Source: https://secondexodus.com/the-catechism/the-ten-commandments/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 10:43:54+00:00

Document:
The Ten Commandments, revered by Jews, Catholics, and Protestants, appear twice in the Torah: at Ex 20:2–17 and at Deut 5:6–21. All Jews, Catholics, and Protestants follow the entire text of God‘s two presentations of his Ten Commandments for us.
“Take this book of the law, and put it by the side of the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God, that it may be there for a witness against you” Deut 31:26.
Rabbi Yokhanan‘s Gospel specifically identifies the word logos with Rabbi Yeshua. Its original Greek begins, En arche en ho logos, kai ho logos en pros ton theon, kai theos en ho logos. Literally, “In the-beginning was the Word, and the word was with God, and God was the word.” Most translations put it: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” Jn 1:1.
Rabbi Yokhanan also identifies the logos specifically as Rabbi Yeshua. Again in his original Greek, Kai ho logos sarx egeneto kai eskenosen en hemin. Literally, “And the word flesh became and took-up-residence among us.” Most translations put it: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” Jn 1:14.
The English name Decalogue appears in the Septuagint as the Greek phrase deka logoi at Ex 34:28 and Deut 10:4.
The Torah refers on several occasions to “tablets of stone” Ex 24:12; 31:18; 32:15–16; 34:1; Deut 4:13; 5:22; 10:1, but never says how many commandments were on each tablet.
God did not call the Decalogue aseret ha-mitzvot, the Ten Commandments. The rabbis understand each of the ten divrot as a group of mitzvot. In our time we can think of each divra as a folder into which various mitzvah files are stored.
For example, the mitzvah to cease work on the Sabbath comes within the category of keeping holy the Sabbath day. The mitzvah to fast on Yom Kippur also falls into that category since every holiday is in some sense a Sabbath.
Similarly, the mitzvah to not stand idly by while a person’s life is in danger obviously comes under “You shall not kill.” Less obviously, The rabbis also place the mitzvah against causing anyone to be embarrassed also under “You shall not kill” because embarrassment causes blood to be drained from the face, thereby shedding blood.
Rabbi Yeshua taught that the two great commandments are the summary of all 613 mitzvot Mt 22:37–40, so it makes sense that his Church would use the Ten Commandments to teach her flock how to live the Shma in day-to-day life.
I am the Lord your God who brought you out of slavery in Egypt.
Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people Jer 31:31–33.
§ 2067 The Ten Commandments state what is required in the love of God and love of neighbor. The first three concern love of God, and the other seven love of neighbor.
In the light of Rabbi Yeshua’s public revelation, St. Augustine saw the prohibition against idolatry as part of the larger precept to adore one God, and him alone, making the first two (Jewish) commandments into one.
St. Augustine then divided the final precept against concupiscence into two parts, using the sequence in Deuteronomy rather than Exodus, to reflect Rabbi Yeshua‘s emphasis on interior holiness: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity” Mt 23:27. St. Augustine’s division also reflected Rabbi Yeshua’s emphasis on interior purity by recognizing lust and envy as separate capital sins.
Matthew Levering summarizes St. Thomas Aquinas by observing that, “The Mosaic Law is ordered to one end: communion or ‘friendship’ with God.” Levering, for St. Thomas, adds, “The Mosaic Law, in a real sense … is still observed by Christians.” Levering continues, “Aquinas’s account of salvation is built around the idea that Christians, as members of the Mystical Body of Christ, share in the redemptive acts of their Head (Christ). Christians share, and all human beings potentially share, in Christ’s fulfillment of all aspects of the Mosaic Law.” “It is not you that support the root, but the root that supports you” Rom 11:18.
For a thousand years all Christians worldwide accepted St. Augustine’s enumeration. Then, during the 1500s, Protestants (except Lutherans) as part of their rejection of Church authority reverted to the Jewish way of counting the commandments. However, they tinkered with that too, using as their first commandment “You shall have no other gods before me” Ex 20:3 which was the Jews second commandment.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife. You shall not covet anything that is your neighbor’s.
§ 2053 To this first reply Jesus adds a second: “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” This reply does not do away with the first: following Jesus Christ involves keeping the Commandments. the Law has not been abolished, but rather man is invited to rediscover it in the person of his Master who is its perfect fulfillment. In the three synoptic Gospels, Jesus’ call to the rich young man to follow him, in the obedience of a disciple and in the observance of the Commandments, is joined to the call to poverty and chastity. The evangelical counsels are inseparable from the Commandments.
The commandments: “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not kill, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this sentence: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
§ 2056 The word “Decalogue” means literally “ten words.” God revealed these “ten words” to his people on the holy mountain. They were written “with the finger of God,” unlike the other commandments written by Moses. They are pre-eminently the words of God. They are handed on to us in the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy. Beginning with the Old Testament, the sacred books refer to the “ten words,” but it is in the New Covenant in Jesus Christ that their full meaning will be revealed.
If you love the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his ordinances, then you shall live and multiply.
You shall remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out thence with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.
§ 2059 The “ten words” are pronounced by God in the midst of a theophany (“The LORD spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire.”). They belong to God’s revelation of himself and his glory. the gift of the Commandments is the gift of God himself and his holy will. In making his will known, God reveals himself to his people.
§ 2060 The gift of the commandments and of the Law is part of the covenant God sealed with his own. In Exodus, the revelation of the “ten words” is granted between the proposal of the covenant and its conclusion – after the people had committed themselves to “do” all that the Lord had said, and to “obey” it. The Decalogue is never handed on without first recalling the covenant (“The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb.”).
§ 2062 The Commandments properly so-called come in the second place: they express the implications of belonging to God through the establishment of the covenant. Moral existence is a response to the Lord’s loving initiative. It is the acknowledgement and homage given to God and a worship of thanksgiving. It is cooperation with the plan God pursues in history.
The Lord prescribed love towards God and taught justice towards neighbor, so that man would be neither unjust, nor unworthy of God. Thus, through the Decalogue, God prepared man to become his friend and to live in harmony with his neighbor. The words of the Decalogue remain likewise for us Christians. Far from being abolished, they have received amplification and development from the fact of the coming of the Lord in the flesh.
§ 2064 In fidelity to Scripture and in conformity with the example of Jesus, the tradition of the Church has acknowledged the primordial importance and significance of the Decalogue.
§ 2065 Ever since St. Augustine, the Ten Commandments have occupied a predominant place in the catechesis of baptismal candidates and the faithful. In the fifteenth century, the custom arose of expressing the commandments of the Decalogue in rhymed formulae, easy to memorize and in positive form. They are still in use today. the catechisms of the Church have often expounded Christian morality by following the order of the Ten Commandments.
§ 2066 The division and numbering of the Commandments have varied in the course of history. the present catechism follows the division of the Commandments established by St. Augustine, which has become traditional in the Catholic Church. It is also that of the Lutheran confessions. the Greek Fathers worked out a slightly different division, which is found in the Orthodox Churches and Reformed communities.
As charity comprises the two commandments to which the Lord related the whole Law and the prophets, so the Ten Commandments were themselves given on two tablets. Three were written on one tablet and seven on the other.
§ 2069 The Decalogue forms a coherent whole. Each “word” refers to each of the others and to all of them; they reciprocally condition one another. the two tables shed light on one another; they form an organic unity.
To transgress one commandment is to infringe all the others. One cannot honor another person without blessing God his Creator. One cannot adore God without loving all men, his creatures. the Decalogue brings man’s religious and social life into unity.
From the beginning, God had implanted in the heart of man the precepts of the natural law. Then he was content to remind him of them. This was the Decalogue.
A full explanation of the commandments of the Decalogue became necessary in the state of sin because the light of reason was obscured and the will had gone astray.
We know God’s commandments through the divine revelation proposed to us in the Church, and through the voice of moral conscience. the obligation of the Decalogue.
§ 2072 Since they express man’s fundamental duties towards God and towards his neighbor, the Ten Commandments reveal, in their primordial content, grave obligations. They are fundamentally immutable, and they oblige always and everywhere. No one can dispense from them. the Ten Commandments are engraved by God in the human heart.
§ 2075 "What good deed must I do, to have eternal life?" - "If you would enter into life, keep the commandments" (Mt 19:16-17).
§ 2076 By his life and by his preaching Jesus attested to the permanent validity of the Decalogue.
§ 2077 The gift of the Decalogue is bestowed from within the covenant concluded by God with his people. God's commandments take on their true meaning in and through this covenant.
§ 2078 In fidelity to Scripture and in conformity with Jesus' example, the tradition of the Church has always acknowledged the primordial importance and significance of the Decalogue.
§ 2079 The Decalogue forms an organic unity in which each "word" or "commandment" refers to all the others taken together. To transgress one commandment is to infringe the whole Law (cf Jas 2:10-11).
§ 2080 The Decalogue contains a privileged expression of the natural law. It is made known to us by divine revelation and by human reason.
§ 2081 The Ten Commandments, in their fundamental content, state grave obligations. However, obedience to these precepts also implies obligations in matter which is, in itself, light.
§ 2082 What God commands he makes possible by his grace.

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