The (Real) Ten Commandments
 


Most people are familiar with the "Ten Commandments" that were given to Moses in the book of Exodus (Ex. 20:3-17), but what these people don't realize, is that these are not the Ten Commandments that were placed in the Ark of the Covenant.  God didn't even call the commandments mentioned in Exodus 20, The Ten Commandments.  The actual Ten Commandments were given in Exodus 34:14-26.  As you can see below, they are much different than the ones that Christians are fighting to put up in our schools and courtrooms.


The Ten Commandments


1.  For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God:

2.  Thou shalt make thee no molten gods.

3.  The feast of unleavened bread shalt thou keep.

4.  All that openeth the matrix is mine; and every firstling among thy cattle, whether ox or sheep, that is male.

5.  Six days thou shalt work, but on the seventh day thou shalt rest: in earing time and in harvest thou shalt rest.

6.  And thou shalt observe the feast of weeks, of the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the feast of ingathering at the year's end.

7.  Thrice in the year shall all your menchildren appear before the LORD God, the God of Israel.

8.  Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven; neither shall the feast of the Passover be left until the morning.

9.  The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring unto the house of the LORD thy God.

10.  Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.


After giving these commandments, God said...

Exodus 34
27  And the LORD said unto Moses, Write thou these words: for after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel.
28  And he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.

This is the only place in the Bible in which you will see commandments from God being call "The Ten Commandments".
 
© 1999 Derrick Miller


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