The Ten Commandments, also known as the Decalogue, are a set of biblical laws relating to ethics and worship, which play a fundamental role in Judaism and Christianity. They include instructions to worship only God and to keep the sabbath, and prohibitions against idolatry, blasphemy, murder, theft, and adultery. Different groups follow slightly different traditions for interpreting and numbering them.
The Ten Commandments appear twice in the Hebrew Bible, in the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy. According to the story in Exodus, God inscribed them on two stone tablets, which he gave to Moses on Mount Sinai. Modern scholarship has found likely influences in Hittite and Mesopotamian laws and treaties, but is divided over exactly when the Ten Commandments were written and who wrote them.
Read more about Ten Commandments: Terminology, The Revelation At Sinai, Two Texts With Numbering Schemes, Importance Within Judaism and Christianity, United States Debate Over Display On Public Property, Cultural References
Famous quotes containing the words ten commandments, ten and/or commandments:
“Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.”
—Bible: Hebrew Exodus 20:12, one of the Ten Commandments.
“Saul was very angry, for this saying displeased him. He said, -They have ascribed to David ten thousands, and to me they have ascribed thousands; what more can he have but the kingdom? So Saul eyed David from that day on.”
—Bible: Hebrew, 1 Samuel 18:8-9.
“Not for nothing does it say in the Commandments ‘Thou shalt not make unto thee any image’ ... Every image is a sin.... When you love someone you leave every possibility open to them, and in spite of all the memories of the past you are ready to be surprised, again and again surprised, at how different they are, how various, not a finished image.”
—Max Frisch (1911–1991)