Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Benwbrum (talk | contribs) at 22:28, 7 May 2002 (Moved Muslim opinion to its own section). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

The Ten Commandments are a list of religious and moral imperatives that feature prominently in Judaism and Christianity. They are found in the Torah or Pentateuch (five books) of Moses, which is the first part of the Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible, known to Christians as the Old Testament.) Jews and Christians have historically believed that these rules were dictated to Moses by God at Mount Sinai.

While Jews, Catholics and Protestants all agree that the Bible lists the ten commandments in chapter 20 of the book of Exodus, that passage contains more than ten imperative statements.

In the King James Bible, Exodus 20 reads as follows:

20:1 And God spake all these words, saying,
20:2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
20:3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
20:4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
20:5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
20:6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
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.
20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
20:9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
20:10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
20:11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
20:12 Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
20:13 Thou shalt not kill.
20:14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.
20:15 Thou shalt not steal.
20:16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
20:17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

Different groups have divided the commandments in different ways. For instance, Protestants separate the first six verses into two different commands (one being "no other gods" and the other being "no graven images"), while Catholics see all six verses as part of the same command prohibiting the worship of pagan gods. To the Jews, the initial reference to Egyptian bondage it is important enough to Jews that it forms a separate commandment.

Notes about the above KJV passage:

• In the grammar of Early Modern English (the language of the King James version), "thou shalt" was an intimate, more personal way of saying "you mustn't," in a manner reminiscent of a parent speaking to a child. Due to developments in the English language, the emotional effect of that stylistic choice is lost on most modern readers.
• Most modern day Bible scholars reject the King James Bible as inaccurate and stilted; as a Protestant undertaking, it does not reflect Jewish, Catholic, or Orthodox scholarship. Some of the most widely respected translations of the Bible into modern English include the translation used in the Anchor Bible, published by Doubleday, and the "New JPS" translation, the translation of the Tanakh made from 1955 to 1985 by the Jewish Publication Society, with scholars from all denominations of Judaism. (This translation has also received wide acclaim from non-Jewish scholars.)

A very similar, but not identical, list of commandments is in Deuteronomy 5:1-22. In Matthew 19 and elsewhere, Jesus refers to the commandments, but condenses them into two general commands.

Jewish understanding of the Ten Commandments

Popular belief holds that these are "the commandments" of the Hebrew Bible, but in fact the Hebrew Bible has some 600 commandments. (An early and well known Jewish tradition records that there are precisely 613 commandemnts.)

Judaism understands the Ten commandments in the following way:

(1) "I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt..."

This commandment is to believe in the existence of God.

(2) "You shall have no other gods besides Me...Do not make a sculpted image or any likeness of what is in the heavnes above..."

This commandement is a prohibition to believe in or worship any other deities, gods, or spirits. It is also a prohibition against objects like crucifixes, and any forms of paintings or artistic representations of God.

(3) "You shall swear falsely by the name of the Lord..."

This commandement is to never take the name of God in a vain oath.

(4) "Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy"

(5) "Honor your father and your mother..."

(6) "You shall not murder" The Hebrew Bible makes a distinction between murdering and killing, and explicitly notes that murder is always a heinous sin, while killing is sometimes necessary, and therefore just in the eyes of God. Thus, Jews take offense at translations which state "Thou shall not kill", which Jews hold to be immoral. Many Protestant and most Catholic Christians hold that this verse forbids abortion; Judaism disagrees.

(7) "You shall not commit adultery"

(8) "You shall not steal" (sometimes interpretted as kidnapping, since there are other injunctions against stealing property in the Bible).

(9) "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor"

(10) "You shall not covet your neighbor's house..."

Catholic and Orthodox Christian understanding of the Ten Commandments

Catholic and Orthodox Christians understand the Ten commandments in the following way:

(To be written)

Protestant Christian understanding of the Ten Commandments

Protestant Christianity understands the Ten commandments in the following way:

(To be written)

Muslim understanding of the Ten Commandments

Muslims reject the validity of the Ten Commandments as such, as Islam teaches that the entire text of the both the Tanakh and the New Testament are false and misleading documents meant to deceive mankind from learning the true will of Allah (God). For Muslims, the true will of God is embodied only in the Quran.

Christianity holds that the commandment to honor the seventh day as a sabbath is no longer binding; instead the first day of the week is used in memory of what they hold to be the new covenant made by Jesus. For most Christians, this observance of the first day is understood as fulfilling the observance of the seventh day. For Jews, this Christian practice is seen as an explicit rejection of the commandment.

Christianity holds that the commandments not to make "any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above" is no longer binding; instead some Christians make graven images of Jesus Christ as messiah and God, and most Christian sects allow or encourage people to bow in prayer before these images. For most Christians, this practice is understood as fulfilling the observance of this commandment. For Jews, this Christian practice is seen as an explicit rejection of the commandement

There is an ongoing dispute in the United States concerning the posting of the Ten Commandments on public property. Conservative religious groups, angry about the banning of officially-sanctioned prayer from public schools by the U.S. Supreme Court, desire to increase the influence of religion in public life and test the boundaries of the separation of church and state. As a result they have succesfully lobbied many state and local governments to display the ten commandments in public buildings. Liberals oppose this, arguing that it is violating the separation of church and state. Conservative groups claim that the commandments are not necessarily religious, but represent the moral and legal foundation of society. Liberal groups counter that they are explicitly religious, and that statements of monotheism like "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" are unacceptable to many religious viewpoints, such as atheists or followers of polytheistic religions.

Many religious Jews oppose the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools, as they feel it is wrong for public schools to teach their children Judaism. The argument is that if a Jewish parent wishes to teach their child to be a Jew (as most do), then this education should come from educated and practicing Jews, and not from non-Jews. This position is based on the demographic fact that the vast majority of public school teachers in the United States are not Jews; the same is true for the students. This same reasoning and position is also held by many believers in other religions. Many Christians have some concerns about this as well; for example, can Catholic parents count on Protestant or Orthodox teachers to tell their children their particular understanding of the commandments? Differences in the interpretation and translation of these commandments can sometimes be significant.

Organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union have launched lawsuits challenging the posting of the ten commandments in public buildings. Opponents of these displays include a number of religious groups, including some Christian denominations, both because they don't want government to be issuing religious doctrine, and because they feel strongly that the commandments are inherently religious. Many commentators see this issue as part of a wider kulturkampf (culture war) between liberal and conservative elements in American society.