Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPulpit Commentary - Deuteronomy 5:1 - 5:33
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Moses reminds them of the making of the covenant at Horeb, and of the revelation of the fundamental law of the covenant there. As he was about to recapitulate the laws which God their King had enacted, it was fitting that he should refer at the outset to that covenant relation between Jehovah and Israel on which all the injunctions of the Law rested.
Deu_5:1
And Moses called all Israel [called to all Israel], and said. "The calling refers not to the publicity of the address, but to the clear voice which, breaking forth from the inmost heart of Moses, aimed at penetrating, as far as possible, to all (Gen_49:1; Joh_7:37)" (Schroeder). (Cf. also Pro_8:4.)
Deu_5:2, Deu_5:3
Not with our fathers, the patriarchs (cf. Deu_4:37.) The covenant to which Moses refers is not that made with Abraham, but that made at Sinai, with Israel as a people; and though the individuals who were then present had all perished with the exception of Moses, Joshua, and Caleb, the nation survived, and as it was with the nation as an organic whole that the covenant had been made. it might be with propriety said that it was made with those whom Moses addressed at this time, inasmuch as they constituted the nation.
Deu_5:4, Deu_5:5
The Lord talked with you face to face. God spoke to them immediately, in their presence and to their face, from the mount, as one person might to another. There is a slight difference in form between the phrase here and that in Exo_33:11 and Deu_34:10, where it is used in reference to Moses, but it is so slight ( áÀÌôÈÌðÄéí instead of àÆìÎôÈÌðÄéí ) that no difference of meaning can be elicited. God spake directly to the people, as he did to Moses, only Moses was admitted to closer communion with him than the people were. This difference is sufficiently indicated in Deu_34:5, where the mediatory function of Moses, in the promulgation of the Law and the making of the covenant, is described as necessitated by the fear of the people, and their not going up into the mount (cf. Exo_19:19, etc.). This is referred to more fully afterwards (verse 23, etc.). I stood between the Lord and you; i.e. acted as mediator; LXX; εἱστήκειν ἀνὰ μέσον (cf. Gal_3:19).
Deu_5:6
I am Jehovah thy God. "The Law, the establishing rule for men, can proceed only from him who alone and over all stands fast; i.e. from God, specially as Jehovah. The eternal, unchangeable One, since he demands the obedience of faith (is not merely the moral imperative), must not only reveal himself, but in revealing himself must claim Israel as loyal and faithful; thy God" (Schroeder).
Deu_5:7-21
Repetition of the Ten Commandments. On these, as the basis of the covenant, the whole legislation rests, and therefore a rehearsal of them is a fitting introduction to a repetition and enforcement of the laws of the theocracy. Some differences appear between the statement of the "ten words," as given here and as given in Exo_20:1-26. It is chiefly in the fourth commandment that these are to be found. It begins here with "remember" for "keep;" reference is made to the command of God as sanctioning the Sabbath (Exo_20:12), which is omitted in Exodus; a fuller description of the animals to be exempted from work on that day is given (verse 14); the words, "that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou" are added (verse 14); and in place of a reference to the resting of God after the Creation as the ground of the Sabbath institute, as in Exodus, there is here a reference to the deliverance of the Israelites out of bondage in Egypt as a reason why the Lord commanded them to keep the Sabbath day (verse 15). In the fifth commandment there are two additions here-the one of the words," as Jehovah thy God hath commanded thee," and the other of the words, "that it may go well with thee" (verse 16). In the tenth commandment, the first two clauses are transposed, "desire" appears in place of "covet" in relation to "wife," and "field" is added to the specification of objects (verse 21). These differences are of little moment. The only one demanding notice is that in the fourth commandment, where different reasons are assigned for the ordinance of the Sabbath. The two reasons assigned, however, are perfectly compatible; the one is fundamental and universally applicable, the other is subsidiary and special in its application; the one is a reason why the Sabbath was originally instituted and is for all men, the other is a reason why it was specially and formally instituted in Israel and was especially memorable to that people. In a popular address to them it seems fitting that the latter rather than the former should be the one adduced. As a memorial of their deliverance from Egypt, the Sabbath was all important to them, for by it they were constantly reminded that "they were thereby freed from the dominion of the world to be a peculiar possession of Jehovah, and so amid the toil and trouble of the world had part in the holy rest of their God" (Baumgarten). It was also fitting in a recapitulatory address that special emphasis should be laid on the fact that what the Law enunciated was what "the Lord had commanded." The addition of "field" in the tenth commandment is probably due to the fact that now, the occupation and division of the land having begun, the people were about to have, what they had not before—each his own property in land. In the tenth commandment, also, there is a difference in the two accounts worthy of notice. In Deuteronomy, "field" is added to the enumeration of objects not to be coveted, and the "wife" is put first and apart, while in Exodus the "house" precedes the "wife" and the latter ranks with the rest. In Deuteronomy also this separation of the wife is emphasized by a change of the verb: "Neither shalt thou desire ( úÇÌçÀîÉã ) thy neighbor's wife, neither shalt thou covet ( úÄÌúÀàÇåÈÌä ) thy neighbor's house," etc.
Deu_5:7-16
FIRST TABLE OF THE LAW praecepta pietatis.
Deu_5:7
In this, the first commandment, the great principle and basis of all true religion is asserted—monotheism, as opposed to polytheism or pantheism There is but one God, and that God is Jehovah, the self-existent and eternal, who yet has personal relations with men.
Deu_5:8-10
Here the spirituality of God is asserted, and, in the prohibition of the use of images in the worship of the Deity, all idolatry is denounced, and all deification of the powers of nature in any sense is prohibited. By the Jews, this commandment was not always regarded, for they were not infrequently seduced into following the idolatrous usages of the nations around them. It does not appear, however, that, though they set up images of the idol-gods whom they were thus led to worship, they ever attempted to represent by image or picture the great God whom their fathers worshipped—Jehovah—by whom this command was given; and at a later period, when they had long renounced all idolatry, they became noted as the one nation that adored the Deity as a spirit, without any sensible representation of him: "Judaei mente sola unumque Numen intelligunt … igitur nulla simulacra urbibus suis, nedum temples sinunt" (Tacit; 'Hist.,' 5.5). It appears that, by many of them at least, the commandment was regarded as prohibiting absolutely the graphic and plastic arts. This may account for the low state of these arts among the Jews, and for the fact that they alone of the civilized nations of antiquity have left no monuments of art for the instruction or admiration of posterity. Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them; LXX; προσκυνήσιες αὐτοῖς οὐδὲ μή λατρεύσης αὐτοῖς . Every kind of worship of images is forbidden, alike that of proskunesis and that of latria. And showing mercy unto thousands; i.e. to the thousandth generation (cf. Deu_7:9)
Deu_5:11
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; literally, Thou shalt not take [or lift] up the Name of Jehovah thy God to vanity. This commandment forbids not only all false swearing by the Name of God, but all profanation of that Name by an irreverent or light use of it (Le Deu_19:12).
Deu_5:12-14
Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee. This phraseology implies that the Sabbath institute was already well known to the people of Israel; so that this commandment was intended, not to enact a new observance, but to enforce the continuance of an observance which had come down to them from earlier times. The Sabbath was to be kept by being sanctified. This means that it was to be consecrated to God to be used as he had appointed. The sanctification of any object "always goes back to an act of the Divine will, to Divine election and institution. In other words, it is always a state in which the creature [or institute] is bound to God by the appointment of God himself, which is expressed by ÷ÉãÆùÑ äÄ÷ÀãÄéùÑ ÷ÄãÅÌùÑ ÷ÈãåÉùÑ ,". The sanctification of the Sabbath, accordingly, was the consecration of that day to the Lord, to be observed as he had enjoined, that is, as a day of rest from all servile work and ordinary occupations. Among the Jews, those who were careful to keep this law "rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment'' (Luk_23:56). Not, however, in mere indolence and idle vacancy, unworthy of a man. Not thus could the day be sanctified to the Lord. Man had to "release his soul and body from all their burdens, with all the professions and pursuits of ordinary life, only in order to gather himself together again in God with greater purity and fewer disturbing elements, and renew in him the might of his own better powers". In the Sabbath institute, therefore, lies the basis of spiritual worship and pious service in Israel.
Deu_5:16
The germ of society is the family, and the family is sustained only as the authority and rule of the heads of the house are upheld and respected. The command, then, to honor parents may be justly regarded as asserting the foundation of all social ordinances and arrangements. Where parents are not honored, a flaw lies at the basis, and the stability of the entire social fabric is endangered.
Deu_5:17-21
SECOND TABLE OF THE LAW: praecepta probitatis.
In the enactments of the second table there is a progression from the outward to the inward. First, sins of deed are prohibited, such as murder, adultery, and theft; then sins of word, such as injury of a neighbor's good name by false testimony; and finally, sins of the heart, which do not come into open manifestation, such as covetousness and evil desire. The "commandment" is thus seen to be" exceeding broad" (Psa_119:96). So that only the man "who hath clean hands and a pure heart, and who hath not lifted up his soul to vanity, nor sworn deceitfully," shall "ascend into the hill of the Lord, or stand in his holy place" (Psa_24:8, Psa_24:4).
Deu_5:22-27
Here is an expanded citation of Exo_20:15-18, addressed by Moses to prepare the way for the solemn admonition to observe and do all that the Lord had commanded them, with which he passes on to the enunciation of the various statutes and ordinances he had been enjoined by God to lay upon them.
Deu_5:22
And he added no more. "Only these ten words did God speak immediately to you; all the rest he spoke afterwards by me" (Herxheimer); cf. Num_11:25, where the same formula occurs, "and they added not," i.e. they prophesied only when the Spirit of God came on them, but this was not continuous. And he wrote them in two tables of stone. This anticipates what is recorded in its proper historical connection in Deu_9:10, Deu_9:11.
Deu_5:23-27
In a purely historical narrative such as that in Exodus, a condensed statement of what took place on this occasion was sufficient; but in an address to the people, it was fitting that Hoses should give it in fuller detail, especially in view of what follows.
Deu_5:28, Deu_5:29
The words of God in reply to those of the people are not given in Exodus; here they are fittingly inserted God approved of their words because they expressed a proper reverence and m due sense on their part of the unworthiness of sinful men to come into the presence of the great and holy God; but knowing their fickleness, and proneness to forget and depart from him, he added, Oh that there were such an heart in them that they would fear me and keep all my commandments always! God looks upon the heart, and will accept no service or worship that is not rendered from the heart. Only they who do his will from the heart (Eph_6:6) really fear and keep his commandments. The tongue may sometimes promise what the heart does not guarantee; and so when the occasion that provoked the utterance has passed, the whole may be forgotten, and the promise never be fulfilled.
Deu_5:30, Deu_5:31
The people were commanded to return to their tents, and Moses was appointed to act as mediator between God and them, receiving from him his commandments and communicating them to the people.
Deu_5:32, Deu_5:33
Moses winds up this part of his discourse by exhorting them to observe and do all God's commandments, not in any way departing from that course of action to which he had called them, that they might live, and it should be well with them in the land they were about to possess.
Deu_5:32
To the right hand or to the left. "This signifieth an exact care to walk in God's Law, as in the highway, from which men may not turn aside, as in Deu_2:27" (Ainsworth); cf. Deu_17:11, Deu_17:20; Deu_28:14; Jos_1:7; Pro_4:27; Isa_30:21. "To receive what God enjoins is only half obedience; it belongs thereto also that nothing be required beyond this. We must not desire to be more righteous than as we are taught by the Law" (Calvin).
(1) members of the great human family, moral, responsible beings, amenable to the government of God. They were
(2) a Church in the wilderness, with their own institutions, which embodied the worship appropriate to the religion enjoined upon them. They were
(3) a people rescued from bondage, about to have a commonwealth of their own, for which sundry civil and political regulations had to be provided. They were
(4) a nation which for years was to be in a wandering state, yet destined in the long run to find a home in Palestine. Adapted to them in this last-named aspect, they had sanitary laws; for them in the third aspect there were civil and political laws; for them in the second aspect there were religious institutions; and for them in the first aspect there was the great moral law. The set of rules having reference to health would be binding only so far as the laws of climate and modes of life necessitated their continued observance. The civil law would be but temporary so far as it received its complexion from the idolatrous surroundings of the people. The ceremonial law would pass away in form, but the underlying principles of it are permanent. The moral law is unchanging as man's nature, and enduring as his relation to God. It is given in the ten commandments, of which the first enjoins supreme love to the Divine Being: the second, recognition of the spirituality of the Divine nature: the third, reverence for the Divine Name: the fourth, care for Divine worship: the fifth inculcates religion in the home: the sixth, the religion of the temper: the seventh, the religion of the body: the eighth, the religion of the band: the ninth, the religion of the tongue: the tenth, the religion of the heart. But antecedently to the Law in any of its aspects, there is a question of deep interest and importance, viz. From whom came it? The reasons for obedience to it come very largely out of the answer to be given to that question. Now, the words in Deu_5:6, which precede the Law itself, are not merely a preface to it, they are at once the basis of it and the reason for obedience to it. And these words should be opened up clearly in every case where the Decalogue is about to be expounded. The Law is not set on law, but on grace! For observe—
I. HERE IS A SPECIAL VIEW OF GOD PRESENTED TO THE PEOPLE TO DRAW FORTH THEIR ATTENTION AND WIN THEIR ALLEGIANCE. "Thy God." The Hebrews were never expected to believe in, obey, or love an absolutely unrelated Being. THERE IS NO SUCH BEING! God is related to all the creatures he has made. Hence our knowledge of him is not unreal, because it is relative; but real, because in knowing God's relations to us, we, so far, know him as he is. God was Israel's Redeemer. He had redeemed them that they might be his. He would have the entire life of his redeemed ones spent in covenant relationship with him. Hence he sets his own Law on the basis of those relations. And so it is now. We are not expected to love a Being whose relations to us are doubtful or obscure, or whose mind and will towards us are unknown. We love because he first loved us.
II. THE VARIED ASPECTS OF CHRISTIAN TRUTH ARE SET UPON A LIKE BASIS, AND HAVE IN IT THEIR REASON AND POWER. The following suggestions may be developed largely with great advantage.
1. The conception of law is materially changed when we know that it comes from One who loves us infinitely, and cares for us with a tender care. This gives sweetness to the command. We are "under law to Christ."
2. "The Lord thy God;" that gives the worship of God its charm.
3. This is the truth which is objectively disclosed by the Incarnation.
4. It is the truth which the Holy Ghost graves on the hearts of the saints (Rom_8:15).
5. This truth shows us that real religion is love responding to love (1Jn_4:19).
6. It gives a manifest ground for trust. We know whom we have believed.
7. It gives a charm to every precept.
8. It gives meaning to every trial (Deu_8:5).
9. It is in the light of this truth that prayer becomes possible, and is seen to be reasonable.
10. This gives a solemn aspect to our responsibility (Psa_81:10; Amo_4:12; Heb_4:13).
11. The fuller understanding of the words, "My God," will be the result of ripeness in grace (Zec_13:9; Isa_41:10-20).
12. This is pre-eminently the truth which gives its certainty and its glow to the hope of future glory (Mar_12:26; Heb_11:16; Rev_21:3, Rev_21:7).
III. SEEING THE WIDE BEARING AND VAST IMPORTANCE OF THE TRUTH IN THE TEXT, WHAT SHOULD BE WITH US ITS PRACTICAL OUTCOME?
1. Seeing the fearful havoc agnosticism would make, if it should ever come to govern human thinking, £ let us show men:
(1) That a God out of relation to us does not exist.
(2) That the one God is related to us as Creator, etc.
(3) That his varied relations are explicitly revealed, specially through the Son and through the Holy Ghost.
(4) That these relations are to be apprehended by our moral and spiritual nature, and not by the intellect alone. It should never make us stagger that, after getting to the very outer rim of natural knowledge, men should look out on an awful blank, and call it "the great unknown." It shows us only that they cannot find God in that way—not that there is no way of finding God, still less that God cannot find us or make his communications intelligible to us. Do not let us suffer men to think that God cannot be found because no one can find him out to perfection! He is our God.
2. Since God is our God, let us cultivate fellowship with him. It is for this purpose he hath revealed himself, that we may come to him (1Jn_1:1-3; Heb_10:19-22).
3. Let us seek to realize the blessedness of a known and happy relationship to God, enjoyed through Christ, by the Spirit, in a life of penitence, faith, devotion, and love (Isa_61:10; 1Ch_12:18; Psa_68:28; Psa_46:1; Psa_18:29; Psa_146:5).
4. Let faith in the love of our God fill up our duties with glorious meaning, and make the discharge of them a delight (Deu_6:5; Deu_28:58; Le 25:38; 11:45; Isa_41:10; Jer_3:13; Mic_6:8; Rom_12:1).
5. Let the fact that God is our God create, confirm, and perpetuate our assurance of immortal blessedness. See the wonderful words in Mat_22:31, Mat_22:32; Heb_11:16. As if God would be ashamed to be called our God, if he did not mean to do something worthy of the name! Wondrous grace! How perfect the reconciliation effected by Christ, to bring together the holy God and sinful men in blest accord and union forever!
Deu_5:7
I. THIS COMMAND AT ONCE SETS ASIDE THE CLAIMS OF ANY OTHER SUPPOSED GODS. (Cf. Deu_4:19; Exo_23:24, Exo_23:25.) "None other gods before me," i.e. "over against me. I will suffer no rival deity; you must worship no other god," etc. Does, then, the command permit Israel to suppose that there is any other god whom they could possibly worship? Not by any means. It recognizes the fact of the existence of idolatry round about them. According to the heathen conception, there were gods many and lords many. Israel was not to regard one of all the gods adored by the heathen. This is the very gracious way in which our Father in heaven would help his children in those young days to higher thoughts about himself. Is it not always the case with young children now? They have to be told what they may or may not do, and as they get older they will discover the reason. Indoctrinate into dogma by means of precept. This was the way God taught Israel "when he was a child," by putting this precept in the front. Had Moses discoursed to the people on the philosophic excellence of monotheism, and so on, he would have been virtually speaking in an unknown tongue. They would not have caught a glimpse of his meaning; but they could understand this. And the faithful obedience to this precept would be for them the very surest way of learning the doctrine which lay beneath it. By serving only one God, they would best come to learn that there was no god but the One. But further. This commandment is much more than a mere prohibition of what we usually call idolatry. It is a declaration of the Divine intolerance of any rival in the heart. Though we acknowledge that there is but one God, yet that is practically the idol of our hearts which engrosses our dearest affections, and with a view to which we shape our lives. God wants the innermost sanctuary of our hearts to be sacredly reserved for him.
II. THE PEOPLE WERE TO DRAW OFF THEIR REGARD FROM OTHER GODS, THAT ALL THE POWERS OF THEIR SOULS MIGHT BE CONCENTRATED ON GOD. (See Deu_6:5.) In our text, the form is negative; the intent is positive. They are to know none but God, that they may concentrate all their strength on God. In fact, the command is equivalent to this: "Let all your personal, family, social, national life be regulated completely by the commandments of your God. And let this be done from love." Is it asked, "Is this practicable? Can a man put forth all his strength for God when his energy is absorbed in trade?" We answer, "Yes; by regulating his business rightly, as God wills." "Can a mother put forth all her strength on loving God, when the care of her family is taxing and even straining all her powers?" We answer, "Yes; by training her children for God." And so on in each one of life's tasks.
III. THIS IS SET ON GROUNDS OF TENDER APPEAL. (See the preceding Homily.) God does not say, "When you love me supremely I will redeem you from Egypt;" but "I have redeemed you, therefore yield me your all." The religions of man go out to an unrevealed Being, if perchance he may be propitiated. Scriptural religion is the response of the heart of man to the revealed love of the Infinite One. Hence the gospel claim is, in substance, like the Mosaic, although its form is new, and the view we get of Divine love is larger (see Rom_12:1). In both, duty is the same: the whole heart of man is demanded for God. But note the advance in light, tenderness, and strength in
(1) the mercies of God;
(2) the "beseeching" tone;
(3) the "consecration of a living sacrifice" asked;
(4) the reason given, "Your reasonable service."
Here is the difference in the method of the gospel.
IV. THIS PRECEPT IS HERE SET IN THE FOREFRONT OF ISRAEL'S NATIONAL LAW? It was the law for each one's life. It was the rule for all. In their legislation, the supreme feature was to be the national recognition of God. And even now, yea, ever, so far as the legislation of any people is based on righteousness, so tar as that legislation recognizes the rights of the Great Supreme, so far as a people are loyal to God, to that extent will there be the surest guarantee for individual, family, social, and national prosperity. If ever a nation as such should "break his bands asunder," and inaugurate an age of reason versus faith, instead of a reasonable faith, the reign of terror would not be far off. And it is owing to the supreme importance of thus launching into the world a nation with God for its Lord, and righteousness for its law, that the open transgression of this first commandment was so severely punished, as being a crime against the State as well as a sin against God (Deu_13:7-12, Deu_13:13-18; Deu_17:2-7). (The frequent phrase "cut off" does not refer to punishment in another life, but to a man's being "cut off" from the congregation.) And even now fidelity to God is the supreme condition of a nation's well-being; and that man is playing foully with the highest interests of a people, who is seeking to undermine its allegiance to heaven.
V. IS THIS THE LAW? THEN LET US MAKE THREE USES OF IT.
1. As a touchstone. It reveals guilt. The need of any such command is a very humiliating fact. "The law is not made for a righteous man." "By law is the knowledge of sin." This precept
(1) discloses the world's sin.
(2) It shows the deep root that sin had in the natures even of the freed people, that they should need such legislation to grave this precept on their hearts.
(3) It shows our sin, that we should need the written Law. If we were what we ought to be, we should do God's will spontaneously without needing a written law at all!
2. As a judge. This being the Law, we see how it is that as by law we stand convicted, so by it we stand condemned, "subject to the sentence of God," for failures innumerable; and our guilt is the greater, since he who asks our heart reveals his own love that he may call forth ours. This Law is a perpetual, silent accuser (see Joh_5:45).
3. As a child-guide to Christ (see Gal_3:24, Greek). God only is greater than law. And he alone can restore those who, having broken law, must needs, in the ordinary course of things, be regarded and dealt with as law breakers. For restoration, three things are required:
(1) Forgiveness;
(2) justification;
(3) re-creation.
Bare Law does not provide for either of these, but God in his Law has witnessed concerning this great restorative scheme. So says Paul in Rom_3:21, "But now there has been manifested a righteousness of God apart from law, being witnessed by the Law and the prophets," etc. So in Rom_1:16, Rom_1:17, "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for therein there is revealed a righteousness of God by faith, with a view to [the production of] faith." By believing in Christ, forgiveness is sure to the penitent, and grace re-creates the man, writing the Law on the heart, so that we obey and love God, not because God says we must, but because we are remade so that we can do nothing else. And what we need is to have our whole nature so reset by Divine grace, that we shall instinctively see God's will and do it, without needing any precept at all. As by the regenerative efficacy of the Holy Ghost we attain to this, shall we understand what it is to do the will of God on earth, "even as it is done in heaven."
Deu_5:8-10
I. ITS CONTENTS. The first commandment claims for Jehovah alone the love and worship of the people. The second warns off from any mode of worship which would bear a resemblance to or which would be a compromise with idolatry. While Israel was in Egypt, there had been a general worship on the part of the Egyptians, of bird, beast, and reptile, not for their own sake, but as representing some attribute of the invisible God. The forms of Egyptian worship, the names of Pasht, Osiris, etc; must be done away with. No representation of the object of worship was to be allowed. However much men might have pleaded that sense was an aid to faith, the stern "Thou shalt not" peremptorily barred the way. We know the reason why, as they in their childhood did not. God is spirit. Being spirit, it is only by spirit that he can be approached. No merely bodily act can possibly be worship. Further, neither God nor any one of his attributes can be represented by any physical form. Whatever idea of Jehovah may be gained or retained through impressions derived from beholding a sensible object with the bodily eye, will be an idea representing it, not him. It will be a thought of God formed by the image and limited by it—not the true thought given by revelation. Obviously, however, this command did not forbid decorative designs in the tabernacle or the temple (cf. Exo_25:18, Exo_25:20, Exo_25:34; Exo_26:32; Num_21:8, Num_21:9; 1Ki_7:25; 1Ki_10:20). But never were any creature-forms allowed, either as objects of worship or as aids to it. Nor can we read through Hebrew history without seeing how much need there was of such a command. Ere long, the people were dancing round the golden calf! And in the days of Jeroboam two calves were set up—one in Bethel, another in Dan. But surely the history of Christendom is even a sadder one than that of the Hebrews. Ere four centuries of the Christian era had passed away, how did the Christian Church lapse into repeated breaches of this law? "An enormous train of different superstitions was gradually substituted in the place of true religion and genuine piety …. Images were not as yet very common. But it is certain that the worship of the martyrs was modeled by degrees according to the religious services that were paid to the gods before the coming of Christ." £ It is true, indeed, that in 726 A.D. Leo III. issued an ordinance forbidding the use of images in churches, as heathenish and heretical, and a Council of Constantinople, in 754 A.D; sanctioned that condemnation. Another Council, which met at Nice in 789 A.D; declared the previous Council heretical, and ordained the worship of pictures in churches. The decisions of this Council were rejected at a Council in Frankfort, in 794 A.D. Also at another in Constantinople, in 815 A.D; all worshipping of pictures and images was forbidden. In 869 A.D. the iconoclasts were condemned. Thomas Aquinas, in the thirteenth century, affirmed a threefold use of images, and declared that like homage is due to the image or Christ as to Christ himself! And we know but too well what the later history of Rome has been, how pagan rites have become more and more mingled with Christian service. The Savior is approached through the crucifix, and fed upon through the bread; and, as if blind to the warnings of history, ritualism openly proclaims that the best exposition of doctrine is that which meets the eye rather than the ear. Perhaps it is not to be wondered at, that in Roman Catholic catechisms the second commandment is left out; and not even Luther was sufficient of a reformer to restore the missing law in his catechism—an easy way, indeed, of blinding the people to the evil of a mistaken ritual, to leave out the authoritative command, obedience to which would render such evil impossible!
II. THE DOUBLE SANCTION ATTACHED TO THIS LAW. The first is drawn from the Divine nature, the second from the Divine administration.
1. From the Divine nature. "I the Lord thy God am a jealous God." "They that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." God is jealous:
(1) For truth in his worship. He would have us think of him as glorious in power, wisdom, righteousness, holiness, and love. Our thoughts of God can be but limited at the best. They need not be untrue. But untrue and dishonoring to him they certainly will be if we come at them through the means of any graven image. We do not even except the crucifix. It represents the bodily form of Christ. It may represent the nails, the wounds, the spear, the crown of thorns, the pain-crushed brow; and we confess it may be possible, by looking at these physical marks, to receive so vivid an impression of the physical suffering that we may be wrought up to agony in thinking of it! But even then this is only knowing Christ after the flesh; it is making an idol of his humanity; and in sympathy with the anguish of his bodily woes, we may altogether miss the acting of faith in that atoning sacrifice which lay among the things unseen and eternal!
(2) For spirit in his worship. The worship paid to a spiritual Being is nothing if it be not spiritual worship. But in the endless bowings and prostrations, genuflexions, cross-markings, and waving of the body at the word "Jesus," there is, at least in appearance, a taking for granted that bodily postures are spiritual attitudes.
(3) God would have man lifted up to a higher level by the worship of him. But the sorry record in history of the breaches of the second law shows us four transitions:
(a) An object which at first represents the Being who is worshipped, comes at length to be worshipped. £
(b) Worship paid through the body will sink to merely bodily worship.
(c) When the lofty platform of spiritual worship is quitted, religious service will inevitably lose its meaning. Sense first comes as "an aid to faith," and then is put in the place of it!
(d) When this is the case, the vitalizing force of religion is gone, and man, sinking in religious vitality, sinks also in morality (see Jer_7:1-34. for an illustration of this in the Hebrew people; see Rom_1:1-32. for illustrations of it in the Gentile world).
2. From the Divine administration. "Visiting the iniquities," etc. It would not have seemed wonderful to have found this second sanction appended to such sins as murder, adultery, etc.; but how is it that it follows on so apparently slight an offense as the use of graven images? Because of the sure and inevitable quadruple transition already referred to. He who comes to lose the life of religion will, so far, be undermining the foundations of morality, not only for himself, but for those who come after him.
(1) What a man is and what his family are or may be, are regarded as bound up together by an unalterable law of God.
(2) Evil follows on from generation to generation. A ghastly inheritance to hand down—formalism and idolatry!
(3) But if a man maintains the true spiritual worship of God in his family, that too will be handed down to those who follow him as a priceless heritage; not only to those who come in the physical line: our Lord's words in Joh_8:1-59. should teach us to look beyond that.
(4) In the mercy of God the influence of a man's good is more lasting than the influence of his evil. Evil—to third or fourth generation. Good—to thousands [of generations]. The influence of Paul, e.g. at this moment, is prodigious; that of Nero is nil.
Learn, in conclusion:
1. We receive an influence from the generations which preceded us; we shall transmit one to the generations that will follow. (We do not think this latter consideration is sufficiently pressed on the people, either on its physiological or on its spiritual side.)
2. Whoever wishes to ensure a prolonged influence that shall blessedly affect generations to come, let him bend all his force to the upholding of the worship of God in purity, in spirit, in truth. So much depends on this. The weal of the land in which we dwell is dependent thereon. Oh! for our own sakes, for our country's sake, for our children's sakes, let us contend earnestly for the maintenance of the worship of God in simplicity and in truth!
Deu_5:11
I. WHAT IS FORBIDDEN BY THIS THIRD COMMANDMENT? We are all aware that some have regarded our Savior's words, "Swear not at all," as prohibitive of solemn oath-taking in a court of justice. We cherish all respect for those who so regard them, but we cannot view them in this light, for the following reasons:
(1) The occasion on which our Lord uses the words seems to refer rather to habits in private life.
(2) Christ and his apostles solemnly appealed to Heaven.
(3) In Heb_6:1-20; the oath of God is spoken of by the sacred writer, and we cannot suppose this would have been if all oath-taking were wrong. We cannot think that, even by way of accommodation, the Most High would represent himself as doing that which it would be always wrong for his creatures to do.
(4) In prophetic language there is predicted a swearing by the Name of God, which is regarded as obviously right (Isa_45:23; see also Deu_6:14). These reasons seem to us to set the matter entirely at rest. And the view that Christ was referring to men's ordinary conversation when he said, "Swear not at all," is confirmed by Mat_5:37; the meaning of which evidently is: "If it is needful for you to interlard your conversation with sundry adjurations, you are the victims of a spirit of falsehood which has ' the evil one' for its father!" Further, this precept covers a far wider range than that of swearing. It forbids any "taking up" of the Divine Name which is not true as to loyalty of purpose, actual fact, and after-fulfillment. This precept manifestly prohibits:
1. All scoffing at sacred things; not merely at the word "God," or at the doctrine of the Divine existence, but ridiculing the Bible as the Book of God, the Sabbath as the day of God, Christians as the people of God, and religion as obedience to God. The mild and supercilious scorn of modern skepticism is equally a violation of this precept—it tramples under foot the Son of God.
2. Perjury is another form of violation of this command. The idea of swearing is that of calling God to witness; and to invoke that great and awful Name to witness a lie is one of the most grievous breaches of this law.
3. Profanity also is here forbidden, i.e. taking the Name of God on the lips on every trifling occasion. This is now thought, as indeed it is, ungentlemanly, to a far greater extent than was the case fifty years ago. So far well. Only let us take care that for a custom to be out of fashion, does not act with us more powerfully than its offensiveness to God, in inducing us to give it up! Some are more concerned at a hole in their manners than at a breach of morals. These things ought not so to be.
4. Frivolity in reference to Divine things is a transgression of this command. This is by no means to be confounded either with scoffing or with profanity. It may be found where there is great reverence for God, great kindness of heart, combined with an excessive fondness for raising a laugh. And where this is the case, even sacred things are but too seldom exempt from frivolous treatment. We recall some acquaintance whose chief, yea, whose only apparent fault, was the extreme tendency to turn everything into a joke, even things most sacred. Many were ready to excuse the frivolity for the sake of the talent it revealed. But they are "nowhere" now. Their levity was their ruin. Wit and humor have indeed a place of no mean value in social life. Social evils are often exposed more effectively in scorn and satire than in graver speeches. But there is no tendency of any man which needs to be more wisely cultured, more carefully and prayerfully guarded, and more conscientiously directed, than that to which we are now referring. Apart from this, there is exceedingly great danger of its leading to the "taking the Name of God in vain."
5. There may be a breach of this commandment without frivolity (as usually understood), even where there is no sense of humor and no talent for witticisms, in the indulgence of a vicious habit, much more easily formed than broken off, of interlarding the conversation with certain well-known epithets. We know what these were in Christ's time (see Mat_23:16-22; Mat_5:33-36). This is conceited talk, and it is sinful talk.
6. False teaching for God breaks this law (see Jer_23:21-24, Jer_23:31). There are several ways by which, in teaching others, the Name of God may be taken falsely. Either
(1) by declaring as God's what he has not said; or by
(2) denying what be has said; or
(3) by calling in question the truth of what he has spoken.
The first was common in the days of Jeremiah; the second and third are at once more ancient and more modern. Whenever any ambassador for God gives his own thoughts as if they were God's message, he is taking the Name of God in vain. Or if a man, while professing to speak for God, is speaking with the desire to exalt himself, he is guilty of the same sin.
7. Hollowness and formality in the professed worship of God are breaches of the third commandment. We take God's Name in vain if we sing "the songs of Zion" with a vacant heart, or outwardly join in the prayers of the sanctuary without devotion in the soul (Eze_33:30, Eze_33:31; Isa_29:13). Oh, the number of times we have been on our knees and have used the Name of God in" indolent vacuity of thought!" "Who is able to stand before this holy Lord God?"
8. We may break this commandment by vowing unto God, and then not fulfilling the vow. When at the Lord's table, we take the sacramental oath of obedience to our Great Commander, and if we are not true to that, we add sin to sin by "taking the Name of God in vain."
II. HOW IS THIS PRECEPT GUARDED? "The Lord will not hold him guiltless," etc. God may or may not mark this sin by visitations of temporal judgment; there are many cases in which levity has been the ruin of a man, even temporally. But the probability is that the more occult and deceptive forms of this sin will leave no appreciable mark on a man's earthly career. The marking of the guilt will be between God and a man's own soul. Hollow prayers bring no blessing; empty worship no growth in grace. Violated vows will bring down the displeasure of God. If God were to visit upon us all the sins of unreality and formalism, of mechanical routine, and of heartless work in his service, we should be lost men! "God often sees more in our prayers to disgust him than to please him," says Charnock. The Lord pardon the iniquity of our holy things!
III. HOW SHOULD THIS PRECEPT BE USED?
1. As a probe. Possibly, when a preacher takes this text, some may say, "We don't need that. We never break God's law so I" Possibly not, in the conventional sense in which the text is often used now. But what about that conversation laden with frivolity? What about that lesson which had more of self than of God in it? What about the songs of the sanctuary, enjoyed for the sake of the music, without a thought of the words? What about the forgotten vows? Surely we can all recall so many breaches of this third commandment that, if we had not a pardoning God, we should be shut up in despair!
2. To quicken to penitence. By so much as our conviction is deep that we have broken this commandment a thousand times, by so much should our penitence be deep and definite before God.
3. To lead us to earnest entreaties for forgiveness. If we were not permitted to ask this, it would be all over with us, even if the third commandment were the whole of the Law.
4. To lead to fervent prayer for daily heart-renewal. "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." If the heart is right the tongue will be right. "If a man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man." Well may we pray that every word we speak may be conformed to truth (for in each of the eight ways named above there is a violation of truth). When our heart, thoughts, words, and deeds are in harmony with God's nature and will, then shall we be true to the duty implied, and free from the sin forbidden, in the third commandment.
Deu_5:12-15
I. INDICATE SEVERAL PRINCIPLES FROM WHICH OUR CONCEPTION OF THE HEBREW SABBATH MUST START. The Hebrew Sabbath has a far-back look. "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." What spaces of time the "six days" represent we may perhaps never know in this life. One thing is clear—a "day" of Divine action must be indefinitely longer than one of man's days. This far-back look, moreover, reveals to us a method of Divine work, after which ours is to be modeled. As man's nature is made in God's image, so our time is to be portioned out after God's order. Further, the basis of the right observance of the day is that of "rest." The word "Sabbath" means that; whatever else may have been connected with the day, the notion of rest lay beneath all. While the Hebrews were to regard the observance of the day as a part of their covenanted duty as a nation, yet the rest was not for them as Hebrews only, but as men. The Sabbath was made for man. Work was to be laid aside, that man might give himself up to a holy and happy day of rest and worship. With a view, moreover, to securing all this, the work of the six other days was to be arranged.
II. THE SUBSEQUENT PRECEPTS ARE ALL IN THE SAME DIRECTION. Never is there anything out of harmony with this benign command to rest (see Exo_16:29; Exo_23:9-13; Exo_31:13; Exo_34:21; Exo_35:1-3; Le Exo_19:3, 30; Exo_33:3; Exo_26:2; Num_15:32-36). Of such importance to the good of the people was their rest day, that if a man attempted to turn it into a day of common work, he was to be stoned! Severity to the one was a guard of mercy round all! If the people could not or would not guard their rest day for themselves, the great Lord who gave it would shield it for them all! In course of time these precepts were grievously disobeyed, either by an entire neglect of the day, or by a merely formal observance of it (2Ch_36:21; Neh_9:14; Neh_10:31; Neh_13:15, Neh_13:16; Isa_1:13; Isa_56:2; Isa_58:13; Jer_17:19-27; Eze_20:12, Eze_20:13; Eze_22:8, Eze_22:26). Later on, when Jesus Christ came, many had lost the spirit of the day in the letter; so that the day which was given to man as a boon of mercy had come to be a chafing yoke and a grievous burden. Consequently, not even Jesus Christ was a sufficiently strict Sabbath-keeper for the -Pharisees. Hence, Jesus in his teaching respecting the Sabbath, did not divert it from, but restored it to, its original intent. The Sabbath as God made it, was restful, beautiful, and free. As rabbinical teaching had perverted it, it was rigid and burdensome. Men came to be on the Sabbath under a hard yoke; but it was man's yoke, not God's (see in Dr. Geikie's 'Life of Christ' abundant illustrations of this).
III. NEW TESTAMENT INDICATIONS VARY IN FORM BUT ACCORD IN SPIRIT. We find in the New Testament some passages which indicate some observance of the first day of the week (Joh_20:19-26; Act_20:7; 1Co_16:2; Rev_1:10). It is remarkable how few there are of such. We have no specific precept to direct us with regard to a Christian Sabbath. There is nothing very clear on the matter, either in the Gospels or the Epistles. Judaism is waning; what is peculiar to it dies away; what is worldwide and for humanity, lives. We seem to see the seventh day receding from our gaze, its luster fades and is lost in the brightness of the first day. There is a dissolving view. Winter is succeeded by spring. Here is something which has Christ's sanction and apostolic warrant, viz. meeting on the first day. It is the day of religious assembling, the day of "breaking bread." The God of Sinai has invested the Son of man with all power in heaven and in earth. He is the Lord of the Sabbath. Memories of the great deliverance wrought by him eclipse those of the deliverance from Egypt. Wherefore, ever after, rest-day becomes "the Lord's day." Ignatius says, "Let every friend of Christ celebrate the Lord's day." Justin Martyr, "On the Lord's day, all Christians in the city and in the country assemble together, because that is the day of the Lord's resurrection." Tertullian, "The Lord's day is the holy day of the Christian Church. So gradually, however, did the seventh-day Sabbath change into the first-day rest, that we find for a while both days observed. Accordingly we find, in 'The Apostolic Constitution,' both days named as days for the assembling of the Church; that on the Sabbath and on the Sunday the slaves should rest from their labors, and attend church with the rest to hear the sermon. But as the new skin is forming under the surface, the old is getting looser and looser. Yet for a time, there are two coverings. Soon, however, the old is shuffled off, and only the new is seen. The Sabbath is lost, but rest-day reappears as the Lord's day!
IV. HOW STANDS THE REST-DAY NOW? The fourth commandment had a natural basis and a religious one. It gave a day of rest for man as man, and, as such, has never been repealed. God has never taken away the world's rest-day. It is ours still—a priceless heritage. The religious side of the Hebrew Sabbath, though abolished so far as the observance of Jewish rites is concerned, was at once taken up by the Christian Church, and Christians have, as we well know, by meeting for worship on the first day, recognized the principle of a world's rest-day, and have used it for the higher purposes of the kingdom of heaven. And now to us the Lord's day is
(1) our day of rest from earthly toil;
(2) the day of hallowed calm;
(3) of richest memory;
(4) of united worship;
(5) of mutual recognition of our common relationship to one God and Savior;
(6) of spiritual training;
(7) of holiest service for the Master;
(8) of noblest outlook (see Dr. R. W. Hamilton's 'Horae Sabbaticae').
V. WHAT IS OUR DUTY WITH REGARD TO OUR REST-DAY?
1. As men, let us regard it as an inestimable boon for the right use of which we are responsible to God. We are so made, as to our physical constitution, that we require one day's rest in seven. Then let us take the rest gratefully.
2. As citizens, we have a trust to guard for our fellow-countrymen. Legislation can never direct a man how to spend his rest-day, but it may do something to guard it for him. While we use the rest wisely, so that it makes us not only brisker animals, but holier men, let us also give others the rest.
3. As Christians, we have a sacred day for sanctuary worship, and for home and school instruction. We should do everything to show the young that the Sunday is a bright, light, cheery day, remembering that whatever helps best to health, rest, worship, and holiness is, and always has been, lawful on the Sabbath day.
4. As workers for God, the rest day is our glorious day of special service for Christ and for souls, in the very fatigue of which the spirit finds refreshment. Then surely we enter into the Master's spirit. Our meat is to do the will of him who hath sent us, and to finish his work.
Deu_5:16