Tag: Ten Commandments

Both Exodus 24:3-8 and Exodus 34:27 present Yahweh as making a covenant with the children of Israel based on “all of Yahweh’s words (Ex 24:4) and “based on these words” (Ex 34:27). Yet the words, or commandments, referred to in each of these passages, Ex 20:1-23:19 and Exodus 34:14-26 respectively, are not the same—despite the fact that the text claims that they are (Ex 34:1)! This contradiction is an extension ofRead More

The traditions relating the giving of the law present both Moses and Yahweh writing them down on stone tablets. If we follow the composite text as it now stands, here is how the occurrences progress. Exodus 24:4 states that “Moses wrote all of Yahweh’s words.” Presumably we are to understand this in its context, that is that Moses wrote down both the Ten Commandments of Exodus 20 and the laws ofRead More

Unknown to millions of so-called “readers” of the Bible, there are actually two different and quite unique accounts of the Ten Commandments. In fact, the only one that is specifically referred to in the text as “Yahweh’s 10 words” is the version least known! In the composite JEP text that we now have before us, these two once independent Ten Commandments traditions were brought together by a later editor to formRead More

The storyline at the end of Exodus chapter 19 is disconnected to what is immediately presented at the opening of chapter 20. 19:25And Moses went down to the people and he said to them. 20:1And God spoke all these words: “I am Yahweh your god… You shall have no other gods before me.” What continues from here to verse 18 is the Ten Commandments. Verses 1-17 are an insert. The TenRead More