Morals & Ten Commandments

The Ten Commandments...

It has been a long time since my last 'Morals' post. But at last I think I am ready to say something about the Ten Commandments. More than that, now I think I have something really interesting to say! In this I am much indebted to John Bright's “A History of Israel”.

That the ten Commandments show similarities to treaties of the time is said so frequently that we forget to ask “why?”. It is in the answer to this question using some of the information Bright and others have supplied that I found the really interesting bit.

According to Bright we have examples of Hittite 'suzerainty' treaties. The Hittites built an empire with its capital in what is now central Turkey (I've been there and seen the ruins of it). They got going somewhere around 2,000 years B.C.. Reached their peak about the time of the Exodus when Hittite and Egyptian armies fought each other to a standstill, made a truce, signed a peace treaty and each king went home claiming to have won a great victory (this was political spin possible before iphones, internet, or even TV) Hittite influence waned and their capital was burned to the ground sometime around 1180 B.C..

Apparently the Hittite empire incorporated a lot of little kingdoms where the kings remained in charge, but had to swear allegiance to the Hittite king (and pay taxes). The agreements between these vassal kings and their Hittite overlord were 'suzerainty treaties' Of course other empires had such treaties, in particular we have evidence of Assyrian ones (The Assyrians had Nineveh as their capital city, took over much of the Hittite empire, and were themselves vanquished by the Babylonians – Nineveh fell in 612 B.C.)

The point of this little history digression is to pave the way for two important points: 1. Why the Ten Commandments being like any suzerainty treaty is important; and 2. Why echoing a Hittite rather than an Assyrian treaty is important.

1. The importance of treaty-like format.

OK, we all know the story of the Exodus: God sends Moses toe-to-toe with Egypt's Pharaoh to get the descendants of Israel (aka Jacob) released from slavery. God and Moses then lead this horde out into the desert to Mount Sinai. There God makes a covenant with them, and gives the Ten Commandments to Moses to give to the people. From then on we have this tribal league bound together mostly by having the shared experience of this covenant between them and God.

So when God puts the Commandments in a form that looks (to modern scholars at least!) like a Hittite suzerainty treaty, was that significant?

The Hittite treaty, after a recitation which I will talk about in the next section, laid down the obligations of the vassal king to the Hittite king. Chief among these was that the vassal was not to make any treaties with any other country – they had to be totally loyal to the Hittite empire. So when the Ten Commandments say “You shall have no other gods besides me...” That has a lot more punch as part of a “treaty” between God and this new nation. The peoples around them worshiped many gods, so to serve Yahweh exclusively was unparalleled – but to not make treaties with any king except your own overlord that was a familiar and very compelling concept.

Succeeding parts of a Hittite treaty included relations with other vassal states. One vassal was not allowed to make war on another vassal state. Also if there were disputes between vassal kings they had had to bring their complaint before the overlord, who would decide the case. Thus when the Ten Commandments move to dealing with relations between people this is exactly what a human overlord did in order to keep peace in his empire.

Taken together this makes a lot of sense of why God may have chosen to echo the form of treaties of the time. It also helps us understand the function of these Commandments. They were not a 'law code' they were the terms of the covenant entered into by God and the Israelite tribal league. But as such they did give the guiding principles which could be embodied in laws made to meet what would be ever-changing conditions. This is so much more useful than a law-code which would quickly become out-of-date!

2. The importance of  Hittite rather than Assyrian.

True, the time of the Exodus was also the time of the zenith of Hittite influence. But when you think about how God used the different personality and life-story of  prophets – say Amos and Hosea – to fit the different message he had them deliver, I can't help but think that had an Assyrian type fitted his purpose he would have arranged events to suite. So I am going to take it that the Hittite form served God's purposes.

Now the Hittite treaties stressed personal relationship and persuasion. The Assyrian form stressed compulsion.

So the Hittite treaties started which a recitation of the relationship history of the overlord and the vassal king, often in an “I … thou” form. It enumerated the good things the overlord had already done for the vassal which put him under an obligation to be loyal and obedient out of gratitude.

The Ten Commandments have “I am Yahweh your God who brought you out of the land of slavery ...”. The covenant is based on the fact that God has already done them a great good, to which they should respond out of gratitude. For us Christians there is an even greater covenant with God based on the incalculably great 'good' which God has done for us in Christ Jesus. Like Israel there is no 'good work' we could ever do which would put God in our debt! We are, like they were, always the unworthy recipients of God's bounty.

These elements of personal relationship and gratitude leading to voluntary obedience are so different to the Assyrian ideal of brute force and obedience out of terror that I think it is really significant that God used the former model rather than the latter! It gives a glimpse of his character – one which gives first and then hopes for voluntary loyalty in return, not one which obtains it by force.

Interesting eh?