excreationist

Sometimes this has problems though... e.g. say you're married to someone and someone else wants to be in a romantic relationship with you. There are two conflicting sides to that and with only one commandment it doesn't say who has the priority.

excreationist

Buffman:
Jesus did want people to follow the "no adultery" commandment - he even said that divorce from a faithful wife or remarriage (<a href="http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=MATT+5:32&language=english&version=N IV&showfn=on&showxref=on" target="_blank">Matthew 5:32</a>) is adultery and so is lust (<a href="http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=MATT+5:27-28&language=english&version=NIV&showfn=on&showxref =on" target="_blank">Matthew 5:27-28</a>). On the other hand he stopped people from stoning an adulteress to death (<a href="http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=JOHN+8:3-11&language=english&version=NIV&showfn=on&showxref =on" target="_blank">John 8:3-11</a>).
And about the Sabbath... Jesus sometimes respected the Sabbath but stretched the rules a bit. (gathering grains, healing) And other times he said he was the Lord of the Sabbath or that the Sabbath was created for man, not man for the Sabbath.

Buffman

expreacher

Thanks for the knowledgeable insights.

And I believe that this so-called Jesus wanted everyone to fulfill the "laws." (I have always had difficulty identifying an accurate list of these "laws.")

MATT 5:17,18

Did he break any of the "laws?" (Perhaps the actual author of Matthew didn't know them very well...or just had a short memory about what he was told was said.)

MATT 7:8 versus 7:21

ShottleBop

Traditional Judaism counted 613 commandments. Here's a list:
<a href="http://www.jewish.com/askarabbi/askarabbi/askr4547.htm" target="_blank">http://www.jewish.com/askarabbi/askarabbi/askr4547.htm</A>

Buffman

ShottleBop

Thank you for the URL. This is the one I used in an attempt to see if I could harmonize "laws" with "commandments", or vice versa.

<a href="http://www.ohr.org.il/special/misc/kosher.htm#taamei_hamitzvot" target="_blank">http://www.ohr.org.il/special/misc/kosher.htm#taamei_hamitzvot</a>

If the 10 Commandments only obtain their relevance through the application of 613 Laws, or the 613 Laws only obtain their relevence through adherence to the 10 Commandments, wouldn't that cause Holy Bible believers serious internal angst that they might fail to gain access to the Kingdom of Heaven because they had no clear idea what this supernatural god really expected of its slaves?

That's why I still have difficulty differentiating between "Laws" and "Commandments."

[ June 07, 2002: Message edited by: Buffman ]</p>

ShottleBop

In Judaism, the "Ten Commandments" (actually, the "Ten Words" or "Ten Things") constitute but 10 of the 613 Commandments. The dietary laws to which you link constitute part of the "halakha"--basically, Jewish "common law"--instructions regarding the conduct of everyday affairs that, over the centuries, the Rabbis developed by applying the principles inherent in the 613 commandments to situations not directly addressed. The approach, often, was to build a fence of safe conduct around prohibited actions. For example, the Torah prohibits boiling a kid in its mother's milk. From that commandment, the sages developed those parts of the laws of Kashrut that require the use of separate dishes for meat and milk and that prohibit the eating of meat and milk at the same meal. From the commandment that Jews not eat the meat of an animal that has been killed by another animal (the word used is "torn") came the rules regarding kosher slaughtering--requiring the use of perfectly honed knife, with no nicks, and killing with a single stroke. (Whether that remains the most humane way of slaughtering animals has been questioned in recent years.)

As for earning entry into the Kingdom of Heaven: my best guess is that the majority of Jews don't believe in an afterlife. There is no real dogma concerning the issue, only speculation. (Jews, on the whole, grow up not terribly concerned about achieving "salvation"; one hears no sermons about fire and brimstone in the synagogue.)

. . . and the Talmud contains passages that state that the reason there are 613 commandments is to ensure that we can't help but to comply with one or two of them during our lifetime . . ..

Buffman

ShottleBop

Thank you for taking the time and effort to post your informed insights. Normally I would have carried my questions over to e-mail rather than waste other folks time rereading the same old questions/answers over and over again as each new person enters this forum and gets caught up in an interesting, to them(me), discussion/issue. (Please feel free to make e-mail contact with me if it is your wish/desire.)

Sojourner553

There is a MAJOR misconception in the general public that the Ten Commandments represents the highest level of moral standards.

The truth is our SECULAR laws give us far more protection.


Specifically, there are no laws in the Old Testament prohibiting:

* torture (you just can't "kill" a person)

* slavery

* pollution

* child abuse

The Egyptian Book of the Dead is a more humane document than the Ten Commandments, for in it good people are exhorted to testify:

General Morality:
I have not done evil.
I have not robbed with violence.
I have not stolen.
I have done no murder; I have done no harm.
I have not committed fornication.
I have not dealt deceitfully.
I have not transgressed.
I have not acted guilefully.
I have spoken no lies.
I have not set my lips in motion [against another]
I have not been angry and wrathful except for a just cause.
I have not worked grief.
I have not acted with insolence.
I have not stirred up strife.
I have not judged hastily.
I have not been an eves dropper.
I have not multiplied words exceedingly.


Regarding Torture:

I have not caused pain.
I have not caused shedding of tears.
I have not caused terror.


Regarding Pollution

I have not laid waste the ploughed land.
I have never fouled the water.

Child Abuse
I have done neither harm nor ill.
I have not burned with rage.
I have not caused shedding of tears. (Other laws under Torture also apply.)



<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/MYSTERY.TXT" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/MYSTERY.TXT</a>

This is no minor OMMISSION, because the SECULAR laws to apply these moral standards faced MAJOR obstacles by religious conservative groups (who argued of course that their ommission meant God did not want them to become laws.)

see corporal punishment at
<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/ETHICS1.TXT" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/ETHICS1.TXT</a>

for slavery, see
<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/SLAVE.TXT" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/SLAVE.TXT</a>

General index:
<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/index.html" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/index.html</a>


Sojourner

ShottleBop

. . . and many people forget that the 10 Commandments are not the WHOLE of the law. Examples of the 613:

64. Not to oppress the stranger in matters of monetary value(2:22:20)
65. Not to afflict the orphan and the widow(2:22:21)
66. To lend money to the poor(2:22:24
67. Not to be demanding of a poor man unable to pay his debt(2:22:24)
68. Not to have any business with a loan made at interest(2:22:24)

112. To let the land lie fallow in the seventh year (shmittah)(2:34:21), (3:25:5)

216. The mitzvah of leaving an edge of one's field unreaped, for the poor(3:19:10)
217. Not to reap the very last end of one's field(3:19:9)
218. The precept of leaving the gleanings of the harvest for the poor(3:19:10)
219. Not to gather stalks of grain that fell away during the harvest(3:19:9)
220. The precept of leaving a part of a vineyard unreaped, for the poor(3:19:10)
221. The prohibition of reaping absolutely all the fruit of a vineyard(3:19:10)
222. The precept of leaving fallen grapes in a vineyard, for the poor(3:19:10)
223. The prohibition of gathering the fallen grapes in a vineyard(3:19:10)

225. Not to deny it when something of value that belongs to another is in our possession (3:19:11)

231. The prohibition on cursing any Jew, man or woman(3:19:14)
232. Not to make a trusting person stumble through misleading advice(3:19:14)
233. Not to pervert justice in a civil judgment(3:19:15)
234. Not to honor an eminent person at a trial(3:19:15)
235. The precept that a judge should render judgment with righteousness(3:19:15)
236. The prohibition on gossiping slanderously(3:19:16)
237. Not to stand idly by when someone's blood is shed(3:19:16)
238. The prohibition against hating one's brethren(3:19:17)

241. The prohibition against taking revenge(3:19:18)
242. The prohibition against bearing a grudge(3:19:18)

258. The prohibition against cheating with any kind of measure(3:19:35)
259. The precept that scales, weights and measures should be made correct(3:19:36)

340. The precept of returning land to its original owner at the jubilee(3:25:24)
341. The precept of redeeming heritage land in a walled city within a year(3:25:29)

452. Not to eat a limb or part taken from a living animal(5:12:23)

529. Not to destroy fruit-trees in setting siege--and so is any needless destruction included in the ban(5:20:19)

538. The religious duty of returning a lost object to its owner(5:22:1)
539.Not to turn a blind eye to a lost object(5:22:3)
540. Not to leave the beast of one's fellow-man lying under its burden(5:23:4)

544. Not to take the mother-bird with the young in a nest(5:22:6)

546. The religious duty of building a parapet(5:22:8)[to keep people from falling off your roof]
547. Not to leave a stumbling-block (keep a dangerous object) about(5:22:8)

550. Not to do work with two kinds of animals together(5:22:10)

568. Not to return a slave who fled from his master abroad, into the land of Israel(5:23:16)
569. Not to oppress this slave who flees from his master abroad into the land of Israel(5:23:17)

583. Not to take in pledge any objects used in preparing life-sustaining food.

587. The religious duty of returning a pledged object to its owner when he need it(5:24:13)
588. The precept of giving a hired man his due pay on his day--when he has earned it(5:24:15)
589. That a near relation of a person in a court trial should not give testimony(5:24:16)

596. Not to muzzle a domestic animal during its work(5:25:4)

600. The religious duty to save a person pursued by a killer(5:25:12)

As noted above, these led, by elaboration to address specific issues, to a much more comprehensive body of law.

[ June 09, 2002: Message edited by: ShottleBop ]</p>

Sojourner553

Actually, there are some good mitzvahs here.

But where do they apply to MY points:

ie, Prohibitions against:

Torture (including child beatings/abuse)
Slavery
Pollution

My point was these MORAL prohibitions had to be developed in SECULAR law -- and history has shown they faced fierce opposition by conservative religious groups over many centuries (because their source was not religious based!)

It's like you tried to drown out my point in so many details -- hoping I might "forget" what my original premise was:

Today we hear so often in the news the claims by conservatives that to post the Ten Commandments in schools would make our children more moral.

My premise is that with the OMISSION of basic moral laws (such as prohibitions against torture and slavery!), the Ten Commandments is not -- stand alone-- complete as a moral document!

Adding extraneous Jewish law (including good laws that most Christians ignore) does not (a) make this part of the Ten Commandments and (b) does not offset the ommissions in prohibitions against torture and slavery!

Sojourner

[ June 10, 2002: Message edited by: Sojourner553 ]</p>