First cut at notes on 10C-Ex. 20

1) We’ve worked on the Ten Commandments before, but I’m not sure if I am going to be too lazy to see what we’ve done before. Again, please get your hands on Patrick Miller’s Ten C for the Interpretation series. Also see the intriguing look at the decalogue by the great ethicist Paul Lehmann. when i was in seminary Harrelson’s book captured a number of folks and it has come out in a new format or edition.I really like Dennis Olson’s look at them in Dt. and the Death of Moses, especially as chapters following the 10C amplify the commandments. (Recall, in Hebrew, they are the 10 words. I think jerome coined the word commandments for them in the Vulgate).
2) first, let’s notice some differences in this batch and the form in Dt. 5.Sabbath and honoring one’s parents, to a lesser degree, come into play immediately.One could use this as a way to introduce repetition in teaching, or re-iteration. I tend to think we cannot usefully talk about them all in a sermon, so please consider picking one or two.
3) Sometimes I wonder how much of this imagines a legal proceeding. Notice oath taking and the command against false witness/perjury. If you are a Republican and mourning the folks running for President, you could pick these two and attack Clinton.
4) While I am on the subject once could use the image of the push to have the Ten C monuments gracing public areas and courthouses in our country.
5) One could also do some legal anthropology and see the not much is different in the second table, with the exception of coveting, but some significant differences seem to come into play with the first tablet.
6) One could also break loose a bit and then look at Moses going back up after the Golden Calf incident.
7) consider looking at how the Larger catechism handles the 10c, especially how it employs the third use of the law to turn them into positive as well as negative guidelines for living. Also the PCUSA Adult Study Catechism does very good work on them, and so cold be good material to open the mind and heart.
8) You may wish to look carefully at some words. for instance, the word, kill/murder seems to me in its use to be closer to homicide, intentional and negligent, in English usage. maybe you could feel brave and move into capital punishment, or abortion (not in the Miller treatise) or just war theory v. pacifist material. A professor at CTS, Indy, Wilma Bailey agrees with the anabaptist formulation that it indeed means kill.