I know it is difficult for Christians to comprehend that not everyone is a Christian, and not every belief system can be described through Christian symbology and dogma. But that is the case. The conviction that The Ten Commandments represents concepts that are or should be cherished by everyone no matter their belief system is not only presumptuous, it is insulting.
I will begin by pointing out that there is some question just what the Ten Commandments actually are. The commandments appear in two places in the Bible, Exodus 20:1-17 and Deuteronomy 5:4-21. The two versions vary, of course, and so naturally the Protestants tend to use the Exodus version and Catholics tend to use the Deuteronomy version. So even Christians don’t really agree completely.
I will follow by defining the word commandment, which is “(1) a command; an edict; (2) one of the Ten Commandments.” [The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language]
The word commandment carries with it some weight. It is more than a suggestion or a guideline. It is an order. In Christianity, it carries the force of religious law, and to violate that law is to invite punishment. It is an uncomfortable truth that abiding by the Ten Commandments is the same as abiding by ancient Mosaic law, which is the Christian version of setting aside civil laws and abiding by Sharia law in Islamic nations. Religious laws have no place in the free and secular society of the United States in which religious freedom is codified in the Constitution.
And the Ten Commandments is unquestionably religious law. It is not a monolithic universal ethical guideline that is applicable to everyone, and should not be touted as such.
Let me examine each commandment, one by one.
The first commandment (I’m going to use the King James translation and the Protestant version for simplicity) is:
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
That has absolutely no applicability to anyone whose faith does not involve a creator god, or who is polytheistic, or who is atheistic or agnostic. Moreover, Christians will be more than glad to tell you that it does not apply to just any monotheistic deity, it applies to the Judeo-Christian deity. The first commandment is a purely Christian religious edict, addresses no greater ethical or moral truth, and does not apply universally.
The second commandment is: Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain.
Once again, this commandment applies to Christianity, or more specifically, the Judeo-Christian god. It is also an extremely self-serving commandment, even in Christianity. As I mentioned, the commandments have the force of law, and apparently the Judeo-Christian god decided that taking his name in vain not only carries equal weight to not killing or stealing, but takes precedence by its position as the second commandment, of less importance only to believing in god (and only god) in the first place. This commandment also is a purely Christian religious edict, addresses no greater ethical or moral truth, and does not apply universally.
The third commandment is: Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Are you seeing a pattern here? This is based on the Christian creation story of the world being created in six days, with a seventh day for rest. Observing the sabbath (Sunday for Christians but Saturday for Jews, so there’s confusion even within the Judeo-Christian belief system) is a way of saying “Way to go, God! Out of respect for your hard work we will do nothing of consequence for one-seventh of our lives.” Not every faith subscribes to the same creation story, and in fact I suspect a significant number of Christians are not believers in Creationism. So once again, this commandment also is a purely Christian religious edict, addresses no greater ethical or moral truth, and does not apply universally.
The fourth commandment is: Honour thy father and thy mother.
This is certainly a nice sentiment, and there is some logic in respecting your elders. However, personally I believe that respect should be earned, and that good parents will in most instances earn their children’s respect without being commanded to do so. There are certainly exceptions, but the children who are exceptions probably will not change their disrespectful ways based on the fourth commandment. Most importantly, though, I am not convinced that this commandment rises to the level of a universal edict that carries equal weight with, say, not killing someone. And I cannot help thinking that parents who would most enforce this as a religious edict probably do not deserve respect to begin with.
The fifth commandment is: Thou shalt not kill.
Finally, here is a commandment that addresses a greater ethical or moral truth and applies universally. If you are keeping track, this is actually the first such commandment, and to my way of thinking it should also be The First Commandment. It is discouraging that the rest of the Bible is filled with holy reasons to break this commandment with alarming frequency. So although it should carry the weight of religious as well as civil law, there are innumerable exceptions and loopholes within the Bible itself. In fact, it seems to me that Christians are much more forceful and obnoxious in enforcing the first four commandments than this one. Consider that it is acceptable to kill in war, and to execute criminals, and to punish apostasy, witches, female adulteresses, and blasphemers, but it is never acceptable to take God’s name in vain. (I’m not saying people don’t do it, I am saying that it is never acceptable.) The bottom line is this: Not killing is #5 on the list.
The sixth commandment is: Thou shalt not commit adultery.
This commandment is suspect for a number of reasons. First, the definition of adultery varies in the Bible. For example, in the New Testament, in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, anyone who divorces and remarries is committing adultery. Second, the penalty for adultery is death. But without the death penalty and the no-divorce clauses, I will go along with this as an admirable guideline by which to live, although giving it the force of religious law does not seem appropriate. A part of me feels like my social programming is making me give this more applicability than it might deserve, and if I had grown up in a less sexually repressed society without a strong bias for monogamy, I might feel differently. More liberal sexual mores would then be perfectly acceptable, in which case having extended relationships would not be interpreted as cheating but actually building a larger web of intimate relationships. There’s probably some Free Love 60’s attitudes mixed into my social programming. So I only very reluctantly see this as having near-universal applicability.
The seventh commandment is: Thou shalt not steal.
Once again, if the Bible itself did not list so many exceptions to this commandment, I would wholeheartedly concur. But Christian hypocrisy aside, this certainly addresses a greater ethical or moral truth and does apply universally. It should be The Second Commandment instead of ending up in seventh place.
The eighth commandment is: Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
Stated more plainly, this commandment should read: Thou shalt not lie. This should be The Third Commandment. Sadly, our current society could not exist if this commandment was actually followed. Businesses routinely lie in the form of advertisements. Salespeople routinely lie to makes sales. Politicians and FOX Newscasters routinely lie to forward ideological agendas. Financiers routinely lie to make profits and protect investments. Players routinely lie to get laid. It would be an unrecognizable world if no one lied.
The ninth commandment is: Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house.
If this means you should not want your neighbor’s property, then while I think it is probably a good sentiment, I feel it is seriously limited in scope and once again does not rise to the level of a universal edict. If this means you should not want to have the same things as your neighbor, or in other words, you should not want to “keep up with the Joneses” as it was once referred to, then it comes dangerously close to saying you should just be satisfied with what you have and get on with your life. People should always want to improve themselves, and if they measure that improvement by comparing themselves to others, that’s not a sin. Once again, I feel like this one is not only not universal, it almost endorses stagnation.
The tenth commandment is: 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.
No, you should not want to take what your neighbor has. That is a good sentiment. I’m not sure it belongs on a Top Ten List of Ways to Live Your Life, but there is no doubt that if it was universally observed, the world would be a nicer place. It would need an asterisk exception, though, to indicate that it has no applicability in the business world or the world of employment where headhunting and employee and customer poaching are everyday occurrences. Personally, I think that if something has universal applicability, it should have no exceptions.
So, in conclusion, I can say without any reservations that only three commandments are not specifically Judeo-Christian, do speak to a greater ethical or moral truth, and do apply universally. However, The Ten Commandments is specifically Judeo-Christian. It has no place in a secular
society that is inclusive of all faiths and belief systems.
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