The only reason to display the Ten Commandments is to promote a certain religion.  It is a statement which says that one religion is more worthy than another of being displayed.  It is wrong because it puts one religion above all others.  

by LynChi on Thu Dec 22, 2005 at 10:45:42 PM EST

"Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean," said Jesus. "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness." (Gospel According to Matthew 23:26-28)

For those of us who follow Jesus, our challenge is to look in the mirror and say, "How then shall I live?" That's a very different, humbling perspective because it's about cleaning up our own "inside," not just looking outward and telling everyone else how to behave.


by jhutson on Wed Dec 21, 2005 at 08:09:25 PM EST

For example, the national motto, "In God We Trust" says that the nation is to be divided up into two populations, a "we" identified by its trust in God and, by the process of elimination, a "they" who do not.

We get the same message from the Pledge, as it now stands. Clearly, the phrase "with liberty and justice for all" was meant to convey a message of approval for justice of liberty, and to convey disapproval for tyranny and injustice. The word "indivisibl" exists to convey a message of approval for Union and to foster disapproval of rebellion.

Following this pattern, clearly, "under God" is meant to favor those who believe in God, and to announce the same disapproval of those who deny God as we should have for rebellion, tyranny, and injustice.

The 10 Commandments start with, "Thou shalt have no god before me." Whereas the First Amendment states, "Thou shalt have whatever God thy pleaseth, so long as thou can live in peace with those who worship a different God, or have a different view of the same God."

I do think, however, that it is a mistake to focus on the fact that something is a religious symbol, if the real problem is the message contained within. We should be focusing on the message.

It is wrong to separate populations into groups of "we" and "they" based on religious beliefs.

It is wrong to put those who do not share a particular religious belief in the same category as rebels, tyrants, and the unjust, purely based on those beliefs.

It is wrong for the state to tell the people which God they should have.

Alonzo Fyfe

The Atheist Ethicist
by Alonzo Fyfe on Wed Dec 21, 2005 at 09:00:29 PM EST

Much like the like "Catholic" and "Protestant" symbols in Ireland since William of Orange attempted to assert English political control beyond the Pale and initiated the dynamics of modern Irish history, the basic differences are far less about theology than economics and culture.  

These symbols are cyphers, whose meaning is deeply dependent on the viewer and so provide a powerful rallying point wherein everyone can 'see' in them what it is they choose to.  Like fetuses, which are uncorrupted by actually being born into the world, they are beyond or above the reach of criticism and unassailable.  This is precisely the reason so much of the emotional energy of these movement is derived from the abortion issue.  

So, I'd personally have no real issue with a diplay of the symbols/artifacts of the great law givers: show me a tablet of Hammurabi's Code alongside it, and I have less trouble with Moses' tablets.  Of course, Roy Moore wants no such thing, and the activist law he'd create while handing down decisions would inject a lot of subjective values not found in either the legislation, or a 'strict constructionist' reading of the Ten Commandments - although his display is a marker to indicate to me and his movement precisely those values.  

What I really find most troubling is the sophistry that gets passed off as serious intellectual discourse in this country about these things - largely because this movement was a dying one when out there in a naked and honest straightforward presentation of itself.  They've had to resort to debates about the terms of the debate, instead of on the merits, and, as with the clear-cut ID decision in Dover, PA, squeal in surprise, again, not on the merits, but in an attempt to turn the values of the materialist methodology (objective reason) on which our country's governing philosophy was founded against itself.  This really is no different from what Islamic fundamentalists in Algeria, Egypt and now Iraq have attempted to do given any democratic freedom.  The cynicism of the corporate media in exploiting this as another source of supposedly empty noise is really playing with fire.  Some things you do not kid around about.  

by montpellier on Mon Dec 26, 2005 at 03:00:17 PM EST

The Ten Commandments have been part of a particularly telling political controversy in Alabama. Judge Roy Moore has installed a monolithic monument to the Ten Commandments in the central courthouse. Installing this monument was not so much an expression of the Judge's commitment to the Commandments, which most legal scholars identify as a foundational aspect of most legal codes, and which Judge Moore most likely, and reasonably relies on in his daily legal work, but rather a calculated political move. Judge Moore clearly intended to tap into a popular attitude, which has become a core quality of American political conservatism that of an American Christianity is supposedly besieged by an increasingly secularized or even "Godless" government. The problem here is not a statue, but the context in which the statue presents the Commandments. While it is true the Commandments have exerted influence upon our codified statutes, they are not, however, word for word, the law of the land. In other words, does this monument elevate the status of one religion over another? In this case, the answer is yes.

As we said earlier, the Ten Commandments are clearly part of our judicial heritage. If the display would have had been part of a presentation on the formation of our current legal system that would have been fine. Perhaps that presentation would include the Code of Hammurabi and the Magna Carta.  However, the line was crossed when the good judge had the Ten Commandments carved out in an exclusively Protestant interpretation. Furthermore, carved into its sides are references that are clearly admonishing a faith in the Deity than instead of merely making allusions. And since the test is whether one specific religious institution has been given more importance than others, the establishment clause has been violated. If the judge had wanted to avoid much of this criticism, all he had to do was just to use Roman numerals one through ten while toning down the carved references. Then, there would have been "wiggle room;" at least the language could be subject to each individual citizen's understanding.

When this particular monument was removed from the courthouse it did not deny any religious person his or her ability to practice his or her faith. That would have occurred if churches and temples were being shut down in order to interfere with a given religion's practice. Nor did anyone tell the protestors that they cannot prayer. But it is improper to take a governmentally funded courthouse and then transform it from a court of law into a de facto church. Citizens do not ordinarily go to a courthouse with the primary goal of holding a prayer service; instead they go there for the dispensation of secular law.

The Ten Commandments is not the statutory authority by which all of Alabama's citizens live by, instead, it is a contributing source of their laws. Judge Moore's actions show a clear intention that he believes this should be the law of the State of Alabama. And in doing so he chose to impose a singular moral consensus on the citizens of his state. To give this particular monument a special place in and of itself, is exclusionary to citizens who are B'hai, Buddhist, Catholic, Jewish or who have no faith at all.

by Frank Cocozzelli on Sat Jan 07, 2006 at 09:26:28 AM EST