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There are two accounts of the Ten Commandments, in Exodus 20 and in Deuteronomy 5. One of the main divergences in the two texts is in the Fourth Commandment, the Shabbat. The Rabbis taught that both texts were simultaneously pronounced, indicating a basic unity, or complementary nature. In Exodus the reason for Shabbat is the fact that G-d created the world in six days and rested on the seventh. In Deuteronomy Shabbat commemorates Egyptian slavery. In the first, "G-d blessed the seventh day and hallowed it”; in the second, "G-d commanded you to make the Shabbat day." Shabbat has social...

If it can be said that the Torah has a climax, it would surely be in this week's Torah portion -- the Giving of the Torah at Sinai, the Ten Commandments. Here is a code everyone subscribes to, possibly without even reading it. "Thou shalt not kill," and "Thou shalt not steal" are for many people all the Ten Commandments, all of morality in fact. I have heard self-styled skeptics question the Divinity of the Torah, and readily affirm G-d's authorship and their personal acceptance of the Ten Commandments. We aren't apt to worship graven images; we will honor father...