What Does The Bible Say About Blasphemy?

Blasphemy is an act of disrespecting God done through either oral or written form. It is an attack to God’s being, work, and name that is considered a very deadly crime according to the laws of God given through Moses the Old Testament. You can find its primary source from the Ten Commandments in

Exodus 20:7:
“Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.”

What Does The Bible Say About Blasphemy? — What does the Bible say about Blasphemy?

In Leviticus 24:10-14, shows us an account of a son of an Israelite woman and an Egyptian man who blasphemed the name of God with a curse. All those who heard him curse God were made to lay their hands on his head and stone him to death. Then God gave a stern command regarding the penalty for blaspheming His name in Leviticus 24:15-16:

“And thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel, saying, Whosoever curseth his God shall bear his sin. [16] And he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord , he shall surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him: as well the stranger, as he that is born in the land, when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord , shall be put to death.”

The Hebrews take names very seriously since it represents a person’s being and destiny. That is why you can see important biblical characters who had their names changed by God, like Abram to Abraham, Jacob to Israel, and Saul to Paul. If human names are that important, all the more God’s name has to be held in highest honor and respect. The Jews were so careful when it came to God’s name that every article that contains His name on it were never allowed to be broken, torn, or burned. That is how they revered God’s name then, with utmost respect, and that is how we should still revere His name now. In our words, action, writings, and even in thoughts, we should honor God’s name at all times.

There is also the kind of blasphemy that is called “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” or the “unpardonable sin.” You can find this in Mark 3:22–30 and Matthew 12:22–32. When Jesus healed a man from being mute and blind after He casted out a demon from him, the people who saw it started to consider if He is the Messiah. But the Pharisees easily extinguished the crowd’s growing faith in Jesus by discrediting the Godly origin of His miracle and said that Jesus is possessed by Satan, the prince of demons, and that is where he gets the power to cast out demons (Matthew 12:24). In doing so, the Pharisees committed the unpardonable sin of blaspheming the Holy Spirit since the miracles done by Jesus were undeniably done by the Holy Spirit not by Satan. Then Jesus told them,

“Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme: [29] But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation.”
(Mark 3:28-29 KJV)

Accusing God of doing evil or discrediting the good He has done is blasphemy. Regarding the details of what “unpardonable sin” is all about, please see our article “What does the Bible say about the “unpardonable sin?”

Job, despite the his overwhelming loss and suffering did not accuse or blaspheme God (Job 1). James also tells us that whenever we are tempted, we cannot just say that God is tempting us, for God does not tempt anyone to do evil (James 1:13 When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone;). Whenever we are tested or tempted, we should always be careful not to accuse God of evil for that is an act of blasphemy. Though because of His great mercy and grace, God allows us to complain and cry out our frustration and pain to Him as Job and David (in his Psalms) did. But we should remember our lowly place and never cross the line of treating the Almighty with contempt.

The Third commandment tells us that we should never misuse the Lord God’s name in vain (Exodus 20:7). We may think that it is just about using God’s name as a curse word. Many Christians may find themselves thinking that we have never violated this command. But if you think about it, as Christians we carry the Lord Jesus’ name with us, wherever we go or whatever we may say or do. Our lives our now associated with the name of Jesus Christ our Lord since we represent Him to the world as His ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5:20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.). We should start to ask ourselves, have I been a good representative of Christ to my neighbor? Whenever we cause others to stumble (especially the lost) because of our words or deeds, we misrepresent His name. We must be careful how we live since we no longer live for our own but for Him who bought us with His blood.

We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.) — What does the Bible say about Blasphemy?

We may have found ourselves blaspheming God in various ways and opportunities but we must also remember that our God is gracious enough to forgive when we repent. Many have blasphemed God like Paul, who forced others to blaspheme (Acts 26:9-11), and Jesus’ family (including James and Jude who wrote some of the epistles in the New Testament) who thought He was crazy when He was doing ministry (Mark 3:21 When his family[a] heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”). But when they repented, even their blasphemy were forgiven. God can forgive all kinds of sin if we only come to Him and seek forgiveness and reconciliation with Him.