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| Q: | Exodus, Deuteronomy Luther, in his Small Catechism, has grouped the Ten Commandments differently from the order given in Scripture. He has also omitted the Command that "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters below... Luther then divided the last Commandment concerning coveting into two Commandments. Why is this? | ||||||
| A: | The Bible says that there are ten commandments (or more precisely, according to the Hebrew, ten "words"), but it does not indicate which are the ten words. For this reason, three different traditions have arisen concerning the" ten words." The Lutheran Church simply retained the tradition of the Catholic church which treated the prohibition of idolatry as one commandment and divided the prohibition against coveting into two commandments to create ten commandments. One point against this tradition is that the statements prohibiting coveting are in different order in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5. I assume this is what you are referring to with your remark about Luther not following the order of Scripture. This remark is not quite correct since Luther's order follows the order of one of the accounts as far of the arrangement of the commandments. The Reformed divided the prohibition of idolatry into two parts, making the prohibition of images a separate commandment and treating the prohibition of coveting as one commandment. This tradition too has ancient precedent. The third tradition, which originated among the Jews, treats the motivational introduction in Exodus 20:2 as the first word and follows with nine commandments. This tradition has the advantage of not dividing either the first or last commandment into two parts. | ||||||
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