Anger, Hate and Murder

What murder is

The sixth commandment says “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13). The Hebrew verb, ratsach, generally means unlawful, personal killing. The Old Testament treats it differently from killing in war or under the judgments of the law, which is why most translations now read “murder” rather than “kill.”

The reason life is protected is given early: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man his blood will be shed; for in His own image God has made mankind” (Genesis 9:6). Murder is first of all an assault on God’s image. To destroy a human being is to strike at the one whose likeness they carry.

Where it begins: Cain and Abel

The first murder grows from a heart, not a plan. God accepts Abel’s offering and not Cain’s, and Cain becomes “very angry, and his countenance fell” (Genesis 4:5).

God warns him before anything happens: sin is crouching at the door, its desire is for you, but you must rule over it (Genesis 4:7). Anger here is an animal waiting to pounce. It can still be mastered.

Cain doesn’t master it. Wounded pride becomes resentment, resentment becomes envy, and envy becomes violence in a field. The story shows the whole progression in miniature, and that progression is what Jesus later exposes.

What it represents spiritually

Scripture links murder to the deepest opposition to God:

• Jesus calls the devil “a murderer from the beginning” and the father of lies (John 8:44). Hatred of life is satanic in origin.
• John points straight back to Cain, who “belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother” because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous (1 John 3:12).
• Then he draws the line Jesus drew: “Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer” (1 John 3:15).

The opposite of murder is not just leaving someone alive. It is love that lays down its life: “By this we know what love is: Jesus laid down His life for us” (1 John 3:16). Cain took a life to protect his pride. Christ gave His life for people who hated Him. The two are mirrors, and every believer lives somewhere between them.

Anger, contempt and “Raca”: what Jesus meant

In Matthew 5:21–22 Jesus says that everyone who is angry with his brother is liable to judgment. Whoever says “Raca” is liable to the council, and whoever says “You fool!” is liable to the hell of fire.

The words escalate. Anger is the inner heat. Raca is an Aramaic insult, roughly “empty-head” or “worthless.” Mōros, “fool,” is contempt for the whole person, writing them off. Jesus moves from feeling, to insult, to dismissal of someone’s worth, and treats each as a form of the same sin.

Contempt is the core. Anger says “you hurt me.” Contempt says “you are nothing.” It removes someone from the circle of people who matter, and that is the mental step that comes before violence. James makes the same point about the tongue: we bless God and curse people “who have been made in God’s likeness” (James 3:9).

A textual note. Some older English Bibles read “angry with his brother without a cause.” The earliest manuscripts lack that phrase, and most scholars think a scribe added it to soften the saying. Jesus’s warning is broader than our excuses.

“Equivalent” in what sense? As with lust and adultery, the root is the same. No one is innocent just because he never acted. The consequences are not the same: a murdered person is gone, and a family is destroyed. Jesus is taking away our self-righteousness, not saying a bitter thought does the same damage as a killing.

Is all anger sin?

No. God is angry at evil, and Jesus was angry. He looked around “with anger and sorrow at their hardness of heart” (Mark 3:5) and drove the money changers from the temple (John 2:13–17). Paul says “Be angry, yet do not sin. Do not let the sun set upon your anger” (Ephesians 4:26), assuming anger will come and telling us what to do with it.

Yet James warns that “man’s anger does not bring about the righteousness that God desires” (James 1:20). Most of our anger is not the righteous kind. Some questions that separate them:

Hate: the slow form of anger

The law already went to the heart: “You must not harbor hatred against your brother in your heart… do not seek revenge or bear a grudge… but love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:17–18). The famous command to love your neighbor is given as the answer to grudges.

If anger is a fire, hate is anger that has been banked and kept burning. It wishes someone harm, or at least is glad when harm comes. Hebrews warns of a “root of bitterness” that springs up, causes trouble, and defiles many (Hebrews 12:15). Bitterness rarely stays private.

Two kinds of “hate” in Scripture are different. God and His people are told to hate evil (Romans 12:9; Psalm 97:10). And Jesus’s call to “hate” father and mother (Luke 14:26) is a Hebrew idiom for loving less by comparison, as Matthew 10:37 shows. Neither licenses hating a person.

Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. (common saying, origin uncertain)

Fighting it by the letter: practical restraint

Right after His warning, Jesus gives two urgent instructions: leave your gift at the altar and go be reconciled first, and settle quickly with your accuser on the way (Matthew 5:23–26). Unresolved conflict is a spiritual emergency. In practice:

• Slow the reaction. “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger” (James 1:19). Pause, breathe, pray, leave the room. A delay often decides whether anger becomes sin.
• Lower your voice. “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger” (Proverbs 15:1).
• Guard your words. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouth, only what builds up (Ephesians 4:29). Don’t send the email or text while hot.
• Overlook what can be overlooked. “His virtue is to overlook an offense” (Proverbs 19:11). Not every slight needs a hearing.
• Deal with it today. Don’t let the sun go down on it (Ephesians 4:26–27). Overnight anger gives the devil “a foothold.”
• Make the first move. Whether you wronged them (Matthew 5:23–24) or they wronged you (Matthew 18:15), Jesus tells you to go. “If it is possible on your part, live at peace with everyone” (Romans 12:18).
• Watch your company and inputs. “Do not make friends with an angry man” (Proverbs 22:24–25). Outrage-driven media trains the same reflexes.

Fighting it by the spirit: seeing what it really is

Restraint keeps anger from acting, but the heart has to change or the anger just goes underground. The deeper work is seeing the situation truly.

Anger is often a blocked desire. “What causes conflicts and quarrels among you? … You crave what you do not have; you kill” (James 4:1–2). Ask what you wanted that this person stood in the way of: respect, control, comfort, being right. Bring that desire to God.

Anger takes the judge’s seat. In anger I decide the verdict and the sentence. Scripture tells us to step down: “Do not avenge yourselves, beloved, but leave room for God’s wrath” (Romans 12:19). Justice is real, and it is in better hands than mine.

See the image of God. The coworker, the spouse, the driver who cut you off and the person across the political aisle all bear God’s likeness. Contempt can’t survive a clear view of that. Pray for them by name; it is hard to keep despising someone you are bringing before God (Matthew 5:44).

Remember the size of your own debt. In the parable of the unforgiving servant, a man forgiven millions throttles a man who owes him a few months’ wages (Matthew 18:21–35). Grudges grow when we forget how much we have been forgiven. “Forgive as the Lord forgave you” (Colossians 3:13).

Forgiving is not pretending. It doesn’t mean calling the wrong small, forgetting it, or trusting someone unsafe right away. It means releasing the debt to God and giving up the right to repay. Reconciliation may take longer and needs repentance on both sides.

Overcome evil with good. Feed your enemy and give him a drink (Romans 12:20–21). Active kindness breaks the loop of retaliation from the inside.

Walk by the Spirit. “Rage,” “hatred,” and “discord” are listed among the works of the flesh; patience, kindness, gentleness and self-control are the Spirit’s fruit (Galatians 5:19–23). These grow from abiding in Christ, not from gritted teeth alone.

When you fail

Some of the Bible’s central figures had blood on their hands. Moses killed an Egyptian in anger (Exodus 2:11–12). David arranged Uriah’s death (2 Samuel 11). Paul approved of Stephen’s execution and hunted Christians (Acts 8:1; 9:1), and later called himself the foremost of sinners, shown mercy as an example of Christ’s patience (1 Timothy 1:15–16).

At the cross, the world’s worst murder met the world’s greatest forgiveness. While they crucified Him, Jesus prayed:

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34)

If He forgave that, He can forgive your outbursts and grudges. Confess them to God, and where you’ve wounded someone, to them as well. Being forgiven is what makes it possible to forgive.