What Good Are The Ten Commandments?

Many of those who insist that the government is justified in publicly posting, supporting, and endorsing the Ten Commandments argue that in doing so, the government will also be supporting and endorsing basic principles of good morality and behavior. This, of course, is entirely within the authority of the government - and who could be against promoting public morality?

The problem is, it isn't at all clear that the Ten Commandments actually do encourage public morality. Consider, for example, how the Bible itself depicts matters:

You know, that didn't even work when Yahweh God was supposedly paying attention. Two cities destroyed, lands laid waste by wrath from above, Israelites winning battles they had no business engaging in, the forceful assimilation of young virgins, the post-mortem mutilation of their indigenous peoples...er, you know, all the Old Testament stuff, and still there was immorality, obsession with sex, glamorizing violence, exploitation of the elderly, child pornographers, cheaters, murderers, perversion, injustice, fear and hopelessness. Wasn't King David a master at all those? It's in the Book, if you'd just READ IT.

It is legitimate to argue that when someone wants to create a more biblical society they won't really achieve their stated goals because the biblical society portrayed in the Bible is no better, and is perhaps a good deal worse, than what we have now.

Read More:

• Separation of Church and State 101
• Ten Commandments