Question: What do you mean by “Law”?

So he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights. He neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments. Exodus 34.28

In the Scriptures, particularly in the Old Testament, a wide range of words is used to refer to what we mean by “the Law of God.” These terms include commandments, instruction, word, statutes, rules, testimonies, precepts, and covenant. All these refer to the Word God revealed through Moses, and which became the cornerstone and “acorn” of all Scripture (more on this later this week).

In its most foundational, the term, “Law of God”, refers to the Ten Commandments, which were given twice to Moses on Mt. Sinai while the people of Israel waited at the base of the mountain below. Moses receive the first tablets Moses from God Himself, but he broke these in a fury upon returning to the camp to find the people had already begun to resort to idolatry (Ex. 32). The second set of tablets were prepared by Moses shortly thereafter, and he inscribed on them the Ten Commandments as first given in Exodus 20. A second proclamation of the Ten Commandments is given, with only minor variations, in Deuteronomy 5, following forty years of wandering in the wilderness and the need for a new generation of Israelites to receive the Law as their continuing mandate from the Lord. The inability of the generation that preceded them to fulfill the requirements of the Law did not negate the Law for those who were about to enter the land. Rather, the Ten Commandments were renewed for them, just as Jesus renewed them in His own instruction for those who were about to enter the Kingdom and promises of God through His work.

We do not know whether the Commandments were divided between the two tablets – four on one, six on the other – or a copy of all ten “words” (since each of the Commandments is a compound word) were inscribed on each of the two tablets, one to be kept for ordinary use and one for preservation in the ark of the covenant. Covenant theologians tend to think in terms of this second option, with one copy put into the ark for God’s keeping, and one copy for the use of the other Covenant partner, Israel. Such may have not been necessary, however, since Israel would have had two copies of the Commandments already, those written by Moses in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5.

The Ten Commandments are typically thought of in terms of 4 + 6, the first four instructing Israel in the essentials of loving God, the second six teaching them how to love their neighbors. This has some reason to it, although the entirety of the Commandments addresses the calling to love God and neighbors, since, as James explains, the Commandments are, as it were, a seamless garment (Jms. 2.10). Thus, we are not truly loving God unless we love our neighbors; and we cannot love our neighbors as we ought without loving God (Matt. 22.34-40).

The Ten Commandments are the “constitution” of Biblical Law. All the Commandments are included in both Testaments, although the fourth is not expressly stated in the New, perhaps because of the change in the Sabbath from the seventh day to the first, to mark the resurrection of Christ.

Jesus and the Apostles insisted that the Ten Commandments remain valid in perpetuity as expressions of the Kingdom purposes of God and the love we owe to Him and our neighbors (cf. Matt. 5.17-19; Rom. 3.31; 1 Jn. 2.1-6; 1 Jn. 5.1-3; etc.).

Thus we cannot speak properly about the Law of God without having in mind, at bottom, as the foundation, the Ten Commandments as given in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5. All discussion of the Law of God begins here and must be anchored here.

T. M. Moore

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