6. The law of the ten commandments was honored by Jesus Christ as embodying the substance of the law of God enjoined upon man. With a master’s hand he grasped and brought out its two great principles, underlying all the precepts: Love supreme to God: love equal and unselfish toward fellow-men. “Thou shalt love the Lord with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself.” (Mat. 22: 36–40, and 19: 18, 19 and Mk. 12: 28–34).
7. It can scarcely be doubted that Jesus had his eye specially if not exclusively on this law (Mat. 5: 18) as one never to be repealed—from which not one jot or tittle should ever pass away.
To this great moral law of ten commandments we now give special attention and note—That its introduction (Ex. 20: 2), “I am the Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt—out of the house of bondage”—is special—not general and universal; is adapted to the circumstances of Israel, and gives a special reason why they should honor this law as coming from the God of their national covenant, the Redeemer and Savior of their nation. On the one handthis special reason why Israel should render supreme homage to Jehovah as their Deliverer from Egyptian bondage neither applies specifically to all mankind, nor does it imply that this law is not binding on other people than Israel. It was pertinent that as given originally to them it should be preceded and introduced by this special consideration, so pertinent to their case. Yet it should be thoughtfully considered—God might have said most truly to every child of his great human family—I am He who gave thee thy being and every good; and therefore I claim thy supreme love and homage.——I see no reason to question that this clause was put on the two tables of stone—its special introduction as given to the children of Israel.
I. In the first precept, the words “before me” are construed variously. The most usual and obvious translation of the Hebrew words is—before my face. In some connections the preposition might mean upon or above. “My face” is thought by some to be merely equivalent to myself. Keil translates—“literally beyond me, or in addition to me, equivalent to except me, or by the side of me.” He rejects the construction, “before me” (in my presence) as incorrect, and also condemns against me—in opposition to me. Fuerst has it “above i. e. except me.” Murphy says—“before me” is literally “upon my face.” It supposes those other gods to be set up before the true God as antagonists in the eye of God and as casting a shade over his eternal being and incommunicable glory in the eye of worshipers.——The two constructions—beyond me and above me—are open to the objection that they seem tacitly to admit other gods provided they are inferior and that God is supreme. I prefer as the more obvious and natural construction—before my face. Thus the precept forbids homage to any other god in the presence of the supreme and omniscient Jehovah; and by consequence, forbids divine honor to any other being or thing whatsoever. “Thou shalt have no other gods before my face” seems to imply that the least acknowledgment of other gods is in its very nature an insult to Jehovah, as if it thrust those gods into his very face—held them up before his eye as more worthy of homage than he. Moreover, as no possible worship of other gods can escape his eye, or be otherwise than thrust up before his face, the prohibitionnecessarily shuts off all such worship. You may never worship other gods than the One Supreme Being, for it is simply impossible that any such worship can elude his eye, and you must not put it before his face.
II. The second command prohibits the making and worshiping of images designed to represent idol gods—imaginary powers, supposed to have more or less control over human welfare. It equally prohibits images designed to represent the true God. All such sensuous conceptions of God are necessarily debasing. They rest on false views of God; tend to fearful and fatal degeneracy; and must therefore be forbidden under most stringent penalties. The whole history of our race witnesses to the infinite mischief wrought by such sensuous conceptions of God, as well as by the notion of subordinate powers, lower than the one supreme yet more than human. This has been one of Satan’s devices to rule God out of his universe and transfer to other objects the worship due to God alone.
This prohibition as it stands here is not enforced by specific penalties, but in a way far more impressive it bears us back to the very heart of God, revealing his holy jealousy of any rival to his throne who would wrest and steal away from him the supreme love and homage of his creatures, and give it to supposed gods that are no Gods at all. “For I am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.”——By the very law of the family relation, the great sins of the father send their curse down upon his children. He makes them heirs to an inheritance of shame and sorrow. He entails calamity upon his offspring. Godless and idolatrous himself, he makes his family also godless and idolatrous. The influence of his sin will naturally and almost inevitably blight the morals and the souls of his children after him, and of his children’s children. Let this fact throw its shield like a wall of fire around him and his family, so that, if not for his own sake, at least for the sake of his unborn offspring, he will most sacredly obey this command and abstain from the least infringement of it in spirit or in letter.
“Visiting iniquity” and “showing mercy” are set over against each other—the penal visitations of judgment for this sin warning men against it; and the greatpromises of mercy to the obedient alluring them to its most diligent observance. Judgment is God’s strange work, while mercy is his delight. Therefore we have here the forceful antithesis—the visiting of the iniquities of fathers upon children to the third and fourth generation, but the showing of mercy unto thousands of generations of them that love and obey. To a Hebrew mind this last clause of the second command would naturally suggest God’s mercies to Abraham, the well-known friend of God, upon whose posterity God was shedding forth his blessings to thousands of generations. So richly does the loving God reward his dutiful and trustful children! So much more grateful to his heart it is to bless even to the thousandth generation than to visit iniquity even so far as to the third and fourth!
It should be carefully noted that the visiting of the iniquities of fathers upon sons falls only upon those who hate him. If sons in any future generation turn from their sinning to the love of God, his merciful loving-kindness to them is sure. The curse visits only those who persist in the sin of their fathers despite of all the warning judgments that should admonish them to fear God. (See Ezek. 18).——This injunction against image-making and worship would naturally suggest to the men of Israel the idolatrous Egyptians. Their early fathers received from Noah the knowledge of the one only true God. But they did not love this knowledge, nor the God whom it revealed; therefore, not liking to retain these views of the pure and holy God, they chose to think of him as being like some of his works and began to worship such imaginary gods; or they put in his place some lower beings or powers as objects of worship. Hence the terrible judgments which the children of Israel had seen falling upon Egypt and her idols.
“Upon those that love me” is delightfully suggestive of the great truth that the essence of all acceptable worship is love. God looks complacently on his human children when they delight in his glory, love his character, rejoice in his blessedness, and make it the best joy of their souls to please him by doing all his will. Such love legitimately flows out in reverent worship and adoring homage. Over against this the worship of idols in place of God is congenial only to the souls that hate God. This command assumes that those who worshipother gods really hate the one Supreme Jehovah. Therefore it is that his jealousy burns against them. They withhold from him the love and the homage of their hearts.
III. In the third command the exegetical question is whether it refers primarily and properly to perjury,or to profanity, i. e. whether the Hebrew word for “in vain”[40] is precisely falsehood, or emptiness, a nothing, a thing of no worth. The current of critical opinion (Gesenius, Fuerst, etc.) goes for the former, falsehood; and makes the precept in its strict sense condemn perjury. Thou shalt not take up the name of Jehovah to a falsehood—shalt not use it to affirm the more solemnly what is false. Yet as what is false has no foundation in fact, and in point of truth is nothing—is only an emptiness—it comes to pass that this Hebrew word takes not infrequently this secondary sense; what is empty, vain. Hence some able critics [e. g. Keil] construe this precept to prohibit “all employment of the name of God for vain and unworthy objects so as to include not only false swearing, but trivial swearing in the ordinary intercourse of life and every use of the name of God in the service of untruth and lying—for imprecations, witchcraft, or conjuring.”——The construction of Keil, being the more broad and comprehensive, and withal being clearly within the established usage of the original word, is to be preferred. The doctrine of inspiration is—“Thy commandment is exceeding broad” (Ps. 119: 96).——The name of God is associated closely with the idea and thought of God. Hence all irreverent use of this name naturally begets irreverence of spirit toward God, and must be fearfully pernicious. Using God’s sacred name to affirm the more solemnly a falsehood is more than mere irreverence, and must incur his highest displeasure.