the land (Numbers 13:33), meaning that the descendants of the Nephilim were still present. Eight of the ten spies (the eight fearful ones) who went into Canaan reported this:
31We be not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we. 32 And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the children of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature. 33 And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.
(Numbers 13:31–33)
Joshua and Caleb did not dispute the size of the giants (estimated at thirty-six feet!). They believed they could defeat these brutes (Goliath was one, and he was only nine feet tall) with the assistance of Yahweh.
The punishment for murder is death (Exodus 21:12-15 and Numbers 35:16–19) which is to be administered by man, so Elohim could not have meant generalized killing in this verse. States that have abolished the death penalty are heaping an unfair burden on the families of the victims. Not only have they been unfairly deprived of a loved one, but they also must sacrifice their tax dollars to keep the murderer alive. It is difficult to get a state government to change their minds on the death penalty but not impossible. There are many victims’ rights groups and other organizations that you can join to effect change to a biblical standard.
[continue to the 7th Commandment – No Adultery]
[1st Commandment – No Other Gods]
[2d Commandment – No Graven Images]
[3d Commandment – Taking the Name of Yahweh in Vain]
[4th Commandment – Keep the Sabbath Holy]
The first four Commandments are considered to be vital to our relationship with Elohim. The last six Commandments concern our relationship with others. This is why, when asked what the greatest commandment is, Yeshua is able to embody all ten in his short answer:
37 Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
(Matthew 22:37–39)
[5th Commandment – Honor Your Father and Mother]
[6th Commandment – Do Not Murder]
[7th Commandment – No Adultery]
[8th Commandment – Do Not Steal]