The Catholic Church Changed The Ten Commandments? [Ecumenical]

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[Salvation]

The Catholic Church
Changed The Ten Commandments?

  

 

 

Real Audio Lessons on this Topic

Commandment 1
Commandments 2-3
Commandment 4, 6, & 9
Commandments 5, 7, 8, 10

Some Protestants accuse the Catholic Church of having dropped one of the 10 Commandments. "You're idolators! You worship statues! And because you do, your Church dropped the commandment against graven images!"

The truth, of course, is that the Catholic Church did not and could not change the Ten Commandments. Latin Catholics and Protestants simply list them differently. It is incredible that such a pernicious lie could be so easily spread and believed, especially since the truth could easily be determined by just looking into the matter. But the rumor lives.

Now, below are the ways in which Protestants and Roman Catholics enumerate the Commandments:

Most common Protestant listing:

Thou shalt have no other gods before me
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain
Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy
Honour thy father and thy mother
Thou shalt not kill
Thou shalt not commit adultery
Thou shalt not steal
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour
Thou shalt not covet

Latin Catholic listing:

Thou shalt not have other gods besides Me
Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain
Remember to keep holy the Lord’s day
Honor thy father and thy mother
Thou shalt not murder
Thou shalt not commit adultery
Thou shalt not steal
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods

So what the heck? What did happen to the commandment about graven images in the Catholic listing? Did the Church just "drop" a commandment?

Um, no. The Old Testament was around long before the time of the Apostles, and the Decalogue, which is found in three different places in the Bible (Exodus 20 and Exodous 34 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21), has not been changed by the Catholic Church. Chapter and verse divisions are a medieval invention, however, and numbering systems of the Ten Words (Commandments), the manner in which they are grouped, and the "short-hand" used for them, vary among various religious groups. Exodus 20 is the version most often referred to when one speaks of the Ten Commandments, so it will be our reference point here. Here's how the relevant portion of Exodus 20 reads:

2	I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3	Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.
4	Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
5	Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
6	And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
7	Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
8	Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
9	Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10	But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
11	For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
12	Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
13	Thou shalt not kill. 1
14	Thou shalt not commit adultery.
15	Thou shalt not steal.
16	Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
17	Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

So we have 16 verses and Ten Commandments (this we know because of Exodus 34:28 and Deuteronomy 4:13 which speak of the "Ten Words" of God). How to group these verses and Commands? Here's how different groups have handled this:   

	Verses Grouped Together
Counted as Commandment #	Jewish	Latin Catholic, Lutheran	Eastern Catholic, Orthodox, Most Protestant
1	2 (commandment to believe)	3, 4, 5, 6	3
2	3, 4, 5, 6	7	4, 5, 6
3	7	8, 9, 10, 11	7
4	8, 9, 10, 11	12	8, 9, 10, 11
5	12	13	12
6	13	14	13
7	14	15	14
8	15	16	15
9	16	17a (commandment against lust)	16
10	17	17b (commandment against greed)	17

When the Commandments are listed, they are often listed in short-hand form, such that, for ex., verses 8, 9, 10 and 11 concerning the Sabbath become simply "Remember the Sabbath and to keep it holy." Because Latin Catholics group 3, 4, 5 and 6 together as all pertaining to the concept "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me," we are accused of having "dropped" the commandment against idols. That Eastern Catholics list the Commandments differently never enters the equation for people who think this way; they are simply against those they probably call the "Romish popers" and that's that (I hope it doesn't bother them that Jews would accuse them of totally forgetting the First Commandment, or that Latin Catholics could accuse some Protestants of skipping lightly over the commandments against lust. And why don't the Protestants who have a problem with our numbering system go after the Lutherans for the same thing, anyway?).

Bottom line:

• chapter and verse numbering in the Bible came about in the Middle Ages
   

• the Catholic Church (which includes Eastern Catholics, too) has two different numbering systems for the Commandments given, one agreeing with the most common Protestant enumeration;
   

• the Latin Church's numbering is the most common in the Catholic Church and is the one referred to by Protestants who, ignoring Eastern Catholic Churches, accuse the Catholic Church of having dropped a Commandment;
   

• no Commandment has been dropped, in any case, but the Latin Church's shorthand for the Commandments looks different than the typical Protestant version because of how the Commandments are grouped;
   

• everyone knows how to find Exodus 20 in the Bible, anyway -- even us stoopid Latin Catholics; and
   

• we don't care how they are grouped together; we only care that they are understood and obeyed -- not because we are under the Old Testament Moral and Ceremonial Law with its legalism and non-salvific ritual (we aren't!), but because we are to obey God as children of the New Covenant, whose moral law includes the Two Great Commandments (to love God and to love our neighbor) which surpass the Decalogue, and whose Sacraments surpass empty ritual, being media of grace.

Footnote:
¹ The Septuagint, the Latin Vulgate (the official Scripture of the Church), and the original Douay-Reims phrase the Fifth Word as "Thou shalt not murder"; later Douay-Reims versions, such as the Challoner, and the King James Bible, etc., phrase it as "Thou shalt not kill." "Thou shalt not murder," however, is the original intent and the meaning of the earliest texts. Catholics, of course, have 2,000 years of Church teaching and the Magisterium to interpret Scripture, and the meaning of the Fifth Commandment is that one is not to take innocent life. It doesn't entail pacifism, ignoring the needs of self-defense and justice, worrying about squashing bugs, etc.

---

Further Reading

The Catechism of the Catholic Church: Section on the Ten Commandments

[TSgt]

I think your post can stay

Thank you Religion Moderator, er Salvation

[Salvation]

The article that I posted did not present antagonisms, just the facts. Just the facts, man, just the facts -- Joe Friday lives!

 

Here are the rules as posted (my copy and paste) on the Religion Moderator's profile page.

Ecumenic[al] threads.

Who can post? Anyone

What can be posted? Articles that are reasonably not antagonistic. Reply posts must never be antagonistic.

What will be pulled? Antagonistic reply posts. If the article is inappropriate for an ecumenic discussion, the tag will be changed to open.

Who will be booted? Antagonists

[Non-Sequitur]

Actually they were here first. The Protestant churches changed the 10 Commandments.

[TSgt]

How do you reconcile the fact that they are kneeling, bowing, kissing, gazing at the statue or image of Mary?

[netmilsmom]

Only if one attributes motives does one find idolatry in those pictures.

Look, this girl is worshiping a stone.

This is from Salem Baptist church where they Idol the Bible by leaving flowers.

Goodness! Here's a double. Santa and Jesus!

If you want to pretend that you know what's in a person's heart, you be my guest.

[Belteshazzar]

The last assertion of the article reads:
“We don’t care how they are grouped together; we only care that they are understood and obeyed — not because we are under the Old Testament Moral and Ceremonial Law with its legalism and non-salvific ritual (we aren’t!), but because we are to obey God as children of the New Covenant, whose moral law includes the Two Great Commandments (to love God and to love our neighbor) which surpass the Decalogue, and whose Sacraments surpass empty ritual, being media of grace.”

Let me see if I understand this:
1) We don’t care how the 10 Commandments are arranged.
2) But we do care that they are obeyed.
3) By the way, they have no application to us whatever.
4) We have superior laws in the “New Covenant.”
5) Bottom line: Still, we care that the 10 Commandments are obeyed, because we need more rules and commandments to obey, even though we can’t and don’t obey the rules and commandments we currently have and agree do apply to us.

Did I get that right?

[pabianice]

“Thou shall not kill” is a willingly false misinterpretation. The commandment is “Thou shall not commit murder.” The Talmud clearly states, “If someone comes to kill you, rise up and kill them.”

[small voice in the wilderness]

The thread title is a question. If anyone answers ‘yes’ to the question and gives supporting evidence, will that person be considered antagonistic?

[TSgt]

Yeah, Baptists worship flowers. They kiss them, pray to them, bow to them, kneel to them, etc...

I’m sorry to break this to you, but Santa isn’t real.

FAIL Try again...

[BornToBeAmerican]

Look this girl is solemnly remembering a loved one. Worshiping a stone, get a life!

[Pyro7480]

Yeah, but you didn’t address her first picture. FAIL on your part.

[small voice in the wilderness]

Maybe she is looking at a stone copy of the Ten Commandments. And wondering WHERE the 2nd one is.

[netmilsmom]

I didn’t make that “Graven Image” of Santa.
But who ever did, according to your standards, is Idol Worshiping.

[surroundedbyblue]

I think the point of her post was to illustrate how absurd yours was regarding the “worship” of Mary.

[Gerish]

How do you reconcile the fact that they are kneeling, bowing, kissing, gazing at the statue or image of Mary?

They are certainly not worshipping her, rather they are praying for her intercession and/or showing adoration.

If you ever want to know the real qualities of a man, judge him not by his attitude to the world, his outlook on business or politics, or even his manners, but judge him rather by his attitude toward his own mother. Likewise, if you want to the know the quality of a religion, judge it exactly the same way, not by the way it seeks to please men, but rather by the attitude it bears to the Mother of Our Blessed Lord!!!

[longtermmemmory]

Why do you kneel in any church?
Why do you even need a specific building?

Why do people treat a bible with respect?

Why do people treat the American flag with respect?

[netmilsmom]

>>Look this girl is solemnly remembering a loved one. Worshiping a stone, get a life! <<

You’re attributing motives. We see a girl kneeling before a stone.
When a picture is shown of people kneeling before a statue, it’s idol worship. Here’s a girl kneeling before a stone. By the standards presented, she is worshiping that stone.

This is the problem with presuming to know what is in a person’s heart.

[Hegewisch Dupa]

Too many of them seem more than happy to ignore that pesky ‘do not bear false witness’ one...

[netmilsmom]

>>Yeah, Baptists worship flowers. They kiss them, pray to them, bow to them, kneel to them, etc...<<

I didn’t know that! Well thanks for that information.
I thought it was flowers brought to the Bible, but you’re saying that it’s the Bible brought to the flowers.

I’ll have to ask my Baptist sister about this.

[small voice in the wilderness]

When I see a stone being carried down the road, with crowns on it and flowers draped around it, crowds parting, kneeling, Adoring, and praying to it for intercession, then I will listen to your weak defense. Until then..it’s a ridiculous comparison.