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last update Jan. 6, 2002 PDF (Adobe Portable Document Format) and .rtf files (rich text format) of the transparencies used in this presentation, as well as the notes on this web page, are available on the download page
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage Exodus 20:1-2 (RSV).
Topics Questions and topics taken largely from the introduction and chapter 1 in Broken Tablets : Restoring the Ten Commandments and Ourselves. Ed. by: Rachel S. Mikva. Jewish Lights Pub; 1999,
1. Introduction 1.1. The Ten Utterances 1.2. Scripture Reference 1.3. Context 1.4. Numbering 1.6. At Mount Sinai 2. The First Commandment 2.1. Can God Command Belief? 2.2. A God who is an "I" 2.3. The Name of God 2.4 "Your " God 2.5. God the "Bringer Out;" The Involved God 2.6. God the Liberator from Bondage 3. References
1. Introduction 1.1. “The Ten Utterances” Hebrew aseret hadibrot = “the ten utterances” Greek deka logoi (“the ten words”).
1.2. Scripture Reference Exodus 20: 1-17: God’s words to Israel from Mount Sinai Deuteronomy 5:6-21: Moses’s recapitulation to Israel of what God told him at Mount Horeb
1.3. Context Part of the story of Israel’s liberation from Egypt. The basis for Israel’s continuing relationship with God = “covenant.” The way to lead Israel to the fullness of life God intended. Obedience to the commandments is a response of love from a grateful Israel.
1.4. Numbering Varies among the religious traditions:
* The Christians traditions give Exodus 20:2-3 as the first Commandment, and Exodus 20:4-6 as the second. However, some Jewish sources give Exodus 20:2 as the first Commandment, and Exodus 20:3-6 as the second.
In Jewish tradition, the arrangement of the commandments on the two tablets has significance. That arrangement is:
God’s name is not mentioned in the commandments on the second tablet. Roman emperor Hadrian (76 to 138 AD) asked Rabbi Joshua ben Chananyah why this was. His answer: God’s name cannot lie adjacent to heinous crimes, just as the emperor does not put his name on outhouses and such.
The last five commandments about our relationship with others parallels the law codes of other ancient near Eastern peoples. What is unique however is that breaking these laws about our relationship with others also effects our relationship with God
1.6. At Mount Sinai 1.6.1. Written and Oral Torah in Rabbinic Judiasm After the destruction of the temple, the Torah became the central focus of Jewish faith. God gave the Commandments and the entire Torah (written and oral = all rabbinic interpretation) to Moses at Mount Sinai. When a rabbi interprets Torah today, he is making oral Torah, and speaks with the authority of the Torah.
1.6.2 The Scene at Mount Sinai in Exodus Rabbah The description from the rabbinic text Exodus Rabbah of the scene at Mount Sinai when God gave Moses the Ten Commandments:
2. The First Commandment 2.1. I, Adonai your God, am the One
“I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery” Exodus 20:2 (NRSV)
“I, Adonai your God, [am the one] who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from a slavehouse Exodus 20:2 (tr. Eugene Borowitz, in Broken Tablets)
2.2. Can God Command Belief? Is this really a commandment? How can God demand we believe when belief is not under our direct voluntary control? Some have suggested the “first commandment” should be considered a preface to the actual commands that follow. Maimonides on the other hand, said it is the first among the commandments, the essential pillar upon which all else rests
2.3. A God who is an “I” “I am the LORD your God. . .
An “I” speaks (first person, pronoun, singular) in this commandment:
2.4. The Name of God
YHWH
Hebrew letters yod
This is the Tetragrammaton:
This name was spoken only by the high priest on the high holy days (Yom Kippur) in the temple in ancient Israel. At that time:
The tetragrammaton is no longer pronounced since the Romans destroyed the temple in 70 A.D. No one now knows the correct pronunciation.
Because it is otherwise blasphemy to say the name of God, when a devout Jew encounters YHWH in the Hebrew scripture, they substitute a word that could not possibly sound like the real name of God -- Adonai, meaning “my LORD.” The pronunciation of YHWH as “Yahweh” is a guess by Jewish scholars (Masoretes) some time before the 10th century.
Christian bible translators in the 16th century combined the consonants of YHWH (poorly transliterated as “JHVH,” with the vowels of the substitute name Adonai to produce the artificial hybrid name Jehovah. Devout Jews: saying aloud the approximation “Yahweh” is getting too close to the real name and hence is blasphemous. Hallelujah = “Praise Yah”
2.5. “Your” God God is God of everyone and everything. But the “your” here is a singular pronoun: God is addressing us as individuals.
implications:
2.6. God the “Bringer Out;” The Involved God Adonai does not say
“I am the LORD your God, all powerful, almighty, omniscience, omnipresent, who created you and the universe you live in. . .”
but rather:
“who brought you out the land of Egypt. . .”
What might it say about God that he would describe himself in this way? What does it emphasize?
The divine presence is incarnate in all the world. God is ruach kol basar; the spirit that resides in all flesh. That presence may be brought to consciousness in the mind of every human who is open to it, as it may be blocked out and negated entirely by the closing of the human heart, by cruelty, or by the denial of God’s image. The Shechinah, the divine presence in our world, does not dwell where she is not wanted.”
- Arthur Green, in Seek My Face, Speak My Name, quoted in Broken Tablets
2.7. God the Liberator from Bondage Can be a metaphor for anything that releases us from the many possible bondages that impede our freedom to act properly / live fully (listed examples here from Broker Tablets)
Whenever we are so freed, it is through the God who liberates from bondage, who brings us out of slavery
3. References
Broken Tablets. Restoring the Ten Commandments and Ourselves. Rachel S. Mikva, editor. Jewish Lights Publishing, Woodstock, Vermont, 1999. Eerdman’s Dictionary of the Bible. David Noel Freedman, Editor. Eerdman’s Publishing, Grand Rapids, MI, 2000. (articles on “Ten Commandments”, “Jehovah,” “Yahweh”) The Anchor Bible Dictionary. David Noel Freeman, Editor in chief. Doubleday, New York, 1992. (articles on “Ten Commandments”, “Yahweh”) Philosophy and Religion in the West. Part I. Phillip Cary. The Teaching Company, 1999
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