BULL STREET – The art of the Con

The Ten Commandments--1300 BC

The bible tells us that Moses, while leading his people out from Egypt, started observing that his flock was getting a tad too frisky and were cavorting with idols. A consultation was held between Moses and someone else and the two had a long meeting regarding serious matters, Moses eventually returned to find that things had gotten even worse with the heathens now praying to a golden idol. It dawned on Moses that the group needed discipline and he determined, along with this unnamed associate, that regulations should be drawn up covering the group’s religious and social proclivities.

Moses assigned his partner to the task and in return was told that the regulations would be ready anon At the appointed time, right in the middle of a vicious lighting and hailstorm, the tablets appeared. Lo and behold, they were the Ten Commandments. It turns out that Moses’ friend was somehow on a first name basis with a guy in the neighborhood named God. To a large degree this fellah God, was a forgiving type of guy and was quoted as saying,  “On a long march, people sometimes tend to get testy and ought not to be punished too severely for their transgressions.” However, God certainly felt that there should be some rules made for these folks to follow.

While the Ten Commandments themselves are rather simplistic, the bible substantially elaborates upon them and when all is said and done, the Ten Commandments began to resemble Hammurabi’s philosophy of an “eye for an eye” as opposed to any unique redefinition of law. However, from what we can tell, these were the first set of laws attributed to a really higher being and many that were in the know, felt that Moses thought that this would give them more credibility. Moreover, the Ten Commandments were substantially massaged when the  bible was scripted and big time penalties were thrown in even for minor infractions of the rules. However, as opposed to the preceding laws given to us by Hammurabi and his antecedents, we are certain exactly how and who is going to be carrying them out, the bible leaves us somewhat at a loss as to what to do next regarding these maters:

1.  Exodus 22:20                   He that sacrifceth onto any god, save unto the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed.

2.  Leviticus 24:16               And he that blasphemed the name of the Lord, he shall surely be put to death.

3.  Exodus 31:15                   Whosoever doeth any work in the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.

4.  Exodus 21:15                   He that smiteth his father or mother, shall be surely put to death.

5.  Exodus 21:17                   He that curseth his father or his mother, shall surely be put to death.

6.  Exodus 22:19                   Whosoever lieth with a beast shall surely be put death.

7.  Leviticus 20:13               If a man lie with mankind as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death.

8.  Leviticuus 20:110          And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall be put to death.

9.  Mark 16:16                     He that believeth not, shall be damned.

10.Malachi. 2:1                    And now, O ye priests, this commandment is for you. If you will not hear, and if ye will not lay it to heart to glory to my name, …behold, I will corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your faces. [4]

While we are a long way from being biblical scholars, the Ten Commandments seem only to have teeth if you are devoutly afraid of God’s wrath. Most people living then and now, seem to be a great deal more fearful of civil authorities when it comes to worrying about which laws to think about breaking. As we can see, while the writers believed that they were covering the waterfront, these laws still did not concern themselves with crimes of forgery or plagiarism because this was still not of consequence in terms of sociological criteria.

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