The Ten Commandments Put to Chisel

The book of Exodus is a commandment-rich environment, with fierce orders to slay people for committing any of several minor offenses.  The Ten Commandments stand apart from all others as they have a special place ... on stone tablets.

Christian apologists insist that objective morality is possible only with God as the law-giver.  They cite Bible's Ten Commandments, besides others, as absolute objective moral laws given to us by God, the law-giver.

The Christian view is that God given moral laws in the Bible are:
(1) absolute -i.e., universally applicable to all situations at all times.
(2) objective - I.e., not dependent on subjective views.

Christians most often cite the Ten Commandments from the Old Testament and Sermon on the Mount in the New Testament as the essential moral teachings of God documented in the Bible.  Jesus himself asserts in the New Testament that he is not here on Earth to replace old laws with new laws but to uphold old laws.. Ten commandments, then, are central to Christian teachings.

Let us put the ten commandments on stone tablets  to the test of Dharmic Gaze and see if they are absolute and objective or if they could use the help of chisel.

Following are two major points that chisel away the claim that ten commandments are absolute:

1. Failure to provide exceptions to moral laws makes all the moral commandments vulnerable to criticism arising from rational thought.  Absolute moral laws simply fail to account for exceptions. The only practical remedy is to replace absolute morals with situational ethics.
2. Ten Commandments were addressed to a specific group in the Bible - a nomadic tribe whose main economy is primitive agriculture and whose wealth is sometimes counted in people as well as animals. 

 Commandment I and II:   

• I am the lord thy God.… Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Is God implying by this command that there are indeed other gods?  Since the Biblical God is one and only one, those other gods must be imaginary gods imagined by humans.  God is simply asserting his authentic self over those fictional gods.  Play on upper case and lower case letters suggests that "God" with an upper "G" has an upper hand over "other gods" with a lower "g". 
• Very troubling that an omnipotent God, who created this gigantic Universe in which the Earth is less than a spec of dust, is threatening humans for worshiping other fictional gods.   God wants humans to worship Him alone as their God.  However, God without form or attributes is inaccessible to human mind.  Any attempts to worship Him are bound to give some form or attributes.  What complicates the matter, nay makes it impossible, is when humans are forbidden worship via the symbolical idea of Him.  Case in point are the various "icons" used in the Church and by Christians of the biblical God.  
• I the lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation. Firstly, it is downright silly for the omnipotent and omniscient God to be jealous of fictional gods.  Secondly, the collective punishment of future children, for the sin of angering the jealous God, may not go down well for the rational-minded.  After all, how can one see justice in making someone pay for the sin of their ancestors, a silly sin of worshiping fictional gods, which in reality is a symbolic worship of one and only one God?
• Of course, it is possible that these are not commandments of God at all but those created to assert superiority over gods of other established religions.  Perhaps, Moses is telling his people to break lose of the cultural influence of Egyptian gods by offering the commandments of their god? Perhaps, to break their reverie and make them fall in line with him, Moses needed commandments of a god, their god, expressed in stern, threatening words?
• In any event, as expressed by these two commandments, Biblical god seems to have misunderstood symbolic worship as the worship of competing gods and taken a rather unfatherly attitude towards symbolic worship.  Since the omniscient God cannot be wrong, the commandment really cannot be his.  Conversely, his commandment would have been worded differently. In fact, there is really no need for these commandments.  
• Monotheistic God simply must have given the following advice: "I am the one and only God.  No matter what form you worship, you are still worshiping me.  Do not lose sight of that as you engage in symbolic worship."
• Panentheistic God of Dharma traditions does not threaten with commandments.  An advice from Panentheistic God could be imagined as: "I am everything, both transcendental and immanent.  All your material objects, even symbols you worship are ultimately me.  Do not lose sight of this Ultimate Reality as you contemplate on me through symbolic worship."

Commandment III:

• 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. A slightly querulous and repetitive note is struck here, as if of injured vanity. Nobody knows how to obey this commandment, or how to avoid blasphemy or profanity. For example, I say “God alone knows” when I sincerely intend to say “Nobody knows.” Is this ontologically dangerous? Ought not unalterable laws to be plain and unambiguous? 
• Seems command III is better worded as follows: "Do not portray me as favoring some of you over others for I am not a partial God and I do not like to take sides.  Do not play politics using my name suggesting that I favor some of you over others.  Such parochial usages of my name are in vain and they will anger me."

Commandment IV:

• Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. This ostensibly brief commandment goes on for a long time—for four verses in fact—and stresses the importance of a day dedicated to the lord, during which neither one’s children nor one’s servants or animals should be allowed to perform any tasks.
• In Exodus 20:8–11, the reason given for the day off is that “in six days the lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day.” 
• In Deuteronomy 5:15 a different reason for the Sabbath observance is offered: “Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.”
• Very different reasons offered in Exodus and Deuteronomy.  Why can’t the infallible and omniscient and omnipotent one make up his mind what the real reason is?
• Also, why can't rest be recommended for its own sake?   It is surprising that it should make the top 10 things that God wants to tell us Humans in the form of inviolable moral laws.
• This commandment made sense when slavery was prevalent.  As an absolute law, it has lost its shine without the outmoded practice of slavery.  What is the purpose of an absolute law that made sense as a law only in the context of an evil social practice that is now outmoded?  
• On that note, this commandment would have served humanity far better, and would have eliminated untold miseries for centuries, had it been worded as follows: "Slavery is an unacceptable practice.  No human can be owned by any other for they are all the same in my eyes.  Let humans be free and choose what they want to do with their time - work hard, take it easy, or rest all together."

Commandments I to IV are not moral laws.  They are Biblical god's (arbitrary) injunctions. 

Commandment V is the first moral.  A quick read of it makes us wonder if we need the Biblical god to tell us that.

Commandment V: 

• Honor thy father and thy mother. Both the Exodus and Deuteronomy versions urge it for the same reason: “that thy days may be long upon the land which the lord thy God giveth thee.” This perhaps has the slight suggestion of being respectful to Father and Mother in order to come into an inheritance—the Israelites have already been promised the Canaanite territory that is currently occupied by other people, so the prospective legacy pickings are rather rich. 
• As a general purpose absolute law, ... do we really need such a law demanded of humans by God? Why not propose filial piety as a nice thing in itself?
• Non-Abrahamic civilizations have developed a deep sense of respect for parents without God interfering and mandating love and respect for one's own parents.   In Dharma traditions, the saying goes, "Mathru Devobhava, Pithru Devobhava, ...".  In other words, children are encouraged to see God in their own parents.  Makes immense cultural sense.  Who cares more for children than their own parents?  
• As a command, and implemented as a forced behavior, at best it brings indifferent formality, and at worst brings resentment towards parents.  As a cultural trait, it has resulted in a very stable family-centric civilization.   Makes much more sense as a cultural trait than an absolute law from a moral-giver.  
• There are other pathological problems: If you have pathological parents, moral law-giver has not specified exceptions.

 Commandment VI:  

• Thou shalt not kill. This very celebrated commandment quite obviously cannot mean what it seems to say in English translation. In the original Hebrew it comes across as something more equivalent to “Thou shalt do no murder.” 
• We can be fairly sure that the “original intent” is not in any way pacifistic, because immediately after he breaks the original tablets in a fit of rage, Moses summons his Levite faction and says (Exodus 32:27–28): Thus saith the lord God of Israel, put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor. And the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses: and there fell of the people that day about three thousand men.
• St. Augustine took the bait of this commandment when he lamented: "But, say they, the wise man will wage just wars. As if he would not all the rather lament the necessity of just wars, if he remembers that he is a man; for if they were not just he would not wage them, and would therefore be delivered from all wars." Not a very useful quote when you are up against the threat of war or in need of war to establish justice.
• 900 hundred years after St. Augustine, St. Aquinas rectified this by stating the following criteria for Just War:

• First, war must occur for a good and just purpose rather than for self-gain or as an exercise of power.
• Second, just war must be waged by a properly instituted authority such as the state.
• Third, peace must be a central motive even in the midst of violence.

• Anyone who understands the role of a soldier in war understands that a soldier cannot perform his duty with the absolute moral law that "You shall not murder or kill."  The Catholic Church recognized the failure of the Universal application of this absolute moral-law from the moral law-giver.  Accordingly, Christian theology has come up with situational ethics in the name of "Just War".
• Long before Aquinas came up with Just War theory, the Mahabharata Epic spoke of "Dharma Yuddh" meaning "Just War" and discussed the need for a soldier to be unselfish and duty-minded when in war.  
• Dharma traditions do not have absolute moral laws or absolute moral law-giver.  There are epics or Ithihasa that gently teach the reader through stories of great virtues and selfless service.  There is a fine idea for an absolute moral law, if there is ever a need for one: "Do your duty guided by an elevated sense of justice and selfless attitude.  Gain an understanding of human nature and foibles so that you do not get trapped into harming others for selfish reasons."

Commandment VII:   

• Thou shalt not commit adultery. For some reason, “the seventh” is the only one of the commandments that is still widely known by its actual number. Extramarital carnal knowledge was probably more of a threat to society when families and tribes were closer-knit, and more bound by stern codes of honor. 
• Adultery continues to be a great source of misery, joy, and fascination even in our current times.  Prevalence of adultery is a clear example of how much respect and following ten commandments have among Christians.
• Success of controlling adultery is higher in societies that do not follow the Bible.  Perhaps, such social injunctions are less effective, even if coming from the God himself. 

 Commandment VIII:   

• Thou shalt not steal. 
• Most civilized society will agree with this without God's injunction.
• Those who have worked hard to acquire a bit of property are entitled to resent those who would rather steal than work, and when society evolves to the point where there is wealth that belongs to nobody—public or social property—those who plunder it for private gain are rightly regarded with hatred and contempt. Admittedly, the prosperity of some families and some states is also founded on original theft, but in that case the same principle of disapproval can apply.

 Commandment IX:       

• Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. This is possibly the most sophisticated ruling in the whole Decalogue. Human society is inconceivable unless words are to some extent bonds, and in legal disputes we righteously demand the swearing of oaths that entail severe penalties for perjury. 
• If you consciously lie in order to indict someone who is not guilty, you have done something irretrievably foul.

 Commandment X:   

• Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor’s.  
• It lumps the wife in with the rest of the chattel.  Clearly, it is addressed to the servant-owning and property-owning class.
• Notice also that no specific act is being pronounced as either compulsory or forbidden. Instead, it is the totalitarian concept of “thought crime.” You are being told, in effect, not even to think about it. [Jesus of Nazareth in the New Testament takes this a step further, announcing that those with lust in their heart have already committed the sin of adultery.]
• From the “left” point of view, how is it moral to prohibit people from regarding the gains of the rich as ill-gotten, or from demanding a fairer distribution of wealth? From the “right” point of view, why is it wicked to be ambitious and acquisitive? And is not envy a great spur to emulation and competition?
• Where is the freedom of thought?  Such scary totalitarian injunctions are against the most basic of all human rights - freedom of conscience.

Summary:

• What emerges from the review is this: The Ten Commandments were derived from situational ethics. They show every symptom of having been man-made and improvised under pressure. And there is nothing wrong in doing this - ethics are often situation specific.  What is wrong is taking these situation specific commandments from the Bible, separate them from context, and offer them to public as absolute objective moral laws of the moral law-giver.
• Ten Commandments are addressed to a nomadic tribe whose main economy is primitive agriculture and whose wealth is sometimes counted in people as well as animals. 
• Ten Commandments are addressed to a group that has been promised the land and flocks of other people: the Amalekites and Midianites and others whom the god of Israel orders his chosen people to kill, rape, enslave, or exterminate.   Let us not get carried away and attribute them to the true God.

Attribution:
Above article is largely inspired by Christopher Hitchens' article in Vanity Fair to take a fresh look at Ten Commandments.  Jump here to read the article by Christopher Hitchens in its entirety:  Christopher Hitchens' The New Commandments