Do Not Murder!: Shedding Innocent Blood and Polluting the Land

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Do Not Murder!: Shedding Innocent Blood and Polluting the Land Rabbi Shai Held The second tablet of the ten commandments begins with two stark, simple words: Lo Tirtzah, do not murder.

Scholars of law note that ancient legal collections tend to put their most prominent concerns first and then proceed to move to laws of lesser value.

1 Do Not Murder!: Shedding Innocent Blood and Polluting the Land Rabbi Shai Held The second tablet of the ten commandments begins with two stark, simple words: Lo Tirtzah, do not murder. Closely entwined with the Torah s impassioned insistence on the sanctity of human life, the prohibition on shedding innocent blood lies at the very heart of Judaism s theology and social vision. Scholars of law note that ancient legal collections tend to put their most prominent concerns first and then proceed to move to laws of lesser value. So it is surely no coincidence that the social laws of the ten commandments, which constitute the second tablet, are headed by the prohibition on murder. It is first because it occupies the most important place in this summary of social law. The value of the human person receives affirmation in this prohibition against murder as the highest value in the structure of the society. 1 Some translators, beginning with the Vulgate (4 th century), 2 render the sixth commandment as do not kill. But this casts too wide a net, because the Torah decidedly does not say that the The prohibition on shedding innocent blood lies at the very heart of Judaism s theology and social vision. taking of any human life under any circumstances is prohibited. As Bible scholar Peter Enns soberly points out, killing is something both God and the 1 Richard S. Hess, The Distinctive Value of Human Life in Israel's Earliest Legal Traditions, in The Ancient Near East in the 12th-10th centuries BCE: Culture and History, ed. Gershon Galil, Ayelet Gilboa, Aren M. Maeir, and Danʾel Kahn. pp Passages cited are on pp. 223, And likely earlier: Cf. Onkelos (c CE) translation of lo tirtzah as lo tiktol nefash, do not take a life. 1

2 Israelites, by God s approval, do throughout the Bible. As a rule, in any case, the word ratzah is never used to describe killing in war or as punishment for a crime. 3 What is spoken of in the sixth commandment, then, is culpable homicide, 4 not any and every instance where life is taken. The Torah emphasizes that the prohibition on murder is not a norm unique to God s covenant with Israel; according to Genesis, it lies at the core of God s covenant with all of humanity. So fundamental is the prohibition on homicide to the Torah s vision that it is the only law governing interpersonal relations given to Noah and his sons in the aftermath of the flood (Genesis 9:5-6). Upon emerging from the ark, they are told that they may now kill animals for food, but they must be careful not to consume the blood. But killing animals and killing people, the Torah insists, are radically different: Whereas an animal s blood may be shed but not consumed, a human being s blood may not be shed at all. 5 God announces: But for your own life-blood I will require a reckoning: I will require it of every beast; of man, too, will I require a reckoning for human life, of every man for that of his fellow man (Genesis 9:5). In order to accentuate the sheer weight of the crime of murder, God declares three times in a single verse that God will require a reckoning for spilled human blood. And then God adds: Whoever sheds the blood of a human being, by a human being shall his blood be shed (9:6). 6 The tight chiastic formulation (shed, blood, man, man, blood, 3 Peter Enns, Exodus, (2000), p For an exception one that perhaps proves the rule cf. the odd formulation in Numbers 35:30, where ratzah is used to describe the execution of an accidental manslayer. Bible scholar Jeffrey Tigay comments that the use of ratzah for executing a manslayer is exceptional, and is probably simply a literary device for showing that his death corresponds to his own deed. The term ratzah is never used elsewhere for killing (harag and hemit are used instead). Tigay, Deuteronomy (1996), p. 357n Victor P. Hamilton, Handbook on the Pentateuch (2005), p Cf. Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1-15 (1987), p It is worth noting, if only in passing, that some scholars propose that the verse might better be translated as Whoever sheds the blood of a human being, on account of the human being shall his blood be shed. Cf., for example, Jon D. Levenson, Genesis in Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler, eds., Jewish Study Bible (2004), comment to Genesis 9:6, and Everett Fox, Everett Fox, The Five Books of Moses: A New Translation with Introduction, Commentary, and Notes (1995), p. 42 ( for that human shall his blood be shed ). 2

3 shed) repeating each word of the first clause in reverse order in the second emphasizes the strict correspondence To kill a human being is effectively to launch an assault on God. of punishment to offense. 7 In contrast to the spare prose of the ten commandments, in the universal context of Genesis, the theological rationale for the prohibition is explicitly given. Why is murder considered such a grave offense? For in the image of God God made the human being (9:6). To kill a human being is effectively to launch an assault on God: Murder is the supreme and capital crime because the dignity, sanctity, and inviolability of human life all derive from the fact that every human being bears the stamp of the divine Maker. 8 More than that, since God is the source and sustainer of life, a murderer usurps the divine prerogative and infringes upon God s sovereignty. 9 At first reading, at least, there seems to be a tension in these verses from Genesis. One verse states that God will require a reckoning from those who shed innocent blood (9:5), while another asserts that human beings must be the ones to punish murderers (9:6). But the apparent contradiction yields a profound teaching. Human beings, created in the image of God, are here asked to do God s work to build a just civilization in which human blood is not cheap. Being created in the image of God does not only mean that we cannot be killed; it also means that we ourselves must act to prevent or at least deter such killing. Thus, the conclusion of the verse, for in the image of God God made the human being applies both to the victim and to the one who executes justice. A human being may not be murdered, for she was created in the image of God. And human beings must see to it that one who commits 7 Wenham, Genesis, p This is what Rabbinic tradition calls midah ke-neged midah, or measure for measure (poetic justice). 8 Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (1989), p Nahum M. Sarna, Exodus (1991), p

4 murder is punished, because we, too, are created in the image of God. Although Rabbinic tradition had serious misgivings about capital punishment and effectively did away with it, 10 the force of the biblical message endures. As Bible scholar Tikva Frymer-Kensky notes, Human beings must be the ones responsible for making sure that human beings are not killed. God will not act to save the threatened person or to wreak vengeance or bring punishment on the killer. Instead, God established a system in which we, the images of God, perform the divine task of preventing and punishing murder. 11 What is at stake for the Torah is the Parashat Mas ei reiterates the insistence that a murderer must be put to death, supreme and incalculable worth of (all) and adds a crucial coda: You may not human beings. accept ransom for the life of a murderer who is guilty of a capital crime; he must be put to death (Numbers 35:32). This prohibition on taking money instead of life has no parallel in the ancient Near East; all Near Eastern law recognizes the right of the slain person s family to agree to a settlement in lieu of the death of the slayer. Some suggest that the Torah s insistence on taking the life of the one who takes life is evidence of its archaic or primitive nature. But such readings are wrong-headed, I think, because what is at stake for the Torah is the supreme and incalculable worth of (all) human beings. The point is that one may never place a monetary value on a human life. The gravity with which the Torah treats murder is (perhaps paradoxically) made clear by how comparatively lightly it treats offenses against property. Whereas in Babylonia, for example, 10 R. Tarfon and R. Akiva say: Were we in the Sanhedrin [during the time when it had the power to execute], no one would ever have been killed (BT, Makkot 7a). But cf. R. Shimon b. Gamliel s response there. For R. Yohanan b. Zakkai s attempts to eliminate the death penalty in practice (if not in theory), cf. BT Sanhedrin 41a and 81b. For an important study of the status of the death penalty in Rabbinic literature, see Gerald J. Blidstein, Capital Punishment The Classic Jewish Discussion, Judaism 14:2 (Spring 1965), pp Tikva Frymer-Kensky, The Image, the Glory, and the Holy: Aspects of Being Human in Biblical Thought, in William Schweiker, Michael A. Johnson, and Kevin Jung, eds., Humanity Before God: Contemporary Faces of Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Ethics (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), pp Passages cited are on pp. 125,

5 one could be put to death for breaking and entering or looting a fire, for the Torah no crime against property is ever punishable by death. What emerges here is a stunning contrast: Whereas ancient Near Eastern law is lenient in dealing with homicide and strict with crimes against property, Biblical law is lenient with offenses against property and severe in confronting cases of homicide. According to Bible scholar Moshe Greenberg, the implications of this are dramatic: In biblical law life and property are incommensurable; taking of life cannot be made up for by any amount of property, nor can any property offense be considered as amounting to the value of a life. 12 Life can never, under any circumstances, be treated as a commodity; it is, irreducibly, a divine gift. To shed innocent blood, then, is to commit a morally and theologically unimaginable crime. This is the value that biblical law expresses and enforces. The first interpersonal sin reported in the Torah is the murder of Abel by his brother Cain, suggesting, perhaps, that the Torah considers murder the primary sin human beings commit against one another. Although Cain brazenly attempts to evade responsibility for what he has done ( Am I my brother s keeper? ), 13 God berates him: What have you done? Hark, your brother s blood cries out to Me from the ground! (Genesis 4:10). The story serves as a paradigm for what God will say after the flood: God here demands a reckoning from the first murderer. There is no getting around the enormity of the crime committed and no possibility of eschewing responsibility. But God s words to Cain are crucial in another way as well. As we ve seen, God tells Cain that the blood he has Life can never, under any circumstances, be treated as a commodity; it is, irreducibly, a divine gift. 12 Moshe Greenberg, Some Postulates of Biblical Criminal Law, in Studies in the Bible and Jewish Thought (1995), pp Passages cited are on pp. 30, Cf. what I have written about responsibility between siblings in His Brother s Brother: Judah s Journey, CJLI Parashat Miketz 5774, available here. 5

6 spilled cries out from the earth; God adds that the earth itself will cease to cooperate with him (4:12). The idea that the blood of innocent victims makes an appeal to God comes to play a crucial role in God s relationship with Israel. After instructing the Israelites not to accept a ransom for the life of a murderer, and not even to accept a ransom in lieu of exile for a manslayer, God adds a warning: You shall not pollute (tahnifu) the land in which you live; for blood pollutes the land, and the land can have no expiation for blood that is shed on it, except by the blood of him who shed it (Numbers 35:33). Parashat Mas ei makes clear that both murder and accidental killing pollute the land (cf. Netziv, Ha amek Davar to Numbers 35:34). The former is atoned for by the death of the murderer, the latter by the death of the high priest, who, it seems, dies on behalf of the killer (35:25). If Israel ignores these laws and treats the death of innocents lightly, the land will become defiled (titamei) and God will no longer be willing to dwell in their midst (35:34) As a midrash puts it, Bloodshed pollutes the land and causes the Divine Presence (Shekhinah) to depart (Sifrei, Numbers 161). The warning is ominous: God s blessings are contingent upon Israel s behavior. Just as the nations lost the land because of their abominations, so, too, can Israel. Just as the nations lost the land because of their abominations, so, too, can Israel. The terse, unadorned formula of the sixth commandment makes it clear that murder is forbidden, and that there is no place for exceptions or rationalizations. In 1938, tensions were high between Arabs and Jews in Palestine. In response to acts of terrorism against Jews, some Jews took revenge and committed acts of terrorism, killing innocent Arabs. A fierce debate broke out among the Jewish leadership in Palestine over how best to respond. Rabbi Moshe Avigdor Amiel ( ), Chief Rabbi of Tel-Aviv and a leader of the religious Zionist movement, was incensed 14 Cf. also the Torah s legislation of what to do when a corpse is found in the land but the identity of the killer is unknown (Deuteronomy 21:1-9). For other sins that pollute the land, cf., for example, Leviticus 18:24-30; Deuteronomy 21:22-23; and Jeremiah 2:4-7. For a useful discussion of pollution and its many dangers, cf. Tikva Frymer-Kensky, Pollution, Purification, and Purgation in Biblical Israel, in Studies in the Bible and Feminist Criticism (2006), pp

7 that some Jews condemned the murders out of fear that they would be counter-productive and sow discord among the Jews of Palestine. What if the murders did serve some political purpose, he wondered; would they be any less of an abomination in that case? R. Amiel wrote: The murder of Arabs is forbidden to us by the commandment do not murder. It represents unprecedented moral decay to argue that murder is prohibited because it is pointless. 15 Self-defense is one thing, Amiel consistently argued, but the murder of innocents is forbidden always and everywhere. Shabbat shalom. Sign up to receive Rabbi Shai Held s weekly divrei Torah direct to your inbox: 15 Moshe Avigdor Amiel, The Prohibition Do Not Murder In Relation to Arabs (Hebrew), Tehumin 10 (1989), pp Passage cited is on p For an important discussion of Amiel s approach to violence and military force, cf. Elie Holzer, A Double-Edged Sword: Military Activism in the Thought of Religious Zionism (Hebrew) (2009), pp

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