The Numbering of the Ten Commandments

I have received questions on why the numbering of the Ten Commandments in protestant teaching is different from that of the Catholics. 

The second commandment in some Pentecostal and protestant teaching is not the second commandment in the Catholic teaching yet both used the same Exodus 20 as their source. 

Why this difference?

If you are interested in learning the reason, you can continue reading. Though, it is a bit long.

The first thing we should all remember is that the original writing of the books of the bible does not have chapters or verses.

The chapters and verses in the bible were all later additions. The chapters were added in the 13th century by Cardinal Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury. The verses were added in the 16th century by Robert Stephanus, a protestant layman.

The second thing to note is that, though it is called the Ten Commandments, it was not numbered from 1 to 10 and given to Moses to deliver.

With the above in mind, if you go back to Exodus 20 and read the Ten Commandments again, you will discover something. You will discover that by merely counting, the number of times you will see the phrase "Thou shall not. . ." Or "You shall not" is ten times. Two other commands did not carry the "thou shall not" phrase. They are: Remember to keep the Sabbath day Holy and Honour your father and mother.

So, in all, you will be getting about 12 commandments. Let me itemize them for you:

1. You shall have no other gods before me.

2. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything.

3. You shall neither prostrate yourself before them (graven images) nor worship them.

4. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.

5. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

6. Honor your father and your mother.

7. You shall not murder.

8. You shall not commit adultery.

9. You shall not steal.

10. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour.

11. You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife.

12. You shall not covet your neighbour’s house or anything that is your neighbour’s.

As far back as the 3rd century, from the record, Origen (a great theologian and exegete of the early Greek Church) was the first to distinguish the Ten Commandments and itemized/numbered them from 1 to 10. When he did this, he did not include the one I listed as number 3 above. Also, he combined numbers 11 and 12 as one commandment. 

This was what he came up with:

1. You shall have no other gods before me.

2. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything.

3. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.

4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

5. Honor your father and your mother.

6. You shall not murder.

7. You shall not commit adultery.

8. You shall not steal.

9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour.

10. You shall not covet.

As you already know, this is what the protestants of today and modern-day Pentecostal denominations adopted.

In the 6th century, St Augustine came up with a different numbering. He maintained 11 and 12 as separate commands and combined 1, 2 and 3 as one commandment to have something like this:

1. You shall have no other gods before me.

2. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.

3. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

4. Honor your father and your mother.

5. You shall not murder.

6. You shall not commit adultery.

7. You shall not steal.

8. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour.

9. You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife.

10. You shall not covet your neighbour’s house or anything that is your neighbour’s.

As you already know, this is what the Catholics and even Lutherans are still using.

What is the reason behind all these?

Is a long history, but I think to be fair to all, everyone has reasons for the choice of their numbering.

For Catholics, the last two commandments on not to convet your neighbour's wife and not to covet your neighbour's goods are separated because the former is about lust and the need for purity of thought and freedom from concupiscence. The latter talked about inordinate greed, fraudulent acts, and manipulation to gain earthly possessions.

For the Catholic church, these two are different and can't be joined together as one since they express two different things God is against.

Then on the commandment on images. . .The teaching of the Catholic church is that "Thou shall not make for yourself any graven image", is already contained in "Thou shall not have any strange God except me."

Let's look at this:

1. You shall have no other gods before me.

2. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything.

3. You shall neither prostrate yourself before them (graven images) nor worship them.

A good summary will come to the conclusion that the three are talking about one thing, which is already contained in number 1 of the command.

But,

If your understanding is that God is explicitly against the use of images, as in LITERALLY, and you feel the number 2 command in some protestant teaching (You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything) must be there to emphasis that fact, then it make mess of the fact that just five chapters after Exodus 20, God commands Moses and the Israelites to build the Ark of the Covenant, moulding two cherubim of gold and instructing them on how to place them, which totally contradict his command on not having images of ANYTHING (Exodus 25:18-19.)

Or even more dramatic is when God instructed Moses to mould a fiery serpent made of bronze and place it on a pole to cure snake bite. (Numbers 21:8-9). 

How can God give a command not to make images of ANYTHING, and go ahead to command that images should be made?

So, the right understanding of that command is not that images are forbidden, but that they should not take the place of God.

#PurestPurity