The Ten Commandments are Moral Fossils
by Dr. Charlie Webb
Nobody really believes in the Ten Commandments of Moses. Most of us can't
even remember them, let alone name the punishments for breaking them. If we
did know, we would all turn away in disgust and look for a more civilized
guide for morality.
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For example, if your loved one comes to the hospital on a "Sabbath" day, all
the nurses and doctors who work to save a life are breaking the fourth
commandment. What is their punishment as prescribed by the Old Testament
God? Death. ( Exod. 31:15 or Num16:32-36). And since Islam, Judaism, and
Christianity are all derived from ancient Mosaic law, the Sabbaths now
include Friday, Saturday, and Sunday!
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If you go to church and pray to an image of Jesus or to a cross, your reward
for breaking rule #2 is death. If Dad is frustrated and takes the Lord's
name in vain (whatever that means), his punishment for breaking rule #3 is
death. If a teenager is stubborn and rebellious or if she curses her
parents, her punishment for breaking rule #5 is death. ( Exod. 20:9 or Exod
21:17). In the words of philosopher Michael Earl, "How's that for family
values?"
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So why do we cling to such fossilized traditions as the Bible and its Ten
Commandments? I think it's because of our need for symbols. We spend the
first decade or two of our lives just learning our cultural symbols (words,
numbers, and pictures). We are really the symbol species, Homo symbolicus.
This is our great strength and our great weakness. We have the capacity to
communicate countless ideas, yet we confuse symbols with reality. We think
we understand something simply because we can name it.
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We are most easily fooled by symbols that fill our emotional needs. We all
have a need for symbols that proclaim our goodness, but in our laziness we
often forego integrity for the convenience of tradition. Hence the common
but superficial belief in a symbolic "good book" and in the" Ten
Commandments". Most of us have been taught that the Bible is both loving
and good before we are old enough even to read or examine it for ourselves.
But the Bible is not really loving or good: commandment #1 demands that
anyone worshipping any religion different from that of Moses must be killed.
Have any words in the history of mankind done as much damage as this?
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Most of us would agree with the last five commandments of Moses (do not
kill, commit adultery, steal, lie, or covet your neighbor's home and wife).
Yet who remembers the greatest criminal of all in the Old Testament, the one
who boasts in Numbers 31 of killing 32,000 innocent men, women, and
children, of stealing the booty of an entire city, and of coveting and
raping every female virgin? Of course it was Moses, the lawgiver
himself...Some things never change.
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We do not need to proclaim our goodness by professing faith in the Bible any
more than we need to wear suits and yellow ties to show that we mean to do
business. We can find more wisdom in William Shakespeare and Robert
Ingersoll and more love in Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King than in any
books of religion.
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