Keluaran 22:28

22:28 “You must not blaspheme ¹  God ²  or curse the ruler of your people.

Keluaran 22:2

22:2 “If a thief is caught ³  breaking in ⁴  and is struck so that he dies, there will be no blood guilt for him. ⁵ 

1 Tawarikh 1:10

1:10 Cush was the father of Nimrod, who established himself as a mighty warrior on earth. ⁶ 

[22:28]  ¹ tn The two verbs in this verse are synonyms: קָלַל (qalal) means “to treat lightly, curse,” and אָרַר (’arar) means “to curse.”

[22:28]  ² tn The word אֱלֹהִים (’elohim) is “gods” or “God.” If taken as the simple plural, it could refer to the human judges, as it has in the section of laws; this would match the parallelism in the verse. If it was taken to refer to God, then the idea of cursing God would be more along the line of blasphemy. B. Jacob says that the word refers to functioning judges, and that would indirectly mean God, for they represented the religious authority, and the prince the civil authority (Exodus, 708).

[22:2]  ³ tn Heb “found” (so KJV, ASV, NRSV).

[22:2]  ⁴ tn The word בַּמַּחְתֶּרֶת (bammakhteret) means “digging through” the walls of a house (usually made of mud bricks). The verb is used only a few times and has the meaning of dig in (as into houses) or row hard (as in Jonah 1:13).

[22:2]  ⁵ tn The text has “there is not to him bloods.” When the word “blood” is put in the plural, it refers to bloodshed, or the price of blood that is shed, i.e., blood guiltiness.

[22:2]  sn This law focuses on what is reasonable defense against burglary. If someone killed a thief who was breaking in during the night, he was not charged because he would not have known it was just a thief, but if it happened during the day, he was guilty of a crime, on the assumption that in daylight the thief posed no threat to the homeowner’s life and could be stopped and made to pay restitution.

[1:10]  ⁶ tn Heb “he began to be a mighty warrior in the earth.”