The Ten Commandments Quiz

Biblical Principles Relating to Ethics and Worship

• The Ten Commandments are a set of biblical principles that relate to ethics and worship and play a fundamental role in Judaism and Christianity.

• The Ten Commandments were revealed to Moses at Mount Sinai and inscribed by the finger of God on two tablets of stone kept in the Ark of the Covenant.

• Scholars disagree about when the Ten Commandments were written and by whom, with some suggesting that they were likely modeled on Hittite and Mesopotamian laws and treaties.

• The terms used to describe the Ten Commandments are translatable as "the ten words", "the ten sayings", or "the ten matters".

• The arrangement of the commandments on the two tablets is interpreted in different ways in the classical Jewish tradition.

• The Ten Commandments are written with room for varying interpretation, reflecting their role as a summary of fundamental principles.

• The Bible indicates the special status of the Ten Commandments among all other Torah laws in several ways.

• The Ten Commandments form the basis of Jewish law, stating God's universal and timeless standard of right and wrong.

• The traditional Rabbinical Jewish belief is that the observance of these commandments and the other mitzvot are required solely of the Jewish people.

• The Ten Commandments are heard in the synagogue three times a year: as they come up during the readings of Exodus and Deuteronomy and during the festival of Shavuot.

• In printed Chumashim, as well as in those in manuscript form, the Ten Commandments carry two sets of cantillation marks.

• The Ten Commandments concern matters of fundamental importance in Judaism and Christianity.The Significance of the Ten Commandments in Different Religions

• The Jewish Bible follows the ta'am tachton verse numbering, and the references to the Ten Commandments are Exodus 20:2–14 and Deuteronomy 5:6–18.

• The Samaritan Pentateuch varies in the Ten Commandments passages, and Samaritans count nine commandments instead of ten, with the tenth commandment being on the sanctity of Mount Gerizim.

• Most traditions of Christianity hold that the Ten Commandments have divine authority and continue to be valid, with different interpretations and uses of them.

• The Eastern Orthodox Church holds its moral truths to be chiefly contained in the Ten Commandments.

• After rejecting the moral theology of Roman Catholicism, early Protestant theologians continued to take the Ten Commandments as the starting point of Christian moral life.

• The Lutheran division of the commandments follows the one established by St. Augustine, while the Articles of the Church of England state that the moral law contained in the Ten Commandments "does forever bind all."

• The moral law contained in the Ten Commandments, according to the founder of the Methodist movement John Wesley, was instituted from the beginning of the world and is written on the hearts of all people.

• The Ten Commandments are a summary of the requirements of a works covenant given to the nascent nation of Israel, fulfilled by Christ at the cross, according to the Baptist religion.

• The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints considers the Ten Commandments eternal gospel principles necessary for exaltation.

• The receiving of the Ten Commandments by Prophet Musa (Moses) is dealt with in much detail in Islamic tradition.

• The imperative "thou shalt not kill" is against unlawful killing resulting in bloodguilt, and the Hebrew Bible contains numerous prohibitions against unlawful killing, but does not prohibit killing in the context of warfare, capital punishment, or defending against a home invasion, which are considered justified.

• The depiction of God or any living creature is prohibited in Islam, while in Eastern Orthodox tradition, depictions of Jesus as the incarnation of God as a visible human are permissible.Interpretations of the Ten Commandments

• The husband had exclusive rights over his wife in marriage, while the wife was considered the husband's possession.

• Louis Ginzberg saw the tenth commandment as a sin that could lead to trespassing of all Ten Commandments.

• Julius Wellhausen's documentary hypothesis suggests that Exodus 20–23 and 34 could be seen as the document that formed the starting point of Israel's religious history.

• Bernard M. Levinson argued that this reconstruction assumes a Christian perspective and dates back to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's polemic against Judaism.

• The Jahwist texts express a theology that was already normalized in the period of the Judges.

• John Bright believes the decalogue is a central feature in the covenant that brought Israel together as a people.

• Exodus 34 is distinct from the Jahwist document and identified with King Asa's reforms in 899 BC.

• Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman argue that the Ten Commandments came together in the seventh century BC.

• Exodus 34:11–27 is the J text of the Ten Commandments, and the other seven commandments here are completely different.

• The Ten Commandments reflect the relationship between God and Israel as a relationship between king and vassal, enacting that bond.

• Decalogue monuments and plaques in government spaces had become a legal battleground between religious and political liberals and conservatives in the US.

• Summum has won court cases against municipalities in Utah for refusing to allow the group to erect a monument of Summum aphorisms next to the Ten Commandments.