The hazards of being raised Lutheran

[mrissa]

I was reading karentraviss's Crossing the Line, and the last line of a chapter was, "'Get up, Commander,' he said. 'I'm fully prepared to break the Sixth Commandment.'" And I went, "WooHOOOOO!" And then: "Oh. That Sixth Commandment. Darn."

So the necessary background for those of you who don't have it: when people talk about the Ten Commandments, it's not like the Bible sits down and says, "Number One: X. Number Two: Y." The numbering is up to the monkeys. It's really the Approximately Ten Commandments. In some traditions, idolatry and worship get more attention, while in others, covetousness does. So for someone who was raised, say, Lutheran like me, the Sixth Commandment is, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." But for someone who was raised, say, Calvinist like markgritter, the Sixth Commandment is, "Thou shalt not murder." Which is, y'know, exciting and all that, but not nearly the plot twist that the other would have been.

Sigh.

Comments

[supergee.livejournal.com]

I thought all Protestants had the same 10 commandments, with the first one being just "I am the Lord thy God" and the 10th dealing with all sorts of coveting. (Jews have the same ones, but say "Thou shalt not murder" rather than "kill.") Catholics run the first two together and have a separate commandment for coveting thy neighbor's wife.

[zunger.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure the numbering was fixed in the 1.0; it's just some translators that played a bit faster and looser than usual.

But you're right, that would have made for a much better story. (And why is it reminding me of a George Carlin routine where he suggested doing a search-and-replace in old movie cliches, turning murder into sex? "Alright, Sherriff - now, we're going to fuck you!")

[brooksmoses]

Neither of those assertions about the Protestant versions of the commandments agrees with what I know of regarding them, in at least the Methodist church.

The New International Version, which has been pretty much the standard bible in the Methodist Sunday-school classes I've attended, uses "murder" rather than "kill". It doesn't actually number the commandments as such, but the copy I have sets them off in sections, and the typography makes it pretty clear that "I am the Lord thy God" is preamble, and "You shall have no other gods before me" is the first commandment. (Further, if one counts that as the first and goes down the list, it comes out to ten.) It also -- in the Exodus version, but not the Deuteronomy version -- puts coveting the neighbor's wife between his house and his manservant and maidservant in the list of things not to covet, which makes pulling it out as something separate seem a bit interesting.

The New English Bible with the Apocrypha has the same characteristics (aside from the helpful typography to imply the numbering, which leaves it unclear whether "I am the Lord thy God" is part of the "Thou shalt have no other gods" commandment or not).

The King James Version and the Revised Standard Version use "kill", and are approximately the same as the New English Bible on the order of the covets.

For that matter, the Tanakh (The New JPS Translation) and the Book of Mormon, in their versions of the commandments, do not seem to present anything that would seem to me to suggest a different numbering.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

The NIV has zip, which is not a virtue to be underestimated. But some of their translation choices bug me: "murder" for "kill" here, "servant" for "slave" in many many places, and "homosexual" for all kinds of not-so-clear words.

The ten-or-so commandments are also spread throughout Leviticus 19, along with the more concise Exodus and Deuteronomy versions.

[brooksmoses]

I'll agree with the other two translation gripes, but in the "murder" vs. "kill" case, I rather distictly remember seeing a reasonable argument that "kill" was somewhat a misrepresentation of the original intent, and "murder" was notably closer. So, at this point, I'm rather tempted to prefer "murder", but would leave a definitive opinion up to someone who can read it in the original language and connotations.

(And, right; I'd forgotten about the Leviticus versions.)

[supergee.livejournal.com]

I was close. This is what Wikipedia says:

Although the Ten Commandments in the Douay Rheims Bible and King James Version of the Bible are the most well-known in the English-speaking world, they do not conform to today's usage: "Thou shalt not kill" instead of "You shall not murder."

Different groups have divided the commandments in different ways. For instance, Catholics and Lutherans see the first six verses as part of the same command prohibiting the worship of pagan gods, while Protestants (except Lutherans) separate all six verses into two different commands (one being "no other gods" and the other being "no graven images"). The initial reference to Egyptian bondage is important enough to Jews that it forms a separate commandment. Catholics and Lutherans separate the two kinds of coveting (namely, of goods and of the flesh), while Protestants (but not Lutherans) and Jews group them together.

A very similar, but not completely identical, list of commandments is found in Deuteronomy 5:1-22. Reference to each of the commandments and the consequences for not following them as a part of Hebrew Law are found throughout this book. In the New Testament book of Matthew 19 and elsewhere, Jesus refers to the commandments, but condenses them into two general commands: love God and love other people.

So Lutherans and Catholics agree about 2 commandments on coveting, and I was out of date about only Jewish bibles saying "murder" instead of "kill."

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Doooo it. Do it!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Lutherans are certainly Protestant enough to count as Protestants.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Well, that's the translation quandary: the connotations aren't exactly clear to us anymore. The original word is used in a variety of other contexts in the Hebrew Bible to refer to people killing other people. (About the only context it *isn't* used in, though I haven't checked it myself, is warfare). So "murder" is plausible in the sense that it restricts the meaning to people (i.e., killing fatted calves is still okay) and further restricts the meaning to certain kinds of killing people. But "murder" strikes me as *overly* restrictive in meaning, if that makes sense.

I wouldn't have known about Leviticus except for the fact that it comes up in the lectionary for October, and I was reading commentaries yesterday. :)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

If it was Viking law, "murder" would even further restrict the kind of killing involved. You were allowed to walk up to someone and sink your axe into his or her head or torso, as long as you didn't do it by dark, in secret, from behind, refusing to pay his/her family for the death. A murder was a killing for which you refused to take proper responsibility.

The upshot of all this is that after all the Icelandic era reading I've done, my brain files "murder" as "unlawful death," which is not a particularly useful thing in this case -- it shakes out to "thou shalt not kill the people thou shouldst not kill." Sensible, sure, but not useful.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

But Viking rabbis arguing Talmudic weregeld debates would be cool.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Sigh...I'm not thinking about this.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

Not even about yarmulkes with little stereotypical Viking horns on them?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Too close to the Statue Of Moses problem, I'm afraid.