Reading as Seek: to learn Scripture and its teachings. Same facts, warmer framing.

Topic

Ten Commandments

15 passages cited, from 2 classic reference works.

These works date from 1884–1896 and are in the public domain. They reflect the Protestant scholarship of their time: their history, archaeology and dates can be out of date, and where they interpret, other traditions read the text differently. The verses are shown in the King James Version, the wording these works were written against.

The verses

The passages the works cite, those cited by more of them first.

Exodus 19:20Smith
And the LORD came down upon mount Sinai, on the top of the mount: and the LORD called Moses up to the top of the mount; and Moses went up.
Exodus 25:16Smith
And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee.
Exodus 25:21Smith
And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee.
Exodus 31:18Smith
¶ And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God.
Exodus 32:16Smith
And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables.
Exodus 34:28Smith
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.
Deuteronomy 4:13Smith
And he declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and he wrote them upon two tables of stone.
Deuteronomy 5:18Smith
Neither shalt thou commit adultery.
Deuteronomy 5:22Smith
¶ These words the LORD spake unto all your assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice: and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me.
Deuteronomy 10:4Smith
And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which the LORD spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and the LORD gave them unto me.
Deuteronomy 11:1–32Smith
Therefore thou shalt love the LORD thy God, and keep his charge, and his statutes, and his judgments, and his commandments, alway. And know ye this day: for I speak not with your children which have not known, and which have not seen the chastisement of…
1 Kings 8:21Smith
And I have set there a place for the ark, wherein is the covenant of the LORD, which he made with our fathers, when he brought them out of the land of Egypt.

Show 3 more

In the reference works

Smith's Bible Dictionary (1884) · 16 references

The popular name in this, as in so many instances,is not that of Scripture. There we have the "TEN WORDS," (Exodus 34:28; 4:13; 10:4) the "COVENANT," Ex., Deut. 11. cc.; (1 Kings 8:21; 2 Chronicles 6:11) etc., or, very often as the solemn attestation of the divine will, the "TESTIMONY." (Exodus 25:16,21; 31:18) etc. The circumstances in which the Ten great Words were first given to the people surrounded them with an awe which attached to no other precept. In the midst of the cloud and the darkness and the flashing lightning and the fiery smoke and the thunder like the voice of a trumpet, Moses was called to Mount Sinai to receive the law without which the people would cease to be a holy nation. (Exodus 19:20) Here, as elsewhere, Scripture unites two facts which men separate. God, and not man was speaking to the Israelites in those terrors, and yet, in the language of later inspired teachers, other instrumentality was not excluded. No other words were proclaimed in like manner. And the record was as exceptional as the original revelation. Of no other words could it be said that they were written as these were written, engraved on the Tables of Stone, not as originating in man’s contrivance or sagacity, but by the power of the Eternal Spirit, by the "finger of God." (Exodus 31:18; 32:16) The number Ten was, we can hardly doubt, itself significant to Moses and the Israelites. The received symbol, then and at all times, of completeness, it taught the people that the law of Jehovah was perfect. (Psalms 19:7) The term "Commandments" had come into use in the time of Christ. (Luke 18:20) Their division into two tables is not only expressly mentioned but the stress is upon the two leaves no doubt that the distinction was important, and that answered to that summary of the law which was made both by Moses and by Christ into two precepts; so that the first table contained Duties to God , and the second, Duties to our Neighbor . There are three principal divisions of the two tables:

That of the Roman Catholic Church, making the first table contain three commandments and the second the other seven.
The familiar division, referring the first four to our duty toward God and the six remaining to our duty toward man.
The division recognized by the old Jewish writers, Josephus and Philo, which places five commandments in each table. It has been maintained that the law of filial duty, being a close consequence of God’s fatherly relation to us, maybe referred to the first table. But this is to place human parents on a level with God, and, by purity of reasoning the Sixth Commandment might be added to the first table, as murder is the destruction of God’s image in man. Far more reasonable is the view which regards the authority of parents as heading the second table, as the earthly reflex of that authority of the Father of his people and of all men which heads the first, and as the first principle of the whole law of love to our neighbor; because we are all brethren and the family is, for good and ill the model of the state. "The Decalogue differs from all the other legislation of Moses: (1) It was proclaimed by God himself in a most public and solemn manner. (2) It was given under circumstances of most appalling majesty and sublimity. (3) It was written by the finger of God on two tables of stone. (5:22) (4) It differed from any and all other laws given to Israel in that it was comprehensive and general rather than specific and particular. (6) It was complete, being one finished whole to which nothing was to be added, from which nothing was ever taken away. (6) The law of the Ten Commandments was honored by Jesus Christ as embodying the substance of the law of God enjoined upon man. (7) It can scarcely be doubted that Jesus had his eye specially if not exclusively on this law, (5:18) as one never to be repealed from which not one jot or tittle should ever pass away. (8) It is marked by wonderful simplicity and brevity such a contrast to our human legislation, our British statute-book for instance, which it would need an elephant to carry and an OEdipus to interpret."

In the topical indexes

Nave's Topical Bible (1896) · 0 references, grouped by sub-topic

→ See COMMANDMENTS

Texts: Smith's Bible Dictionary (1884); Nave's Topical Bible (1896), from the CrossWire SWORD modules (public domain). Verse references were parsed from the works' own markup and checked against the KJV verse list.

Ten Commandments

The verses

In the reference works

In the topical indexes

Report a problem