NOTES for Exo 20:1-20
1 And God spake all these words, saying, |
2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. |
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me. |
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: |
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; |
6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. |
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. |
8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. |
9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: |
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: |
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. |
12 Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. |
13 Thou shalt not kill. |
14 Thou shalt not commit adultery. |
15 Thou shalt not steal. |
16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. |
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. |
18 And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they removed, and stood afar off. |
19 And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die. |
20 And Moses said unto the people, Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that his fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not. |
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The famous Ten Commandments, which became the symbol and foundation of Jewish and Christian ethics, actually serve as an introduction to a large body of laws and rules for life. Most of them are laws of social, clan, and family law, regulating relations between people at every level. It is entirely natural to call this biblical ethics, since the conduct of a member of God's people must be based on these rules.
But what is unusual and uncharacteristic of other peoples and cultures is that "human ethics" here is intertwined with ethics toward God. These are not ritual instructions, not lofty words about God, but precisely instructions about how to relate to God. He is the first subject and object of this ethics.
Therefore first look at God's faithfulness, then be faithful to God yourself, and then apply this faithfulness, for example, to your parents and to your wife. First remember how God delivered your people from slavery, and then do not create that slavery and oppression yourself: do not kill, do not steal, do not claim what belongs to another. Religion here becomes not simply the "ideological basis" of ethics, but its key, source, and model.
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