Not Yo' Mamma's Sunday School #005

The Ten Commandments.....hmmm, which should we choose from?  There are three sets after all:

There is the set in Exodus 20....

1st 20:3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

2nd 20:4 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.

20:5 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;

20:6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

3rd 20:7 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.

4th 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.

20:9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:

20:10 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:

20:11 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.

5th 20:12 Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.

6th 20:13 Thou shalt not kill.

7th 20:14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.

8th 20:15 Thou shalt not steal.

9th 20:16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

10th 20:17 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. Then there is the set in Exodus 34 (which is very different).... 34:1 And the LORD said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou brakest. 1st 34:12 Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest it be for a snare in the midst of thee: 34:13 But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves: 2nd 34:14 For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God: 34:15 Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go a whoring after their gods, and do sacrifice unto their gods, and one call thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice; 34:16 And thou take of their daughters unto thy sons, and their daughters go a whoring after their gods, and make thy sons go a whoring after their gods. 3rd 34:17 Thou shalt make thee no molten gods. 4th 34:18 The feast of unleavened bread shalt thou keep. Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread, as I commanded thee, in the time of the month Abib: for in the month Abib thou camest out from Egypt. 5th 34:19 All that openeth the matrix is mine; and every firstling among thy cattle, whether ox or sheep, that is male. 34:20 But the firstling of an ass thou shalt redeem with a lamb: and if thou redeem him not, then shalt thou break his neck. All the firstborn of thy sons thou shalt redeem. And none shall appear before me empty. 6th 34:21 Six days thou shalt work, but on the seventh day thou shalt rest: in earing time and in harvest thou shalt rest. 7th 34:22 And thou shalt observe the feast of weeks, of the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the feast of ingathering at the year's end. 34:23 Thrice in the year shall all your menchildren appear before the LORD God, the God of Israel. 34:24 For I will cast out the nations before thee, and enlarge thy borders: neither shall any man desire thy land, when thou shalt go up to appear before the LORD thy God thrice in the year. 8th 34:25 Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven; neither shall the sacrifice of the feast of the passover be left unto the morning. 9th 34:26 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring unto the house of the LORD thy God.      10th    Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk. This numbering system for Exodus 34 was taken from American Atheists written by Frank R. Zindler: 34:27 And Yahweh said unto Moses, write thou these words: for after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel. 34:28 And he was there with Yahweh 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. Finally, there is the set in Deuteronomy 5:7-21, which is basically the exact same thing as Exodus 20 (there is a little rewording).  It seems that the author of Deuteronomy felt it was necessary to copy and paste the original set, but begs the question of why this author ignored the second set (which was the newest version).  Perhaps, Deuteronomy's author hadn't read that far in Exodus before beginning his own version of events; who knows. Anyway, that's your lesson for today.  Next time someone mentions the Ten Commandments to you, be sure to ask them, "Which one?"