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Exodus 20:1-17/ 3.5.5
5. (Verses 20:2-3)The first commandment teaches us that there is but one God, and that we ought to worship him only1. (Verse 4) The second commands us not to make the image2 of any living creature to worship it. The third, that we must not swear by God in a false matter. The fourth, that we must keep3 the seventh day, by resting from all sorts of work4. The fifth, that we must honor our parents5. The sixth that we must abstain from murder6. The seventh that we must not commit adultery. The eighth, that we must not be guilty of theft. The ninth, that we must not bear false witness. The tenth, that we must not admit of the desire7 of any thing that is another's.
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FOOTNOTES
1 Josephus regards the first 2 commandments (Exod. 20:2-3) as a single commandment. So also Philo (De Decalogo 14.65. He omits the statement: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage” (Exod. 20:2). The rabbis divide the Decalogue differently;
2 Josephus uses the word εἰκών (“likeness”) for “image” rather than εἴδωλον (“phantom,” “unsubstantial form,” “image reflected in a mirror or in water”), the word used by the LXX (Exod. 20:4).
3 Exod. 20:8 reads “remember” ( זכור). Josephus here is following the version of Deut. 5:12: “keep” ( שׁמור).
4 Josephus omits the statement (Exod. 20:10) that on the Sabbath work must not be done by “you, or your son, or your daughter, your manservant, or your maidservant, or your cattle, or the sojourner who is within your gates.” He also omits the reason for the Sabbath (Exod. 20:11): “for in 6 days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day.”
5 Josephus omits the reward for observing this commandment (Exod. 20:12): “that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God gives you.”
6 Josephus here uses the word φόνου, which can refer to murder or homicide. The LXX (Exod. 20:13) uses the corresponding verb, φονεύσεις.
7 Josephus’ word for desire ( ἐπιθυμίαν) here is the noun based on the LXX’s verb ἐπιθυμήσεις (Exod. 20:17, Deut. 5:21). Philo (De Decalogo 28.142-53), in his discussion of this tenth commandment, similarly extends the meaning of this word from the Hebrew notion of covetousness to desire in general and concludes with the statement (De Decalogo 28.153) that “all the wars of Greeks and barbarians between themselves or against each other, so familiar to the tragic stage, are sprung from one source, desire [ἐπιθυμίας], the desire for money or glory or pleasure. These it is that bring disaster to the human race.” |
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