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It's good to see you in the forum again, Clay+Iron_Times

Thank you ... I am over the water right now so my connection is via satellite.

You put some time into responding with regards to the 10 Commandment questions and I appreciate it. However, the question remains.. Out of 1700+ Canon Code, why the absence of code with certainty, as to which 10 was decided on?. Being as no code exist to solidify what Augustine had to say, would that raise the possibility of some future alteration in the 10 choices?

Of course that would be placing a "Law" upon a set of "Laws". As Augustine, I also would be reluctant to do that.

be broken into two Commandments or should it be summarized as one?

Exactly.... this also applies to the 9th and 10th Commandments of the right column I posted. Why not leave those 2 grouped together as depicted on the left column?

Finally, and I know this may seem a silly question to some... How did we get from 10 Commandments to over 1700 Canon codes of Law?

For my part it would take an in-depth study on the bibliography of Canon Law. I would not want to expend the time which would take me away from my focus on God. I would rather stay in the scriptures themselves

I read a small portion of this text:

Canon law was born in communities that felt great ambivalence about the relationship of law and faith. Custom governed early Christian communities, not a body of written law. It was custom informed by oral traditions and sacred scripture. Christians did not arrange their lives according to a Christian law but according to the spiritual goals of the community and of individual Christians. St Paul wrote to Roman Christians who knew and lived under the law created by the Roman state and reminded them that faith in Christ replaces secular law with a quest for salvation (Romans 7:1-12 and 10:1-11). Law, he sharply reminded the Galatians, cannot make a man worthy to God; only faith can bring life to the just man. The inherent tension between the faith and conscience of the individual and the rigor of law has never been and never will be completely resolved in religious law.

You put some time into responding with regards to the 10 Commandment questions and I appreciate it. However, the question remains.. Out of 1700+ Canon Code, why the absence of code with certainty, as to which 10 was decided on?.

What is the need for declaring whose "decalogizing" of the Biblical verses is the best? Why would it be important and to whom?

Any way you break it up to try to make it memorable, it contains the same information. This is, frankly, a pathetic position to claim that Catholics "ignore" the 2nd commandment.

I ask again, what part of "I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods before me" do you read as official sanction for the worshipping of idols?

Being as no code exist to solidify what Augustine had to say, would that raise the possibility of some future alteration in the 10 choices?

Think this through again. There is no official position, therefore there can be no "alteration" to what does not exist.

SD

why the absence of code with certainty, as to which 10 was decided on?

You still seem to have difficulty understanding. The list of 10 you recite, and the one I recite, are a tools of convenience to summarize the 10 commandments. They aren't the actual commandments that are found in Exodus and Deuteronomy, but summaries of this scripture for the sake of convenience.

Each of the 3 lists presented summarize equally well the 10 commandments of Scripture. One is no better, or more complete, than the other. You keep pretending that one list is superior to the other or that one comes from scripture and the others don't. No enumeration of the ten can be found in scripture and the ones you and I use are based on tradition.

"Thank you ... I am over the water right now so my connection is via satellite."

Over the water in a boat, or in a plane? I'm picturing you in some sort of James bond set-up.

" Out of 1700+ Canon Code, why the absence of code with certainty, as to which 10 was decided on?"

Well, the Decalogue is the Decalogue, it's Exodus 20: 6-17, and Deuteronomy 5: 6-22. That can't be changed. There are actually something like 14 imperative statements, combined with a lot of information that might be considered extraneous from a modern day perspective (references on how to treat your slave on the Sabbath, references to not desiring your neighbors donkey or oxen, etc.) The question is, how can those 14 imperative statements be best summarized in a 10 Commandment format? Western Catholics choose one list, Eastern Catholics tend to choose another, and Jews choose still a third. All are good summaries, and IMHO, capture the central points of the Decalogue.

"Exactly.... this also applies to the 9th and 10th Commandments of the right column I posted. Why not leave those 2 grouped together as depicted on the left column?"

Well, there are good arguments for either position. Some feel that worshiping a false God and making an idol are the same thing, and so can be summarized together. Others feel that coveting goods and desiring your neighbors wife are essentially summarizing earlier commandments (against theft and adultery,) and pointing that it is not merely external actions, but the state of one's heart that matters. These people feel it's fine to combine these two imperative statements. The view against this is that it speaks specifically to a neighbors wife and property, (echoing the prohibition on theft and adultery,) but does not address the other previous Commandments. Others might object that a spouse is not the same as property.

"would that raise the possibility of some future alteration in the 10 choices?"

No one can alter the actual Decalogue, it's Scriptural. With regards to the division and summary of the ten Commandments from the 14 imperative statements in the Decalogue, it's simply a teaching tool. Christ and His Apostles themselves summarized the Decalogue in different fashions, and there is nothing binding on us Catholics to accept one version over another. It's the Scripture that is inspired, not the summaries of that Scripture.

Our Catechism works from a particular summary of the 10 Commandments, but it quotes and cites the underlying Scripture that makes up the actual and entire Decalogue. When you study the Ten Commandments within the Catholic Church, you are going to be pointed to the actual Decalogue in Scripture.

"Finally, and I know this may seem a silly question to some... How did we get from 10 Commandments to over 1700 Canon codes of Law?'

That's not a silly question at all, Clay+Iron_Times.

"For my part it would take an in-depth study on the bibliography of Canon Law. I would not want to expend the time which would take me away from my focus on God. I would rather stay in the scriptures themselves."

I'm right with you, Clay+Iron_Times. That makes good sense. I've never seen the Code of Canon Law, and I don't know of any Catholics who actually have looked at the Code of Canon Law , outside of people here on FR and, presumably, priests. Your motion to focus on Scripture is an excellent one.

As for the origin of Canon Law, when you have a Church of 1.3 Billion people from every culture and nation on earth, you have to have some set of rules that people can turn to for a set of standards. The Code of Canon Law is not an explanation of Scripture, it's a technical manual that sets a written standard for how the Church operates. It answers questions such as, "Who can be married?" and "What are the proper procedures for disciplining Clergy? The entire point of the Code of Canon Law is to ensure justice in a large, diverse, and complex human organization. It's the answer to "How does one Love thy neighbor as oneself?" when the neighbors are a bishop and a priest who is accused of teaching heresy, or the neighbors are a woman who has just married a man who turns out to be a practicing homosexual, and she wants to know if she is in a valid marriage or just a sham.

It's also the source that the old Norwegian guy who always sits in the back of the Church can turn to if he feels the young priest is not celebrating the mass correctly.

For the most part, the Code of Canon Law is not something to guide your daily walk with Christ. It's a collection of Ecclesiastical laws for the governing of the Church. Most Catholics will never even see, much less read the Code of Canon Law. Basically, Clay+Iron_Times, you don't need the Code of Canon Law unless you get into a dispute with another Catholic relating to Church governance, or you somehow find yourself in a serious pickle vis a vis Church policy. It's not analogous to the Decalogue, it's more analogous to the Book of Leviticus, in that it contains a detailed collections of rules.

"For my part it would take an in-depth study on the bibliography of Canon Law. I would not want to expend the time which would take me away from my focus on God. I would rather stay in the scriptures themselves."

Clay+Iron_Times, if you want to understand how Catholics read the Scriptures, a much better source would be the Catechism. I often turn to it to understand concepts that I can't resolve in my own reading of Scripture.