Leviticus 24:17 - Exposition

In close connection with the command to slay the blasphemer is repeated the prohibition of murder, and the injunction that the murderer shall surely be put to death. Thus a distinction is sharply drawn between the judicial sentence carried out by the congregation, and the unsanctioned smiting the life of a man by another , and a warning is given against any man fanatically taking the law into his own hands, even in the case of a blasphemer.