Exodus 20 – The Ten Commandments. ¹ And God spoke all these words, saying:

 

Tablet I – Love God

1 – No Other Gods - Authority

² “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

³ “You shall have no other gods before Me.

 

2 – No Idolatry - Actions: Worship

⁴ “You shall not make for yourself a carved image — any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; ⁵ you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, ⁶ but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

 

3 – No Swearing - Words

⁷ “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.

 

4 – Keep the Sabbath – Thoughts: Ceremony

⁸ “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. ⁹ Six days you shall labor and do all your work, ¹⁰ but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. ¹¹ For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.

 

 

Tablet II – Love Your Neighbor

5 – Honor Your Parents - Authority

¹² “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.

 

6 – No Murder – Actions: Violence

¹³ “You shall not murder.

 

7 – No Adultery – Actions: Sex

¹⁴ “You shall not commit adultery.

 

8 – No Stealing - Actions: Property

¹⁵ “You shall not steal.

 

9 – No Lying - Words

¹⁶ “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

 

10 – No Coveting - Thoughts

¹⁷ “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”

 

19 In the third month after the children of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on the same day, they came to the Wilderness of Sinai.² … So Israel camped there before the mountain. …

¹⁶ Then it came to pass on the third day, in the morning, that there were thunderings and lightnings, and a thick cloud on the mountain; and the sound of the trumpet was very loud ^…

20 And God spoke all these words, saying:

² “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

³ “You shall have no other gods before Me.

…

Concerning Servants

21 “Now these are the judgments which you shall set before them:² If you buy a Hebrew servant, he shall serve six years; and in the seventh he shall go out free and pay nothing. ^…

⁷ “And if a man sells his daughter to be a female slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. ⁸ If she does not please her master, who has betrothed her to himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has dealt deceitfully with her. ...

Concerning Violence

¹² “He who strikes a man so that he dies shall surely be put to death.¹³ However, if he did not lie in wait, … then I will appoint for you a place where he may flee. ...

¹⁵ “And he who strikes his father or his mother shall surely be put to death.

¹⁶ “He who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall surely be put to death.

¹⁷ “And he who curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death. ...

²² “If men fight, and hurt a woman with child, so that she gives birth prematurely, yet no harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman’s husband imposes on him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. ²³ But if any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, ²⁴ eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, ²⁵ burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.

Concerning Animals

²⁸ “If an ox gores a man or a woman to death, then the ox shall surely be stoned, and its flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox shall be acquitted. ²⁹ But if the ox tended to thrust with its horn in times past, and it has been made known to his owner, and he has not kept it confined, so that it has killed a man or a woman, the ox shall be stoned and its owner also shall be put to death. ... 

³⁵ “If one man’s ox hurts another’s, so that it dies, then they shall sell the live ox and divide the money from it; and the dead ox they shall also divide. ³⁶ Or if it was known that the ox tended to thrust in time past, and its owner has not kept it confined, he shall surely pay ox for ox, and the dead animal shall be his own.

Property

22 “If a man steals an ox or a sheep, and slaughters it or sells it, he shall restore five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep. ...

¹⁴ “And if a man borrows anything from his neighbor, and it becomes injured or dies, the owner of it not being with it, he shall surely make it good. ¹⁵ If its owner was with it, he shall not make it good; if it was hired, it came for its hire.

Moral and Ceremonial Principles

¹⁶ “If a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed, and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride-price for her to be his wife. ¹⁷ If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride-price of virgins.

¹⁸ “You shall not permit a sorceress to live.

¹⁹ “Whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death.

²⁰ “He who sacrifices to any god, except to the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed.

²¹ “You shall neither mistreat a stranger nor oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. ...

²⁸ “You shall not revile God, nor curse a ruler of your people. ...

³¹ “And you shall be holy men to Me: you shall not eat meat torn by beasts in the field; you shall throw it to the dogs.

Justice for All

23 “You shall not circulate a false report. Do not put your hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness. ² You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; nor shall you testify in a dispute so as to turn aside after many to pervert justice. ³ You shall not show partiality to a poor man in his dispute.

⁴ “If you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going astray, you shall surely bring it back to him again. ⁵ If you see the donkey of one who hates you lying under its burden, and you would refrain from helping it, you shall surely help him with it.

⁶ “You shall not pervert the judgment of your poor in his dispute.⁷ Keep yourself far from a false matter; do not kill the innocent and righteous. For I will not justify the wicked. ⁸ And you shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the discerning and perverts the words of the righteous. ...

¹⁷ “Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the LordGod.^[a]

¹⁸ “You shall not offer the blood of My sacrifice with leavened bread; nor shall the fat of My sacrifice remain until morning. 

¹⁹ The first of the firstfruits of your land you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.

You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk. ...

Israel Affirms the Covenant

24 ³ So Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the judgments. And all the people answered with one voice and said, “All the words which the Lord has said we will do.” ⁴ And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord. And he rose early in the morning, and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars according to the twelve tribes of Israel. ⁵ Then he sent young men of the children of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the Lord. ⁶ And Moses took half the blood and put it in basins, and half the blood he sprinkled on the altar. ⁷ Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read in the hearing of the people. And they said, “All that the Lord has said we will do, and be obedient.” ⁸ And Moses took the blood, sprinkled it on the people, and said, “This is the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made with you according to all these words.” ^…

¹² Then the Lord said to Moses, “Come up to Me on the mountain and be there; and I will give you tablets of stone, and the law and commandments which I have written, that you may teach them.”

^… And Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

Offerings for the Sanctuary

25 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ² “Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring Me an offering. …: gold, silver, and bronze;⁴ blue, purple, and scarlet thread, fine linen, and goats’ hair; ⁵ ram skins dyed red, badger skins, and acacia wood; ^… 8 And let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them. ...

31

¹⁸ And when He had made an end of speaking with him on Mount Sinai, He gave Moses two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.

The Gold Calf

32 Now when the people saw that Moses delayed coming down from the mountain, the people gathered together to Aaron, and said to him, “Come, make us gods that shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” ...

¹⁵ And Moses turned and went down from the mountain, and the two tablets of the Testimony were in his hand. The tablets were written on both sides; on the one side and on the other they were written. ¹⁶ Now the tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God engraved on the tablets. …

¹⁹ So it was, as soon as he came near the camp, that he saw the calf and the dancing. So Moses’ anger became hot, and he cast the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain. ²⁰ Then he took the calf which they had made, burned it in the fire, and ground it to powder; and he scattered it on the water and made the children of Israel drink it. ... 

… 

³⁵ So the Lord plagued the people because of what they did with the calf which Aaron made.…

Moses Makes New Tablets

34 And the Lord said to Moses, “Cut two tablets of stone like the firstones, and I will write on these tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke. ^…

⁴ So he cut two tablets of stone like the first ones. Then Moses rose early in the morning and went up Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him; and he took in his hand the two tablets of stone.

^…

The Covenant Renewed

¹⁰ And He said: “Behold, I make a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation; and all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the Lord. For it is an awesome thing that I will do with you. ¹¹ Observe what I command you this day. Behold, I am driving out from before you the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite.

1

 ¹² Take heed to yourself, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land where you are going, lest it be a snare in your midst. ¹³ But you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images¹⁴ 

1a?

(for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), ¹⁵ lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they play the harlot with their gods and make sacrifice to their gods, and one of them invites you and you eat of his sacrifice, ¹⁶ and you take of his daughters for your sons, and his daughters play the harlot with their gods and make your sons play the harlot with their gods.

2

¹⁷ “You shall make no molded gods for yourselves.

3

¹⁸ “The Feast of Unleavened Bread you shall keep. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, in the appointed time of the month of Abib; for in the month of Abib you came out from Egypt.

4

¹⁹ “All that open the womb are Mine, and every male firstborn among your livestock, whether ox or sheep. ²⁰ But the firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb. And if you will not redeem him, then you shall break his neck. All the firstborn of your sons you shall redeem.

4a?

“And none shall appear before Me empty-handed.

5

²¹ “Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; in plowing time and in harvest you shall rest.

6

²² “And you shall observe the Feast of Weeks, of the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the Feast of Ingathering at the year’s end.

7

²³ “Three times in the year all your men shall appear before the Lord, the Lord God of Israel. ²⁴ For I will cast out the nations before you and enlarge your borders; neither will any man covet your land when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in the year.

8

²⁵ “You shall not offer the blood of My sacrifice with leaven,

8a?

nor shall the sacrifice of the Feast of the Passover be left until morning.

9

²⁶ “The first of the firstfruits of your land you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God.

10

You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.”

²⁷ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write these words, for according to the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.” ²⁸ So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water. And He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. ...

The Shining Face of Moses

9 “Hear, O Israel: You are to cross over the Jordan today, and go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourself, …

⁴ “Do not think in your heart, after the Lord your God has cast them out before you, saying, ‘Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land’; but it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out from before you. ⁵ It is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you go in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord your God drives them out from before you, and that He may fulfill the word which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.⁶ Therefore understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people.

⁷ “Remember! Do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day that you departed from the land of Egypt until you came to this place, you have been rebellious against the Lord. ⁸ Also in Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, so that the Lord was angry enough with you to have destroyed you.⁹ When I went up into the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the Lord made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water. ¹⁰ Then the Lord delivered to me two tablets of stone written with the finger of God, and on them were all the words which the Lord had spoken to you on the mountain from the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly. ¹¹ And it came to pass, at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the Lord gave me the two tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant.

¹² “Then the Lord said to me, ‘Arise, go down quickly from here, for your people whom you brought out of Egypt have acted corruptly; they have quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them; they have made themselves a molded image.’^…

¹⁵ “So I turned and came down from the mountain, and the mountain burned with fire; and the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. ¹⁶ And I looked, and behold, you had sinned against the Lordyour God—had made for yourselves a molded calf! You had turned aside quickly from the way which the Lord had commanded you.¹⁷ Then I took the two tablets and threw them out of my two hands and broke them before your eyes. ¹⁸ And I fell down before the Lord, as at the first, forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water, because of all your sin which you committed in doing wickedly in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him to anger. ...

The Second Pair of Tablets

10 “At that time the Lord said to me, ‘Hew for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and come up to Me on the mountain and make yourself an ark of wood. ² And I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke; and you shall put them in the ark.’

³ “So I made an ark of acacia wood, hewed two tablets of stone like the first, and went up the mountain, having the two tablets in my hand. ⁴ And He wrote on the tablets according to the first writing, the Ten Commandments, which the Lord had spoken to you in the mountain from the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly; and the Lord gave them to me. ⁵ Then I turned and came down from the mountain, and put the tablets in the ark which I had made; and there they are, just as the Lord commanded me.”

…

The Essence of the Law

¹² “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul,¹³ and to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command you today for your good? ^… 16 Therefore circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and be stiff-necked no longer. ^…

11 “Therefore you shall love the Lord your God, and keep His charge, His statutes, His judgments, and His commandments always.