Does The 6th Commandment "Thou Shalt Not Kill" Include Civil Execution

Only In The Mind Of The Bible Novice

Every time there is a Civil Execution, these days, in the US, there is a crowd of people outside the prison carrying signs in opposition to Capital Punishment. Invariably some of the signs quote God's 6th commandment, "Thou shalt not kill". The Main Street Media are always there interviewing, and often a family member will say something like one sister asked loudly, "Did they expect that old man my brother killed to live forever? The State is against murder but they are in there murdering my brother".  Are Murderers, who are legally tried, found guilty, convicted, and sentenced to death by the court, murdered? No, not according to the Constitution or the Bible. Execution for Capital Crime is an act of civil obedience to the civil law of God. 

The word "civil", from the Latin civis, means a civilized citizen or a civilized society. Civil law arises from civilizing tribes, states and nations. Where there are no "civilized" laws there is no societal tranquility but unpunished, out of control, uncivilized predators committing acts of rape, robbery, murder, and all kinds of evil ... dominating and assaulting weaker victims.

The death sentence in Eden, the death sentence of Noah's flood, and the second death following the final judgment, were and will be, God's Divine Judgment against His violated will and holiness. That  is not civil, societal judgment but Divine Judgment. 

The Civil Judgment of Capital Punishment, by a civilized society, was first authorized and commanded by God for the physical and mental welfare of all mankind, in Genesis 9:5-6, some years after Noah's flood. 

"And surely your blood of your lives will I require ... at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man." Gen.9:5-6.

In these two verses, God decreed Human Civil Law and Civil government to be established among all civilizing societies for the welfare of the human race and the sanctity of life itself. If a person murders, not kills, but murders, another human being, he must be executed by that society, and God   "requires"   it. The word "man" in these two verses is the Hebrew word "adam" and means human or mankind, not just one man, but the entire world population of mankind. 

What is the deepest meaning of this basic, God given, foundational, civil law authorizing the execution of a murderer? Why is execution the taproot of all other, lesser laws? Read again the last phrase to find God's reason for civil execution...   "for in the image of God made he man."    Murdering an innocent person, created in the image of God, is an attack upon God himself for God breathed his own life into that image of Himself. It reflects the sanctity of life from the moment life begins. Those two verses are the foundation of the ten Commandments and all civil laws of civilized societies. Which brings us to the 10 Commandments.

I have heard many professing Christians and even famous preachers quote the sixth Commandment,   "Thou shalt not kill" Ex.20:13,   as God's command not to execute murderers. When that interpretation of that Commandment is given, it exposes a lack of   

Bible study.   "Study to show thyself approved unto God ... rightly dividing the word of truth".   You see, the word kill, forbidden in Ex.20:13, is the Hebrew word "ratsach" and means to kill by murder, not accidentally, not in self defence and not by civil execution. Proof text is in the very next chapter, Ex.21:12   "He that smiteth a man, so that he die, shall be surely put to death."  The word death here is not "ratsach", as in the 6th Commandment, but it is the Hebrew word "muth" which means required, authorized civil execution. This verse immediately follows the 10 Commandments and throughout Ex.21 the death penalty is put within the responsibility of mankind's civil courts, for murder, kidnapping, vilification of and killing parents, and causing a pregnant woman to lose her child. And these laws of God do not call her baby a fetus or a glob of flesh, but a   "child".   Moses, who penned both Ex.20:13 and Ex.21:12, as God gave him the commandments, could not and would not have made the distinction between "murder" and "execution" within moments of each other... as a contradiction.

"When Jesus, in the New Testament, quoted the 6th Commandment, "Thou shalt not kill", He said    "Thou shalt do no murder", Matt.19:18.    

So, in Jesus name, please do not quote the sixth Commandment as meaning anything but the illegal, unjustified murder of another human being, as Jesus  himself quoted it ...  "MURDER".    And a murderer is to be killed by civil execution ... Gen.9:5-6 and Ex.21:12.