Lots of commentators raise various distinctions. I have provided a mix of ancient and modern scholars. All respected by the vast majority of academics throughout the world.
Curse seems to more than mere words. As you would understand the OT blessing and curse systems. It would appear that curse was within the same ilk. Yes, there seems to be a link to the third commandment, but also to the 5th and the 6th commandments. Jesus in the NT indicated in the sermon on the mount that calling someone a name was akin to murdering them - as he did with striking. Cursing someone however is more than just calling them a name. When GOD curses - it is a removal of his blessing. Hence the term "light" comes into play. He removes his hand from them allowing the system to complete its ordinary deterministic cause and effect in respect of them. I would suggest you get hold of Gordon J Wenham - and his Leviticus commentary, probably the foremost authority on OT Hebrew in the academic world presently. His comments are quite helpful here. Gordon persuasively demonstrates that the legal system of OT used a maximum penalty system - quite like ours actually. And that very often - the maximum penalty was never carried out - the more minimum sentences doing the work that they were required to do to reform persons. Interestingly, Blackstones Legal Commentaries - used extensively even now in the legal world - at least those who use common law systems - attempt to persuade us of the same.
What both note is that cursing your parents - is an offence deserving a maximum death penalty - not that every offender received it - it is however worthy of a strike - which again Jesus reminds us - is akin to murder or from the state's point of view - the death penalty. So interestingly enough, I have learned something from this discussion. That just as we talk about Jesus saying that striking or cursing is akin to killing someone else - there is also the reverse part of this as well. And that is that a strike of a parent onto their child is an equivalent picture of the death penalty. Not that death occurs - but it is symbolised in it. Quite fascinating really. It is something I had directly considered prior to our discussion .So thanks Stephen.
2. Children’s abusing their parents, by cursing them, v. 9. If children should speak ill of their parents, or wish ill to them, or carry it scornfully or spitefully towards them, it was an iniquity to be punished by the judges, who were employed as conservators both of God’s honour and of the public peace, which were both attacked by this unnatural insolence. See Prov. 30:17, The eye that mocks at his father the ravens of the valley shall pick out, which intimates that such wicked children were in a fair way to be not only hanged, but hanged in chains. This law of Moses Christ quotes and confirms (Mt. 15:4), for it is as direct a breach of the fifth commandment as wilful murder is of the sixth. The same law which requires parents to be tender of their children requires children to be respectful to their parents. He that despitefully uses his parents, the instruments of his being, flies in the face of God himself, the author of his being, who will not see the paternal dignity and authority insulted and trampled upon.
Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 175). Peabody: Hendrickson.
9 ¶ For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; phis blood shall be upon him.
For, or, surely, as that particle, chi, is oft used, as Job 8:6; 20:20. So there needs no dispute about the connexion, or what this is a reason of. Curseth; which is not meant of every perverse expression, but of bitter reproaches or imprecations. Or his mother; Heb. and put for or, as hath been noted before. His blood shall be upon him; he is guilty of his own death; he deserves to die for so unnatural a crime.
Poole, M. (1853). Annotations upon the Holy Bible (Vol. 1, p. 241). New York: Robert Carter and Brothers.
Still harder will it be for most of us to understand why the death-penalty should have been also affixed to cursing or smiting a father or a mother, an extreme form of rebellion against parental authority.
Kellogg, S. H. (1903). The Book of Leviticus. In W. Robertson Nicoll (Ed.), The Expositor’s Bible: Genesis to Ruth (Vol. 1, p. 344). Hartford, CT: S.S. Scranton Co.
The commandment is now sanctioned by the denunciation of capital punishment for its violation, yet not so as to comprehend all who have in any respect sinned against their parents, but sufficient to shew that the rights of parents are sacred, and not to be violated without the greatest criminality. We know that parricides, as being the most detestable of all men, were formerly sewn up in a leathern sack and cast into the water; but God proceeds further, when He commands all those to be exterminated who have laid violent hands on their parents,2 or addressed them in abusive language. For to smite does not only mean to kill, but refers to any violence, although no wound may have been inflicted. If, then, any one had struck his father or mother with his fist, or with a stick, the punishment of such an act of madness was the same as for murder. And, assuredly, it is an abominable and monstrous thing for a son not to hesitate to assault those from whom he has received his life; nor can it be but that impunity accorded to so foul a crime must straightway produce cruel barbarism. The second law avenges not only violence done to parents, but also abusive words, which soon proceed to grosser insults and atrocious contempt. Still, if any one should have lightly let drop some slight reproach, as is often the case in a quarrel, this severe punishment was not to be inflicted upon such an inconsiderate piece of impertinence: and the word קלל, kalal, from which the participle used by Moses is derived, not only means to reproach, but also to curse, as well as to esteem lightly, and to despise. Whilst, therefore, not every insult, whereby the reverence due to parents was violated, received the punishment of death, still God would have that impious pride, which would subvert the first principles of nature, held in abhorrence. But, inasmuch as it might seem hard that a word, however unworthy of a dutiful son, should be the cause of death; this objection is met, by what is added by God in Leviticus, “his blood shall be upon him, because he hath cursed his father or mother:” as if He would put a stop to what men might otherwise presume to allege in mitigation of the severity of the punishment.
Calvin, J., & Bingham, C. W. (2010). Commentaries on the Four Last Books of Moses Arranged in the Form of a Harmony (Vol. 3, pp. 13–14). Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software.
Other sins that required capital punishment were blaspheming God’s name, cursing one’s parents, murder and worshipping another god. Respect for parents was the Fifth Commandment. A sentence of death hung over those who cursed their father or mother (Lev. 19:3, 32; 20:9).
Leviticus 19:32 shows mother and father is a metonymy for the elderly. The verb for cursing (√qll) means to make light of. To make light of, i.e. to curse, appears in Leviticus 19:14 in regards to insensitivity to the deaf and, in 24:1, regarding the son of an Israelite woman who cursed the name of God.
The clause signifies blatant disrespect for someone who is due respect. The act of putting obstinate children to death is not a sentence that must make one feel guilty. The phrase added to the death sentence for the blatantly disrespectful his blood will be on his head (Lev. 20:9) demonstrates that the responsibility rests solely upon the guilty and not the prosecution.
Vasholz, R. I. (2007). Leviticus: A Mentor Commentary (pp. 320–321). Fearn, Tain, Ross-shire, Great Britain: Mentor.
To curse one's parent's is not merely to use condescending vocabulary towards them but refers to a serious breach of filial duty. The verb means to make light of something. in the sense of dishonoring and disrespecting .
Currid, D. John (2004) Leviticus: An EP Study Commentary pp 269-70
