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The 11 Commandments

SezMe

post-pre-born
SezMe
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Dec 30, 2003
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All of us in the USA have been inundated with Judge Roy Moore's antics regarding his attempts to install a decalogue in the rotunda of the Alabama Supreme Court. Maybe you folks outside of the USA have heard of this case.

Anyway, take a look at this image. What is absolutely fascinating about this 10Cs monument is that there are actually 11 of them. :confused:

Take a look for yourself and actually count them.

Maybe the fundies should pray for some basic mathematical skills. :D
 
SezMe said:
All of us in the USA have been inundated with Judge Roy Moore's antics regarding his attempts to install a decalogue in the rotunda of the Alabama Supreme Court. Maybe you folks outside of the USA have heard of this case.

Anyway, take a look at this image. What is absolutely fascinating about this 10Cs monument is that there are actually 11 of them. :confused:

Take a look for yourself and actually count them.

Maybe the fundies should pray for some basic mathematical skills. :D
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Maybe "I am the Lord thy God" and "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" are not different commandments . :cs:
 
The first is, of course, not a commandment.

Funnily enough I noticed that these aren't the ten commandments I learned in school. I knew there were several different "ten commandments" in the bible, but this is the first time I've observed the difference in the real world.

The Norwegian church doesn't have the "graven images" commandment, and instead we have two "do not covet" commandments. One for your neighbours property, and one for "his wife, his workers, and others who belong to his household."
 
From Religious Tolerance dot Org :

There are three versions of the Decalogue mentioned in the Hebrew Scriptures (a.k.a. Old Testament). All are different. They are at Exodus 20:2-17, Exodus 34:12-26, and Deuteronomy 5:6-21. The version in Exodus 20 is by far the most commonly cited. Depending upon how Ten Commandments are interpreted, the Exodus 20 version contain a total of 19 to 25 separate instructions. These have been traditionally sorted into ten groups. Unfortunately, various faith groups sort them differently. This makes inter-faith dialog very difficult at times, and can cause conflicts over which version of the Decalogue is to be displayed.
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http://religioustolerance.org/chr_10ci.htm
 
bjornart said:
The first is, of course, not a commandment.

Funnily enough I noticed that these aren't the ten commandments I learned in school. I knew there were several different "ten commandments" in the bible, but this is the first time I've observed the difference in the real world.

The Norwegian church doesn't have the "graven images" commandment, and instead we have two "do not covet" commandments. One for your neighbours property, and one for "his wife, his workers, and others who belong to his household."
Click to expand...

The Catholic Church is the same way: the first two on that monument are combined, the "graven images" one isn't one of the ten, and they have the same two coveting, one for the neighbor's 'goods' and another for the neighbor's wife. And the order is different, too.

I'm not sure what the source was, but I was always taught that the first three were on one slab, the other seven on another. Not sure why....perhaps the Almighty has difficulty with font justification?
 
TragicMonkey said:
The Catholic Church is the same way: the first two on that monument are combined, the "graven images" one isn't one of the ten, and they have the same two coveting, one for the neighbor's 'goods' and another for the neighbor's wife. And the order is different, too.

I'm not sure what the source was, but I was always taught that the first three were on one slab, the other seven on another. Not sure why....perhaps the Almighty has difficulty with font justification?
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God=Dan Rather, Heaven=CBS?
 
Tom Brokaw had a segment on this in the week-long Religion and Politics series last night.

Hyped all through the half-hour evening news, I was expecting something decent. However, the very short segment just featured an interview with Moore, giving his point of view ("it's not about religion...") and some other minister who expressed his leaning towards "separation".

There was no mention of the Constitution, the law, court rulings on the subject, etc.
 
TragicMonkey said:
The Catholic Church is the same way: the first two on that monument are combined, the "graven images" one isn't one of the ten, and they have the same two coveting, one for the neighbor's 'goods' and another for the neighbor's wife. And the order is different, too.
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I don't recall the order being different, but you are correct, that the catholic version of the 10 commandments is different. Personally, I think that at one point, someone recognized the folly of the "no graven images" commandment, considering that catholic churches are full of them (and expensive ones, too; that's a lot of expensive artwork to abandon). Better for the Pope to not open that can of worms.

OTOH, the different versions of the 10 commandments IMO provides one of the best arguments AGAINST public display. Someone says, "We want to display the 10 commandments." The question is, whose version will you display? The catholic version? Or the protestant version? And once you chose one version over the other, how can you claim that you haven't established one religion as preferred over another?
 
pgwenthold said:
OTOH, the different versions of the 10 commandments IMO provides one of the best arguments AGAINST public display. Someone says, "We want to display the 10 commandments." The question is, whose version will you display? The catholic version? Or the protestant version? And once you chose one version over the other, how can you claim that you haven't established one religion as preferred over another?
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Compromise by displaying the Protestant version of the Commandments....held by a statue of the Virgin Mary, with room for votive candles and a kneeler!
 
TragicMonkey said:
Compromise by displaying the Protestant version of the Commandments....held by a statue of the Virgin Mary, with room for votive candles and a kneeler!
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Now who could object to that?
 
The United States Supreme Court recently decided to hear a case pertaining to displays of the Ten Commandments on public property. (Here's another thread on the topic.)

There are those who think that displays such as "Roy's Rock" should be permissible on public land. One of the inherent problems with such displays is that the government selects which version of the Commandments is to be displayed, and disregards the others.

The version of the Commandments on "Roy's Rock" is not the version taught by Catholics and Lutherans. In addition, it is an "edited" rendition of the Commandments as set forth in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, i.e., it is not strictly biblical. Many denominations teach an unedited, biblical version of the Commandments.

As I've discussed elsewhere, chances are very, very slim that the Supreme Court would rule that all displays are unconsitutional. But one possible practical dividing line for the Court is the notion of symbolic displays as opposed to textual displays. (The Ten Commandments representations on display in the Supreme Court building are symbolic; they omit the text of Commandments.) By saying that some symbolic displays are appropriate, while holding that textual displays are not appropriate, the Court could easily avoid the thorny questions as to which version or versions of the Commandments ought to be displayed.
 
There were originally fifteen commandments, but Moses dropped and broke the tablet with the other five. It was in Mel Brooks' "History of the World," so it must be true.
 
Matthew 19:17-19 clearly states the six commandments from the carpenter's son himself. All of them are are secular in nature.
 
agnostic_god said:
There were originally fifteen commandments, but Moses dropped and broke the tablet with the other five. It was in Mel Brooks' "History of the World," so it must be true.
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One might think that this gag would be deemed to be insulting to the Judeo-Christian traditions. But I have spoken with clergymen from a number of denominations, and they all think that this gag was hilarious! It has been mentioned by instructors in seminaries, and some ministers have used it in their sermons.

By the way, it's not widely known that Jesus himself wasn't a stickler for the Ten Commandments. He was criticized by the religious leaders in his day because in their view (among other things) he didn't respect the Sabbath, and because he waffled on the graven images commandment. Also, the gospels have Jesus adding three new commandments to the list. One of them, "Do not defraud," appears in Mark 10:19. In Mark 12:30-31, Jesus is quoted as saying: "And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is similar, namely, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these."
 
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