This week’s parasha begins with the story of Moses’
father-in-law Yitro’s visit to the Israelite Sinai encampment. Yitro sees Moses
standing all day long giving rulings in the interpersonal affairs of the
Israelites, and he gives Moses the sage advice to delegate! Afterwards, we have
the set-up for and then the giving of the Ten Commandments.
This year I’d like to focus on the Ten Commandments or
better said in Hebrew, “aseret ha-dibrot,” the ten utterances. Among these
statements are some revolutionary concepts as well as laws that are common to
most societies. The more common laws include the prohibitions against murder,
adultery and theft. Among the revolutionary concepts, we have the prohibition
of making graven images of God, and we have the idea of a 24-hour period of
cessation from work every week, on Shabbat.
What makes these utterances unique as well is that they are
not given in the form of case law – if you do this, you will be punished. Theft
and adultery and violating Shabbat are not merely seen as illegal and
disruptive to society. But to break these commandments would mean that one is
violating universal principles, determined by God. The statements are absolute.
Rather than proposing some questions for us to wrestle with
up front, I look forward to slowly working our way through these ten
statements, hearing your questions, and drawing on the Etz Hayyim commentary as
we try to address them.
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