But if a man come presumptuously upon his neighbour, to
slay
him with guile
That comes with malice in his heart, with wrath in his
countenance, in a bold, daring, hostile manner, using all the
art, cunning, and contrivance he can, to take away the life of
his neighbour; no asylum, no refuge, not anything to screen him
from justice is to be allowed him: hence, a messenger of the
sanhedrim, or an executioner, one that inflicts the forty
stripes, save one, or a physician, or one that chastises his son
or scholar, under whose hands persons may die, do not come under
this law; for though what they do they may do wilfully, yet not
with guile, as Jarchi and others observe, not with an ill design,
but for good:
thou shalt take him from mine altar,
that he may die: that being the place which in early times
criminals had recourse unto, Joab and others, as well as in later
times, to secure them from vengeance; but a man guilty of wilful
murder was not to be protected in this way; and the Targum of
Jonathan is,
``though he is a priest, (the Jerusalem Targum has it, an high priest,) and ministers at mine altar, thou shalt take him from thence, and slay him with the sword,''so Jarchi; but the law refers not to a person ministering in his office at the altar of the Lord, but to one that should flee there for safety, which yet he should not have.