Proverbs 28:17 Commentary and Bible Study

In Old Testament times God appointed cities of refuge where the manslayer could flee and find sanctuary from the avenger of blood. But it was a provision for those who had caused accidental death, and the authorities in the city of refuge were required to try the case to judge whether the death had been cause accidentally or with malice and premeditation. If the death was accidental the authorities would not hand the man over to the avenger, but if he had committed murder and there was evidence he had planned the death, then no mercy was to be shown him. In this case, in the graphic language of the proverb, the man who fled justice did not flee to safety (though that is what he thought he was doing); he effectively fled to the pit for that is where God in his justice would take him. The imperative is in the second half of the proverb: Let no one hold him back, hinder him, or do anything to prevent him going where God’s justice is taking him. Here is the limit of human mercy, because human mercy is to be aligned with God’s mercy, and in the case of the murderer God’s mercy has been withdrawn. Let human justice not try to mitigate what divine justice has condemned. It is a great evil when the laws of a nation move away from the standards of God’s law. Under the law of Moses the death penalty was extended to many other crimes in that theocratic state and these are not to be imposed by states today. But long before the law of Moses came, God spoke to Noah and commanded the death sentence for murder. Today the Mosaic civil law is no longer in force and we are no longer to apply the death sentence for adultery and many other sins, but God has never taken it away for murder. The life of those made in the image of God is so precious that only God can end it, and we need to exercise the greatest possible care for human life which is so much more valuable than any other sort of life; indeed, it is much more valuable than anything else on the earth. God has given us in our fellow human beings a proxy for himself but which we can show our reverence for him.