Cursing Humans

An urge to belittle others must be kept under strict control, not because there is anything Biblically wrong with speaking abrasively, but because it could become very easy to lapse across the line into cursing others out of malice, speaking to others in order to harm them whether or not the means are unjust.  Aggression can feel and truly be empowering, which could lull certain people into lowering their moral guard and speaking to others immorally to fuel their sense of strength or excitement.  Although verbal abuse might not be as serious as physical abuse or many forms of psychological abuse, cursing other people is absolutely vile on the Biblical framework no matter what the other party has done.  This is logically connected to the doctrine that every human possesses the image of God, specially mentioned as residing within humankind over other animals, and the book of James articulates this connection with cutting directness:

James 3:9-12—"With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God's likeness.  Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing.  My brothers and sisters, this should not be.  Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?  My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs?  Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water."

While it is possible to be of morally mixed character, saying/doing some things which are righteous and some which are wicked, a person who curses other humans is still a sinner.  They cannot be both fully upright and morally deficient.  Hence, this sort of cursing, completely unrelated on its own to the use of profanity sometimes referred to with the same term, comes only from a polluted spring.  As James touches on, all men and women bear the image of God, a doctrine mentioned three times in Genesis and once described as the basis for why murder is immoral.  While cursing falls far short of murder's depravity, with murder itself falling short of the severity of other sins like the more extreme unjust tortures, the above passage from James condemns treating other people in this way for the exact same reason that Genesis does murder:

Genesis 1:26-27—"Then God said, 'Let us make mankind in our own image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.'  So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them."

Genesis 5:1-2—"This is the written account of Adam's family line.  When God created mankind, he made them in the likeness of God.  He created them male and female and blessed them.  And he named them 'Mankind' when they were created."

Genesis 9:6—"'Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind.'"

From Genesis 1:26-27 and 5:1-2 alone, it would follow that the contents of Genesis 9:6 and James 3:9, along with other moral issues, apply to both men and women, who equally bear God's image and thus are equally victimized by the same sinful actions.  From certain verses to be shown soon, it is also easily apparent that the sin of cursing applies equally to male and female victims.  But does calling someone a fool, among other things, constitute cursing them?  Does speaking fiercely?  As mentioned, it is not the same as directing profanity toward's another person; though the term for both kinds of speech is the same, the concepts behind the words can differ extensively.  And if one can do so without malice, harsh speech does not have to dehumanize or slander others.  A commonly misunderstood part of the words of Christ in Matthew 5 (what is not misunderstood in that chapter of the Bible by mainstream pseudo-Christians?) in actuality clarifies that calling someone a fool is not automatically to curse them, with Jesus himself calling people fools in the same book:

Matthew 5:21-22—"'You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, "You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment."  But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment.  Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, "Raca," is answerable to the court.  And anyone who says, "You fool!" will be in danger of the fire of hell.'"

Matthew 23:17—"'You blind fools!  Which is greater: the gold, or the temple that makes the gold sacred?'"

Jesus is either a hypocrite or he does not actually proclaim that calling someone a fool curses them, or mistreats them verbally in any other way in itself.  In fact, it is clear upon careful, rationalistic examination that anyone who calls another person a fool is in danger of hellfire and subject to judgement: he does not say that they automatically deserve to go to hell to face cosmic annihilation (Matthew 10:28) or that the judgment is anything more than evaluative, as opposed to punitive.  Calling someone a fool is not inherently wrong, while the term Raca is one of contempt, and contempt which drives a person to disregard the humanity (and thus the divine image in humanity) and the moral rights of anyone else is vile.  This is the heart of cursing a person made in God's likeness.  Charging someone with being a fool is rational and Biblically just if they truly are a fool, as the book of Proverbs, the actions of Jesus himself, and the lack of condemnation for simply using the phrase in Yahweh's laws all attest to.

Yet genuinely cursing humans, as Jesus likens it to, is to have already succumbed to the root of murderous desires in one's heart.  And every form of mistreatment of fellow humans tramples on the divine image they possess, even something as relatively "minor" as using one's words against them to a wicked end, as James 3 emphasizes.  Cursing others and murdering them are quite different in their degrees of sinfulness, but both of them are evil for the same root reason in Judeo-Christianity.  However, only a few verses after reiterating the contents of Genesis 9:6 in Exodus 21:12-14 (and clarifying the distinction between accidentally killing a person and intentionally murdering them), God reveals to Moses that whoever curses their father or mother deserves the same punishment as the murderer: execution.

As one's biological creators, one's father and mother deserve a special degree of honor not owed by default to all other people.  To curse them is a capital sin, whereas cursing a random bystander is not.  Mosaic Law calls attention to this twice, once in Exodus 21 and the second time in the context of condemning the Canaanites for miscellaneous sins while emphasizing the sheer universal scope of anything in Yahweh's Torah laws (Leviticus 20:23-24) which is not by logical necessity limited to Jews alone, as with the requirements for the Jewish high priest in Leviticus 21.  It is these verses Jesus references, without any philosophical opposition to the prescription itself, in Matthew 15 and Mark 7 when he illustrates the layered hypocrisy of many Pharisees in the New Testament:

Exodus 21:17—"'Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death."'

Leviticus 20:9—"'"Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.  Because they have cursed their father or mother, their blood will be on their own head."'"

Does the fact that only cursing one's parents is listed in Exodus 21 mean that cursing anyone else is not sinful according to the Torah, since they are not responsible for bringing one into earthly life?  This does not follow logically, and James 3:9-12 insists this is not so, but the structure of Exodus 21 already suggests otherwise.  When Exodus 21:15 says to kill anyone who attacks their father or mother (not someone who forcefully protects themself from a physically abusive parent!), it is clear from the immediate context alone that it is not sinful to commit assault only if it is against one's own parents: verses 18-19, 22, and 24-27 address various non-fatal assaults or injuries to other parties.  When Exodus 21:17 addresses cursing one's parents verbally as opposed to physically attacking them, the focus rests on how cursing them specifically deserves death as opposed to cursing people other than one's father or mother, which does not automatically incur a legal punishment.  Similarly, attacking one's parent deserves death despite how attacking other people, also a sin, merits a lesser penalty. 

Cursing any person is evil, with cursing one's father or mother being especially heinous.  All people bear God's image, so to speak to them with unjust harshness or lack of regard for their humanity (and the divine nature it images) is to oppress them.  In fact, the very next chapter of the Bible after the introduction of the punishment for cursing one's father or mother condemns cursing another sort of authority figure:

Exodus 22:28—"Do not blaspheme God or curse the ruler of your people."

There is ambiguity as to whether the first recipient of cursing mentioned in Exodus 22:28 is God or judges administering the legitimate laws of Yahweh, as the Hebrew phrase can reportedly refer to either.  The ruler of one's people is still to not be cursed regardless of whether the first part of the verse refers to God or judges acting on his behalf.  Since cursing God, the Name, is a sin deserving premature death at the hands of other people (Leviticus 24:16), and reviling a non-corrupt judge of Yahweh's laws is also a capital sin (Deuteronomy 17:12), the prohibition of cursing one's ruler is right next to the prohibition of a capital sin in either case.  From this alone, it would follow that cursing the ruler of one's people is a serious offense; however, it would not necessarily deserve death, and as would be logically necessary if morality exists, the Bible still teaches that a ruler must be opposed with lethal force like any other capital sinner, even a close family member, should he or she commit such a crime (Deuteronomy 13:6-10, 17:18-20), with absolutely no exemptions based on their power, wealth, or reputation (Leviticus 19:15, Deuteronomy 16:18-20).

Exodus 22:28 crucially does not forbid all opposition or hostility towards a political authority, which other Biblical tenets require.  If it did, it would present one layer of justice, what a ruler deserves from their subjects, as in conflict with another layer of justice, what anyone deserves as punishment if they commit certain deeds—an inherent contradiction.  It is possible to end a ruler's life when morality requires it without actually cursing them in one's thoughts or words, but to curse them even in this context remains wicked.  And lest some fool think verses like this prohibit challenging or validly criticizing an authority figure, speaking accurate things about a person, however severe they might be, is not cursing them.  Pronouncing malicious intent or uttering phrases which disregard their very humanity is the true sin.  As for why Exodus addresses cursing political leaders of one's region/country, it could be very easy for a disgruntled person to experience the desire to revile their leaders from a distance, especially in times of upheaval.  By prohibiting this behavior alongside cursing either God or judges who legitimately apply Mosaic Law, the verse reinforces how even unjust rulers deserve to not be dehumanized.

Whether against the parents who brought us life or those with political power or any other bearer of Yahweh's image, cursing another human does not have to be the worst possible offense against a person to be a grievous one.  One does not have to strike or murder them to treat them as less than their status deserves—not strictly or primarily as an authority figure in all cases, but always as a human.  Words of genuine cursing, murder, and other examples of mistreatment all originate from the same poisoned spring.  Evil things which erupt forth from a person's mouth defile them, having no other source than a heart that has fallen into producing wicked intentions and deeds (Matthew 15:16-20), much like a fresh spring that becomes unfit for drinking from.