What are the Ten Commandments?

Where they come from

Three months after leaving Egypt, Israel camps at the foot of Mount Sinai. On the third morning come thunder, lightning, a thick cloud and a trumpet blast growing louder and louder. The mountain smokes like a furnace and shakes. Then God speaks, and the first words remind the people who is talking.

I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me.

The list, from Exodus 20

1. You shall have no other gods before me (20:3).
2. You shall not make an idol to bow down to (20:4–6).
3. You shall not misuse the name of Yahweh your God (20:7).
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy (20:8–11).
5. Honor your father and your mother (20:12).
6. You shall not murder (20:13).
7. You shall not commit adultery (20:14).
8. You shall not steal (20:15).
9. You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor (20:16).
10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house, wife or anything that is your neighbor’s (20:17).

The same ten appear again in Deuteronomy 5, in Moses’s farewell speech, with small differences in wording. The Sabbath there is tied to the memory of slavery in Egypt rather than to creation.

Why the numbering differs

The text itself doesn’t number them. Exodus 34:28 calls them “the ten commandments,” in Hebrew aseret ha-devarim, “the ten words.” So traditions divide the same verses in slightly different ways:

• Jewish tradition counts “I am Yahweh your God” as the first word, and joins no other gods and no idols as the second.
• Catholics and Lutherans join no other gods and no idols as the first, and split coveting into two: your neighbor’s wife, and your neighbor’s goods.
• Orthodox and most Protestant churches count no idols as its own second commandment, as in the list above.

The words are the same in every case. Only the counting changes.

The tablets and the golden calf

Moses stays on the mountain forty days. Below, the people lose patience, and Aaron casts a golden calf from their earrings. Moses comes down with two stone tablets, sees the dancing and shatters them at the foot of the mountain. Later he carves two new tablets and climbs again. When he comes down this time, the skin of his face shines. A Latin translation said “horned,” which is why Michelangelo’s Moses has horns.

Which mountain was it? Tradition points to Jebel Musa in Egypt’s southern Sinai, where Saint Catherine’s Monastery still stands. Other candidates include Jebel Serbal nearby, Har Karkom in Israel’s Negev and Jebel al-Lawz in Saudi Arabia.