Loving Your Neighbor: A Broader Perspective (Exodus 21:28-36) Series

Quite a few of us, if we were asked to name the ten words/commandments, wouldn't be able to come up with all ten. But for sure one of the ones we would name, is "Don't murder."

At first glance, this command is straightforward. God doesn't want his people to kill someone without legitimate cause. You can't murder someone because you're angry with them, or because you want their stuff. You can't murder them, simply because you want to. Murder is not the kind of thing that God will tolerate inside of his kingdom, among his people.

But if we stop and think about it, the concept of "murder" has some blurry lines to it. There are situations where you have the right to defend yourself, your family, or those around you, by killing someone. What exactly are those situations? We perhaps think of the "Stand your ground" states.

It also gets blurry, because sometimes people accidentally kill one another. Last week, we read about what happens when a master strikes his male or female servant, and ends up killing them. A more contemporary example, would be a foolish driver, texting his friend, who runs over a pedestrian. Is that murder?

The longer we think about all of this, the more complicated it seems. What's murder, and what's not?

Part of what our passage did last week, is answer the question of whether of whether or not it's okay to kill certain kinds of people. Are all human beings, truly, fully, human beings? Or are some humans, less important? Can you kill some types of people, for whatever reason, and not have it be murder?

Specifically, this played out with two different categories of people-- servants, and the unborn.

Let's reread our verses from last week, to remind ourselves of where we are in the Mosaic law, and help us get in the right frame of mind for today:

(20) and if a man strikes his male servant or female servant with the rod,

and he/she dies under his hand, he/she shall surely be avenged.

(21) However, if a day or two days he stands, he/she shall not be avenged,

because his money/purchase (literally: his silver), he/she is,

(22) and if men are fighting,

and they hit a pregnant woman,

and her children come out,

and there isn't bodily injury,

he shall surely be fined,

according to what the husband of the woman sets/imposes for him,

and he shall give in accordance with the judges/judgments,

(23) and if bodily injury, there is, you shall give life in place of life, eye in place of eye, tooth in place of tooth, hand in place of hand, foot in place of foot, burn/scar in place of burn/scar, wound in place of wound, bruise in place of bruise,

(26) and if a man strikes the eye of his male servant or the eye of his female servant, and he destroys it, as a free person he shall release him/her in place of his eye,

(27) and if the tooth of his male servant or the tooth if his slave woman he causes to fall out, as the free he shall release him in place of his tooth,

So what we've seen so far with the Mosaic law, has revolved around human violence. When humans harm, and kill, and murder one another, how do you respond? What happens next?

Perhaps you think, "None of this should be necessary. People should naturally, easily, do the right thing." But God is working with a hard-hearted people, who don't always want to do the right thing. Who sometimes sin against one another. And who need direction, on what happens next.

Starting in verse 28, in today's passage, we move from human on human violence, to animal on human violence. And what we see, is that the ox is the key animal. But before we start reading about ox on human violence, we should think a little about the ox, in ancient Israel.

I'm pretty sure most of us are a bit like Samson-- powerful, ripped, human beings, able to bench press twice our weight. Despite that, we find that some things push the limits of what we are capable of. There are bunk beds, cleverly designed fit into a box, that Fed Ex drivers can't get up to the third floor apartment by themselves. There are car parts, rusted into place, that refuse to do what our biceps tell them to do.

If we think about farming for long enough, at least in ND, we think about giant boulders. Even for a young, college-aged guy, there are rocks too big to move. And that's true, even if his girlfriend is sitting there watching him. Give me the right tools, and I can till 40 acres. But it would take me weeks, and the lines for planting would be embarrassingly crooked.