The Ten Commandments

5 Moses convened all Israel and said to them:

“Hear, O Israel, the statutes and ordinances that I am addressing to you today; you shall learn them and observe them diligently. ² The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Horeb.^{(A) 3} Not with our ancestors did the Lord make this covenant but with us, who are all of us here alive today. ⁴ The Lord spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the fire.^{(B) 5} (At that time I was standing between the Lord and you to declare to you the word of the Lord, for you were afraid because of the fire and did not go up the mountain.) And he said:^(C)

⁶ “ ‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery;^{(D) 7} you shall have no other gods before^[a] me.

⁸ “ ‘You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above or that is on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. ⁹ You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents to the third and fourth generation of those who reject me^{(E) 10} but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation^[b] of those who love me and keep my commandments.^(F)

¹¹ “ ‘You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.

¹² “ ‘Observe the Sabbath day and keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. ¹³ Six days you shall labor and do all your work. ¹⁴ But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, or your son or your daughter, or your male or female slave, or your ox or your donkey, or any of your livestock, or the resident alien in your towns, so that your male and female slave may rest as well as you.^{(G) 15} Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.^(H)

¹⁶ “ ‘Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, so that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

¹⁷ “ ‘You shall not murder.^[c]

¹⁸ “ ‘Neither shall you commit adultery.

¹⁹ “ ‘Neither shall you steal.

²⁰ “ ‘Neither shall you bear false witness against your neighbor.

²¹ “ ‘Neither shall you covet your neighbor’s wife.

“ ‘Neither shall you desire your neighbor’s house, or field, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.’ ”^(I)

Moses the Mediator of God’s Will

²² “These words the Lord spoke with a loud voice to your whole assembly at the mountain, out of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, and he added no more. He wrote them on two stone tablets and gave them to me.^{(J) 23} When you heard the voice out of the darkness, while the mountain was burning with fire, you approached me, all the heads of your tribes and your elders, ²⁴ and you said, ‘Look, the Lord our God has shown us his glory and greatness, and we have heard his voice out of the fire. We have seen this day that God may speak to someone and the person may still live.^{(K) 25} But now why should we die? For this great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any longer, we shall die.^{(L) 26} For who is there of all flesh that has heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the fire, as we have, and lived?^{(M) 27} Go near, you yourself, and hear all that the Lord our God will say. Then tell us everything that the Lord our God tells you, and we will listen and do it.’

²⁸ “The Lord heard your words when you spoke to me, and the Lord said to me, ‘I have heard the words of this people, which they have spoken to you; they are right in all that they have spoken.^{(N) 29} If only they had such a mind as this, to fear me and to keep all my commandments always, so that it might go well with them and with their children forever!^{(O) 30} Go say to them, “Return to your tents.” ³¹ But you, stand here by me, and I will tell you all the commandments, the statutes and the ordinances, that you shall teach them, so that they may do them in the land that I am giving them to possess.’^{(P) 32} You must therefore be careful to do as the Lord your God has commanded you; you shall not turn to the right or to the left.^{(Q) 33} You must follow exactly the path that the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live and that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land that you are to possess.^(R)

⁷ Remember; do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God to wrath in the wilderness; you have been rebellious against the Lord from the day you came out of the land of Egypt until you came to this place.

⁸ “Even at Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, and the Lord was so angry with you that he was ready to destroy you.^{(A) 9} When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant that the Lord made with you, I remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water.^{(B) 10} And the Lord gave me the two stone tablets written with the finger of God; on them were all the words that the Lord had spoken to you at the mountain out of the fire on the day of the assembly.^{(C) 11} At the end of forty days and forty nights the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant. ¹² Then the Lord said to me, ‘Get up; go down quickly from here, for your people whom you have brought from Egypt have acted corruptly. They have been quick to turn from the way that I commanded them; they have cast an image for themselves.’^{(D) 13} Furthermore, the Lord said to me, ‘I have seen that this people is indeed a stubborn people.^{(E) 14} Let me alone that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven, and I will make of you a nation mightier and more numerous than they.’^(F)

¹⁵ “So I turned and went down from the mountain, while the mountain was ablaze; the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands.^{(G) 16} Then I saw that you had indeed sinned against the Lord your God, by casting for yourselves an image;^[a] you had been quick to turn from the way that the Lord had commanded you.^{(H) 17} So I took hold of the two tablets and flung them from my two hands, smashing them before your eyes. ¹⁸ Then I lay prostrate before the Lord as before, forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water because of all the sin you had committed, provoking the Lord by doing what was evil in his sight.^{(I) 19} For I was afraid that the anger that the Lord bore against you was so fierce that he would destroy you. But the Lord listened to me that time also.^{(J) 20} The Lord was so angry with Aaron that he was ready to destroy him, but I interceded also on behalf of Aaron at that same time. ²¹ Then I took the sinful thing you had made, the calf, and burned it with fire and crushed it, grinding it thoroughly, until it was reduced to dust, and I threw the dust into the stream that runs down the mountain.^(K)

²² “At Taberah also, and at Massah, and at Kibroth-hattaavah, you provoked the Lord to wrath.^{(L) 23} And when the Lord sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, ‘Go up and occupy the land that I have given you,’ you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God, neither trusting him nor obeying him. ²⁴ You have been rebellious against the Lord as long as he has^[b] known you.^(M)

²⁵ “Throughout the forty days and forty nights that I lay prostrate before the Lord when the Lord intended to destroy you,^{(N) 26} I prayed to the Lord and said, ‘Lord God, do not destroy your people, your very own possession, whom you redeemed in your greatness, whom you brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.^{(O) 27} Remember your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; pay no attention to the stubbornness of this people, their wickedness and their sin, ²⁸ lest the land from which you have brought us say, “Because the Lord was not able to bring them into the land that he promised them and because he hated them, he has brought them out to let them die in the wilderness.” ²⁹ For they are your people, your very own possession, whom you brought out by your great power and by your outstretched arm.’^(P)

The Second Pair of Tablets

10 “At that time the Lord said to me, ‘Carve out two tablets of stone like the former ones, and come up to me on the mountain, and make an ark of wood.^{(Q) 2} I will write on the tablets the words that were on the former tablets, which you smashed, and you shall put them in the ark.’^{(R) 3} So I made an ark of acacia wood, cut two tablets of stone like the former ones, and went up the mountain with the two tablets in my hand.^{(S) 4} Then he wrote on the tablets the same words as before, the ten commandments^[c] that the Lord had spoken to you on the mountain out of the fire on the day of the assembly, and the Lord gave them to me.^{(T) 5} So I turned and came down from the mountain and put the tablets in the ark that I had made, and there they are, as the Lord commanded me.”^(U)