"Thou Shalt Not Kill" - The Rashbam and the Debate Regarding the Proper Understanding of לא תרצח

(French, d. 1158?)

(1) לא תרצח. Wherever the term רציחה appears it refers to killing without adequate justification. A deliberate murderer is to be executed as we know from Numbers 35:16-16.....

When the terms הריגה, or מיתה are used to describe killing this means that there was no excuse for the killer to commit his act. (compare Cain slaying his brother in Genesis 4:8)

On the other hand, in Leviticus 20,16 where the Torah decrees והרגת את האשה, this refers to judicial killing for cause. [bestiality]

Concerning the use of the word רוצח, murderer, in Deuteronomy 4:42 as applicable to someone who killed inadvertently, the reason why the Torah used this term there was only because in the same context deliberate murder was also discussed.

This is my answer to the heretics who have admitted to me that the Latin translation of the Bible describing רציחה “killing,” without distinction as to the reason for the killing, is sloppy, most inaccurate. They were so careless in spite of the fact that in their “own” books such as Deuteronomy 32,39 we have the line אני אמית ואחיה, “it is I Who kill and resurrect,” showing that the Torah uses different expressions describing different kinds of killing.

(French; pupil of Rashbam and others)

He states that the French picks up this distinction by using "meurtre," to murder, exclusively in unjustified cases, and מיתה והריגה, which can be used in justifiable homicide (in a court, for example) or unjustified.

("Meurtre" can be contrasted to "tuer" which means "to kill" without regard to justification.)

(42) to which [a man] who has killed someone could escape, one who unwittingly slew another without having been an enemy in the past; he could flee to one of these cities and live:

(11) you shall provide yourselves with places to serve you as cities of refuge to which [a man] who has killed someone —who has slain a person unintentionally—may flee. (12) The cities shall serve you as a refuge from the avenger, so that the killer may not die unless he has stood trial before the assembly....

(22) But if [a man] pushed without malice aforethought or hurled any object at [the victim] unintentionally, (23) or inadvertently dropped upon [the victim] any deadly object of stone, and death resulted—though not being an enemy and not seeking to harm— (24) in such cases the assembly shall decide between the slayer and the blood-avenger. (25) The assembly shall protect the killer from the blood-avenger, and the assembly shall restore him to the city of refuge to which he fled, and there he shall remain until the death of the high priest who was anointed with the sacred oil. (26) But if the killer ever goes outside the limits of the city of refuge to which he has fled....

(30) If anyone slays a person, the killer may be executed only on the evidence of witnesses; the testimony of a single witness against a person shall not suffice for a sentence of death.

(10)....The mitzva to establish a Sanhedrin with the authority to administer capital punishments is in effect both in Eretz Yisrael and outside Eretz Yisrael.

A Sanhedrin that executes a transgressor once in seven years is characterized as a destructive tribunal. Since the Sanhedrin would subject the testimony to exacting scrutiny, it was extremely rare for a defendant to be executed.

Rabbi Elazar ben Azarya says: This categorization applies to a Sanhedrin that executes a transgressor once in seventy years.

Rabbi Tarfon and Rabbi Akiva say: If we had been members of the Sanhedrin, we would have conducted trials in a manner whereby no person would have ever been executed.

Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel says: In adopting that approach, they too would increase the number of murderers among the Jewish people. The death penalty would lose its deterrent value, as all potential murderers would know that no one is ever executed.