COMMENTARY ON THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
"The folklore of almost every ancient people contains a narrative that purports
to record the moment when that nation received the laws by which its tribal
life was organized. These laws were almost invariably said to have been
dictated by, or in some way received from, the divine hand."[1]
"You shall have no other gods before me"
This admits that other gods existed. Polytheism was standard at the time. However if
you want your religion to survive it's imperative that you claim your god to be top god.
The pagen religion may have looked like a belief in many seperate gods but was actually a
belief in one single god with multiple facets. In a similar way Christianity could be
accused of worshiping multiple gods - Father, Son, Holy Spirit, but it is understood
these are three-in-one, not three separate gods.[9;p.79]
"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"
Brutal words from a brutal God. Perhaps originally an injunction against
competition via a very strong threat, though today we still see sins of the
parents being passed onto their children. For example, we now know that an
abused child quite frequently will grow into being an abusive adult.[7]
"You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain"
Our society no longer requires a civil contract to be sworn "in the name of
the Lord," so that if broken, the offending party would be guilty of "taking
the Lord's name in vain." Today contracts are signed into legal documents and
enforced by the courts. Without that defining context, we have begun to
suggest that this commandment has something to do with profanity. Profanity
may be either blasphemous or in poor taste, but it has nothing to do with
"taking the name of the Lord in vain."[3]
"Remember the sabbath day"
In Exodus 20 the commandment is:
"Remember the sabbath day to sanctify it. . . because in six days Yahweh made the
heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and he rested on the seventh
day. Therefore Yahweh blessed the sabbath day and sanctified it."
But in Deuteronomy, when Moses repeats the commandment, he says that it was:
"Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it. . . and you shall remember that you were a slave
in the land of Egypt, and Yahweh your God brought you out from there with a strong hand
and an outstretched arm. Therefore Yahweh your God commanded you to observe the sabbath
day."
The first version is from P, and it quotes the P creation story for its reason for keeping
the sabbath: because God rested on the seventh day. The second version is from D, and it
gives a common D reason for keeping commandments: because God freed you from slavery. To
the redactor, and to his readers, the two different wordings of the same commandment were
compatible. (It is interesting to note that one of the Dead Sea Scrolls collapses these
two texts and simply lists both reasons for keeping the sabbath side by side.)
[From the book:
Who Wrote the Bible? by Richard Elliott Friedman. Year: 1987.]
"Thou shalt not kill"
The King James version of the Bible uses the word, "kill". A more proper
translation would be "murder". It's OK to kill animals, it's not OK to murder
someone else. However, this injunction only applies for a Jew murdering
another Jew. In fact all of the commandments only apply to Jews violating
other Jews. The injunction not to murder does not apply to killing all your
foreign enemies. It's OK to go to war against another community and kill all
their soldiers, and when the community surrenders it's OK to sodomize all the
remaining soldiers and then murder them, rape all the women and then slaughter
them, mercilessly slaughter all the children, and then take as slaves anyone
you didn't slaughter and take posession of all their worldly goods. Hence it
may appear that Jews are breaking the commandment not to murder, not to
commit adultry, not to covet one's wife, not to covet one's land, not to
covet one's manservant, maidservant, ox, donkey, or anything that belongs to
someone else; however, since these are non-Jews, it's OK and no commandments
are broken.
- Moses murdered an Egyptian
(Exodus 2:11-12),
but because his victum was not a Jew Moses was never hunted down, arrested, tried, and
set to prison for the rest of his life as he would if he had committed the same murder today.
- Joshua was said to have murdered five captured Canaanite kings
(Joshua 10:22-27).
- Samuel was portrayed as "hewing into pieces with the sword" another king named
Agag, who was kept in a cave to await his executioner
(1 Samuel 15:32-33).
- God was pictured as ordering Israel to go to war against two nations, and in
those two wars, to kill "every man, women, child, infant, cattle, sheep, camel, and donkey,"
of their enemies
(1 Samuel 15:1-13;
Judges 21:8-13).
- Even the God of the Bible did not appear to take the commandment not to murder
seriously when dealing with the non-Jewish world.[2]
THE TREATMENT OF FOREIGNERS
Consider one of the alternate ten commandments:
Deuteronomy 14:21
"Do not eat anything you find already dead. You may give it to an alien living
in any of your towns, and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner."
That's right, it may not be good enough for you, but it's good enough for a
foreigner.
"You shall not commit adultery"
This commandment, against adultery, was enjoined in a culture that practised
polygamy, not monogamy. A man could possess as many women as he could afford.
In its primary literal meaning, this commandment prohibited a man from violating
the woman who was the property or possession of another man. The proof that
this was the essential meaning of this law is found in that, according to
this code of conduct, if a Jewish man had a sexual liaison with an unmarried
woman, it was not adultery. It was rather a crime against the property of her
father, for which the offender would be fined the amount necessary to make
the father financially whole. The father had had his net worth devaluated by
this act, since he could not get the proper "bride price" for a daughter who
was now "damaged goods."
(Deuteronomy 22:28-29)[5]
Being forced to marry the woman did not prevent the man from marrying other
women. Owning more than one wife was like owning more than one car -- you could
have as many as you could afford.
Even Jesus lived in a world where cultural barriers were drawn that defined
women as subhuman and children as not worthy of God's concern.[6]
Note in the United States the 15th amendment to the constitution gave black
men, formerly slaves, the right to vote in 1870. Women were not given the
right to vote until fifty years later in 1920 with the passage of the
19th amendment. We comment much about the historical treatment of blacks in
our nation, we comment little about the historical treatement of women.
"You shall not covet your neighbor's house, wife, manservant, maidservant,
ox, ass, nor anything else that is your neighbor's"
Please note there is no written prohibition anywhere in the Torah against coveting
your neighbor's husband! The reason for this was that a husband was not property,
but a wife was. The neighbor was a male. His assets were listed in descending
order of value. His house first, his wife second, his slaves third, and then his ox,
his ass, and his other possessions.[4]
Bibliography
[1] John Shelby Spong
Why Christianity Must Change or Die : A Bishop Speaks to Believers in Exile
The believers in exile are people who want to believe but can not deny the reality
of modern day science which contradicts the Bible. Christianity must change its outdated
interpretation of the Bible or Christianity will die because the next generation will
dismiss the old outdated interpretation as hopelessly antiquated and incompatible with
today's scientific knowledge. pg. 149.
[2] ibid. pg. 152.
[3] ibid. pg. 154.
[4] ibid. pg. 153.
[5] ibid. pg. 153.
[6] ibid. pg. 124.
[7] ibid. pg. 208.
[8] Joseph Wheless
Is It God's Word?
[9] Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy
The Jesus Mysteries
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The Ten Commandments: They're Not What You Think